This was initially sent via our mailing list distribution and is being reposted here.

Hello, I hope you are well.

In Tatti (Southern Tuscany) the sun is shining and a lot of music is spinning around. We just published the daily Lithobag, and [CUUUUT…TOO MUCH INFORMATION].

Some of you may have seen updates via social media, but I like the idea of a weekly summary for our project, at least in these first stages.

The project is receiving international attention, for example by the Science+Technology+Arts inititiative by the European Union.

Concerning the household collections: several sample photos are arriving, mostly from outside Tatti, and out of Tuscany. In addition, other families from Tatti who didn’t know about the project at first have expressed their interest to join.
To avoid overloading the system, we have adopted some basic queue management strategies, but if you sent a sample photo over the past two weeks please be assured that it will be examined.
In parallel, we had other classifiers raising their hand to help. Some from Cagliari, Sardinia, some from Sterzing/Vipiteno, South Tyrol. These are people that we have never met in person, so we are seeing a familiar pattern.

Interaction #1 ‘This story is really cool, I’m in!’. Interaction #2. …takes a bit of time to be triggered and actually operate in the project.

On one hand this is easily motivated by everybody’s daily business and worries. On the other hand, there may be second thoughts (These guys are out of their mind!). With the pibinko.org we have been living in projects like this since 2006, so we are comforted by the fact that it could be no different, and we “keep on keeping on”…

In the meantime, Cristian from Torino, one of the classifiers since day 1, has conducted his review of over 90% of the current samples (some 200 items), and others will follow.
The developments in the entertainerment team have been very good. Last Thursday we published a geojazz tune featuring Liliana Cafiero: Tatti and its stones.
We are working on a third song, and we have received the first response to the Metalliferous Hills Jug Band call for an English mother-tongue vocalist. This came from South Africa, and we are now brainstorming in the team to see how we may collaborate.

Last, but not least, we remind you that it is possible to support the Participatory Lithology project in various ways, as explained in the page for prospective sponsors.

Best regards, and stay safe!

A.

P.S. Mauro the T-Rex is on the loose.

versione 31.3.2020

To understand what Participatory Lithology is, and how we are proposing it, we encourage you to read the summary of the project’s first week (March 21-27, 2020).

In the project we have considered four roles: collectors, classifiers, entertainers, and sponsors.

To consider the effort involved in the project, you may review what the different roles are expected to do (follow the links above), and how we communicate it, in Italian and English. On the pibinko.org site we have post with the PELP tag, and on jugbandcm.it we have the daily Lithobag posts, by the Metalliferous Hills Jug Band and other entertainers. All the posts appearing in these sites are then circulated to a wide list of direct contacts (several thousands of people), in addition to being re-posted to social media and thematic mailing lists.

Let us now see what sponsors can do, with different levels of commitment.

What we figure is that the collectors will have a direct return from the project, since the classifiers are helping them to make sense of their collections, so they are ok. On the other hand, classifiers and entertainers are in fact providing a service: so it would be great to give them some real recognition, be it in goods, services, or remuneration (if this cannot be replaced by products or services they may need). Enter the sponsors, with four possible levels briefly presented below. To get more practical details on how to support the project, please write to micalosapevo@pibinko.org

Level 0. Moral Support

The more, the better, but this is never enough to make the project work on its own. Proceed to the next level.

Level 1. Communication

From word of mouth, to interviews, reports and other forms of storytelling, anything goes. With “palla 21” in Chicago, in 2007, we were also covered by Comcast Sports News, and in the following years most projects by the pibinko.org network have received frequent media coverage. For some reason, this is never enough to explain what we are doing…possibly because it sounds strange that our team, generally working out of a bar in a rural area, can manage what we manage. Alas.

Level 2a. Products

We have consolidated relations with several small producers in Southern Tuscany. If you would like to join this list, please write to micalosapevo@pibinko.org.

Participatory Lithology was launched from Southern Tuscany, so -even though we work to engage other territories- we like the idea of sending to the classifiers and the entertainers who will turn out to be more in tune with our project some enticing products from our home region.

Level 2b. Services

At present we have received support by professional photographers, graphic designers, and video editors. Eventually, we may appreciate help from other hands and heads.

Also, sooner or later we will be sending some “rewards” to the most “participatory participants”. At that point we will need support by transporters (or, worst case scenario, to cover shipping costs we will need money, which brings us to Level 3).

