All you loons | Gavia Libraria

"The swans (perhaps even the Swans), they’ll get their shiny awards and their keynotes and their recognition. The Loon doesn’t grudge it; they deserve it. This post isn’t for them, though. This post, in which the Loon dips her razor-beak in awed recognition of what was accomplished today, is for you. You know who you are, all you loons. You who took hopeless Coordinator Syndrome institutional-repository and scholarly-communications jobs because you believed open access mattered. You who tried to move unmovable committees, to convince intransigent scoffers. You who ate dirt from skeptical colleagues, dismissive bosses, clueless faculty, publisher quislings, and hypocrites of every stripe. You who were brought to your knees by friendly fire. You who did all you could with the nothing you had to work with. You who walked the scary dark paths of setting-an-example, rather than the easy well-lit boulevards of lip-service-at-most. You who built coalitions of the distinctly unwilling. You who seized on the least, most tenuous whisper of opportunity. You who debunked the same idiotic myths and baldfaced lies the first time, the tenth time, the hundredth, the thousandth. You who blogged. You who spoke. You who wrote. You who coded. You who risked respect, publications, opportunities, jobs, careers, tenure. You who risked and lost. You who were infallibly polite. You who weren’t, so that others could be. All you loons. The swans may swan about, but this is yours too, and no swan can take it from you. The Loon recognizes and applauds your fidelity, your toil, and your sacrifice."