Dear Friends of the Audio Recovery Project,
We want to let you know of a very important and auspicious event that will be taking place at the Great Stupa of Dharmakaya on Sunday, July 20, 2008. You are invited to attend. Please read on.
We are approaching the final few months of ARP. It is somewhat stunning that we have been able to pull this off! At the beginning, the Archives staff all wondered whether we would actually be able to complete the digitization of all of the Vidyadhara’s teachings, let alone provide libraries to so many centers, within the time span we set for ourselves: three years. Well, it took four years, but we’re almost to the finish line!
First of all, in order to begin, we had to raise a quarter of a million dollars, which sounded like an enormous sum for our little institution. You made it possible for us to proceed by committing your financial resources and support.
Having received your support, we had to go forward. So we did. The exceptional staff (Gordon Kidd, Chris Levy, Sandra Kipis and Carolyn Gimian supporting them) did exceptional things. They will have managed to massage 50,000 CDs out of our equipment, and they will have shipped most of those to your centers by September 1, 2008.
Now it’s time to celebrate!!! On July 20, 2008, there will be a final empowerment of the Great Stupa of Dharmakaya. This Speech Empowerment will entail the installation of 3000 gold cd's of the Vidyadhara's teachings into the body of the Stupa. Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche will preside and give an address. The installation of the CDs is the culmination of the Audio Recovery Project as well as the final empowerment of the Stupa. Gordon, Sandra, Chris and Carolyn will all attend the ceremonies at the Stupa. We hope to see you there.
The Stupa received the empowerment of Body when we placed the Vidyadhara's skull relic into the heart center of the Buddha on the main floor in 2000. Mind is what the stupa is, the architectural representation of awakened mind, and the formal empowerment of mind happened during the Consecration in 2001. Now, we are completing the three empowerments of body, speech and mind.
The ceremony will include a lhasang, a blessing puja, and a procession to carry the boxes of CDs up to the Stupa. A representative from your center is invited to attend this event and carry a box of the gold CDs in the procession. It could be someone attending Seminary or the Dzogchen Retreat at SMC, or perhaps someone from your center would like to come especially for this event.
The activities of the day also include Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche’s “Run for Peace", which will start and finish in the morning at the Stupa with awards following. After lunch, everyone will gather in the tent downtown for SMC’s annual fundraising presentation, followed by the procession up to the Stupa for the Speech Empowerment. Dinner that night will be a celebratory barbeque with live music and dancing.
As this event is happening during a very busy time, the land and facilities at SMC are quite full. We are sorry that, except under exceptional circumstances, we cannot invite you to spend the night at SMC. But of course you are most warmly invited to come up and participate in and enjoy all of the events of this wonderful day. If you would like to spend the night in the neighborhood, we can send you information on nearby accommodations.
It would help SMC tremendously to get a sense of how many people will be coming up from our local community so that we can plan accordingly. We would appreciate it if you would let us know if someone from your center will be able to attend. Please contact Sandra Kipis if you have questions and/or if someone from your center will be attending theevent. Her e-mail is archives@shambhala.org. SMC has a website to register, which will be a great help to them. To register go to: http://www.shambhalamountain.org/register.php?id=945 or phone 1-888- STUPA21
We hope to see you this summer. Thanks so much for your support,
Carolyn Gimian for all the Archives Staff
cgimian@suchns.com
Director Emeritus
Shambhala Archives
June 12, 2008
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
A Poem of Appreciation
This Doha/Spontaneous Poem was written by Linda Lewis after viewing one of the DVDS from the Tibetan Buddhist Path remastered videos, using the technology of the Audio Recovery Project to enhance the sound:
Video Vidyadhara
Velvet eyes,
Blissful, boyish smile pushing up chubby cheeks
Punctured by dimples and a giggle,
You were and are my magnetizing nirmanakaya guru.
Eloquent gentleman's tiblish dharma
Transmitted with right hand of upaya's vajra mudras
Speaking to a hoodlum '70's crowd,
You were and are the buddha for our time.
Sipping amrita out of a hippie goblet,
You presented the maha-dharma of no false hopes,
no nirvana,
no spiritual materialism,
no white nor black magic--
nothing but his awakened heart.
You were and are my stunning sambhogakaya guru.
Anyone who listened, recognized, and practiced what you taught
Received the vajra mind transmission--
Empowering awareness pure and simple.
To you, the timeless dharmakaya guru, I supplicate.
With enormous thanks to Carolyn Gimian, Gordon Kidd,
and the Archives crew, I , jinpaipema wrote this doha to
the only father guru in this year of the Fire Pig. May the
the teachings increase! May all be auspicious!
Video Vidyadhara
Velvet eyes,
Blissful, boyish smile pushing up chubby cheeks
Punctured by dimples and a giggle,
You were and are my magnetizing nirmanakaya guru.
Eloquent gentleman's tiblish dharma
Transmitted with right hand of upaya's vajra mudras
Speaking to a hoodlum '70's crowd,
You were and are the buddha for our time.
