The Age of Bureaucracy

By Mark on Friday 23 May 2003 at 12:11

We're currently working on a site for a large institution (which shall remain nameless). The project was supposed to launch in January, but our sole contact at the organisation (who is also the institution's project leader) went on holiday for two weeks just before the deadline, so we couldn't get hold of any of the content.

Then we waited, as the contact informed us that they were getting a photographer in to take some new photos for the site within the next couple of weeks. Four months later: no photos. Then our contact went on holiday again.

And now, the truly incredible part.

One of the features of the site requires a map, which was to be provided by a department of the institution. The first hitch; that department was unwilling to give us a map because of copyright issues (even though they produced the maps themselves and are part of the same organisation).

Does this make sense to anyone else? It's like me stopping myself from using my own designs to promote myself, because I own the copyright…

Finally we convinced the department to release the maps, but only on the condition that our contact paid for them (remember, this is two parts of the same organisation).

We phoned our contact last week to ask them to pay for the maps, so we could finish the site, and guess where they were?

On holiday. Again.

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