Level 3. Monetary support

In addition to covering shipping costs for typical products for the coolest classifiers and entertainers, we can make use of monetary support for two purposes: (1) to compensate part of the time required to run the project, and (2) to create a reserve for initiatives to further promote the results of the project once this is completed. At present we are considering a first phase reaching the end of April/beginning of May, and the possibility of continuing with a “phase 2” if conditions allow.

Expected return for the sponsors

Sponsors will receive visibility through all communication activities related to the project. Please write to micalosapevo@pibinko.org for more information.

Who is the character in the header image for this article?T

This is Mauro il Tirannosauro, i.e. Mauro, the T-Rex. He has a cover role as the mascot for Participatory Lithology. In fact, Mauro is the mastermind behind the whole story. You may check what Mauro has been up to following his tag on the pibinko.org blog: http://www.pibinko.org/tag/maurotrex-en/

[TO BE TRANSLATED. PLEASE WRITE TO MICALOSAPEVO@PIBINKO.ORG IN THE MEANTIME].

We might not be starting a weekly reporting of this initiative, but we want to make sure we can remember the first seven days.

We had the possibility of experiencing a series of events which proved to be interesting, curious, and at times genuinely entertaining. All this in the midst of an extremely severe situation, which we do not ignore. On one side, we could say we are “Between a rock and a hard place“, but the feeling we had starting participatory lithology was like being “Between a rock and a hard phase” [1].

As an opening act…a new title track, performed by Matti delle Giuncaie’s Francesco Ceri, with lyrics by the Metalliferous Hills Jug Band (a translation of the lyrics is provided here):

With this, we might say we e more or less explained all about our project, but please read on…

Project presentations

We were invited to give presentations of the project by two radio shows. One was on March 24 for Caterpillar, RAI Radio 2. This is one of the main radio shows in Italy and we were proud of having this as our first public sortie. The second one was for Radio Popolare Milano, which has more of a local FM coverage (some 100 km around Milan, plus web streaming). Since 2007 they have covered many of the projects we launched, and allowed a lot of air time to detail what we are doing and give more context and interconnections with our other projects. Based on feedback we received from several people, this interview was a sort of “eye opener” on a lot of aspects of the pibinko.org network’s operations.

Finally, Il Tirreno, one of the two main newspapers in Tuscany, published on March 27 a very long article about “Stone Collectors meeting on the Web“.

If you don’t speak Italian, you may still check the links above since they include additional links to English versions of various topics presented.

If you like to follow the project step by step, you can look for the PELP tag on pibinko.org (PELP stand for Piccolo Esercizio di Litologia Partecipativa ….our little participatory lithology exercise). Click here: http://www.pibinko.org/tag/pelp-en/

Some facts about the project…but please remember that this is not a competition (while not being a game)

Collectors: 4 as of March 21. 6 as of March 27. Overall we have received photos of 182 samples from Tatti (our home base), Vallerotana, close to Grosseto, Southern Tuscany, and Florence.

Classifiers: four as of March 21, seven as of March 27. Active classifiers four (from Turin, Rome, Busto Arsizio, Pavia)…with 57 comments [4].

Entertainers: Eight in the creation of the “lithoplaylist” (songs mentioning rocks, minerals, or stones). Two on performances (plus one in the process of finalizing a third song)….stay -literally- tuned for updates

Sponsor: As of March 21, two. Three as of March 27.

What next?

In our second week we will continue along all four lines of activity (1) looking for more “forgotten rock collections”, (2) identifying samples thanks to our chartered classifiers, (3) proposing “lithomusic” à go go, and (4) the research of more sponsors to improve the rewards for the most active participants, and to cover at least part of our operational efforts on the project.

To have a part in this project or for information on how to support it, please write to micalosapevo@pibinko.org or contact + 393317539228 (if you don’t get an answer this may be because mobile coverage in Tatti is a bit shaky…so please send an SMS or a Whatsapp message).

Acknowledgements

We got to this point as a result of brainstorming and coordination of energies with (in alphabetical order by first name): Alberico Mattei, Amos Unfer, Carolina Cortesi, Cristian Carlone, Francesco Ceri, Guido Bendinelli, Jack O’Malley, Liliana Cafiero, Loriano Bartoli, Martina Busonero, Mauro Tirannosauro, Valeria Trumpy, Wolfgang Scheibe, and other folks you will learn about as their activities unfold.

Note

• [1] Italians don’t say literally “Between a rock and a hard place”…an equivalent expression is “Tra l’incudine e il martello” (i.e. between an anvil and a hammer)…but a lot of people know the Stones so we are using “Between a rock and a hard phase” also in our Italian articles.

Header image: Tatti and the land to the South (Mount Argentation is at the centre of the horizon).