Sipping amrita out of a hippie goblet,
You presented the maha-dharma of no false hopes,
no nirvana,
no spiritual materialism,
no white nor black magic--
nothing but his awakened heart.
You were and are my stunning sambhogakaya guru.
Anyone who listened, recognized, and practiced what you taught
Received the vajra mind transmission--
Empowering awareness pure and simple.
To you, the timeless dharmakaya guru, I supplicate.
With enormous thanks to Carolyn Gimian, Gordon Kidd,
and the Archives crew, I , jinpaipema wrote this doha to
the only father guru in this year of the Fire Pig. May the
the teachings increase! May all be auspicious!
Monday, August 27, 2007
August 27 Newsletter
August 27, 2007
Dear Audio Recovery Project Subscribers and Supporters,
The Audio Recovery Project is entering its final year. We had hoped to complete the project by April 4th 2008, but we expect now to continue on into the summer of 2008. We have more than 2,500 recordings—many more than we anticipated. We will be sending our subscribers 1,500 CDs, but we still have to complete the digitization of all of the material. Some of the “overflow” will be packaged for sale; some will remain largely archival material. However, we want and need to finish it all.
Audio Recovery Blog
Many of you asked for a place online where you could review the information about Audio Recovery that we have sent out previously. I’m happy to report that there is now an Audio Recovery Project blog that contains the text of all the newsletters previously sent out. This one is also posted there. The address of the blog is:
http://audiorecoveryproject.blogspot.com/
Go there for information in past newsletters on purchasing ARP cabinets, recommendations for storage, a list of participating organizations, and updates on our progress to digitize the Vidyadhara’s teachings.
Audio Recovery Staff Consult with Canadian Conservation Institute
In June Gordon Kidd, Director of Kalapa Recordings, and Chris Levy, Audio Recovery Technician, were invited by the Canadian Conservation Institute to attend a one day workshop on digital media preservation strategies in Ottawa, all expenses paid. The work of the Shambhala Archives in this area was identified by CCI as a model project in Canada! Chris’s report on the visit follows:
The Shambhala Archives joined two other national institutions in a one day workshop to discuss the strategies employed by each and how they might be of benefit to other smaller organizations. CCI and others were quite impressed with our strategies and methods, and how they show that it is possible to undertake such a large project with a modest budget.
As well, last May Chris was invited to conduct an information session at the Nova Scotia Council of Archives in Halifax. He was able to share information with organizations from all around the Maritimes about the Audio Recovery Project. Many other institutions are interested in our low-cost but high-quality approach to digitization.
Summer Audio Recovery News:
Summer Intern
For the second year in a row, the Shambhala Archives received a grant from Young Canada Works that allowed us to have a young person helping with Audio Recovery over the summer. Our intern this year, Cobee McNaughton, is a student at the Nova Scotia Community College. He worked closely with Chris and Sandra Kipis and did a great deal of CD duplication over the course of the summer.
Audio Recovery at the Stupa
Chris Levy attended the Vajrayana Seminary at Shambhala Mountain Center this summer, where he was also in charge of sound recording for events during Seminary. Auspiciously, this summer Bob King and other staff of the Great Stupa of Dharmakaya are working on finishing the archival storage space within the Stupa for a complete set of the digitized audio recordings of the Vidyadhara, Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche. Every center participating in Audio Recovery has been contributing a small portion of the money to underwrite a set of special gold CDs of all 2,500 recordings that are being digitized for the Stupa. This will be a set of recordings that we will keep as preservation copies and a gift to the future. Chris consulted with Bob King and others while at SMC. In another auspicious twist, former Archives Director John Perkins was working on the Stupa for a few weeks and also consulted on the long term control of humidity in the archival storage area. John is a world expert in this field, having working on projects as far flung as the Buddhist caves on the Silk Route in China.
Next summer, we hope to have a ceremony at SMC to install the CDs as wonderful “speech relics” of the Vidyadhara in the storage space. All of you will be invited to attend.
ARP in Our Centers
In New York, Tina Meyerhoff and Ellen Green are doing further organization and cataloging of the ARP CDs they receive. If you are interested in the work they’re doing, contact Tina at: oxherding@gmail.com.
In Toronto, Harald Dienes is using the ARP CDs as the basis for seminars for members of the Shambhala Center. Harald can be reached at: haraldd@rogers.com
In Halifax, the cabinets containing ARP CD’s were placed in the main shrine room on the Parinirvana of the Vidyadhara, April 4. They sit next to the visiting teachers’ throne.
If you have news of ARP in your center, please share it with us.
General Update:
We continue to push ahead with the digitization and duplication of the Audio Recovery CD’s. In July shipment six was sent to you, and we expect the next shipment to go out by the end of September. If you have questions about a shipment or want more information about the recordings, including database entries, please contact Chris Levy: clevy@shambhala.org or Sandra Kipis: archives@shambhala.org
Recently, statements were sent to all centers, to encourage you to stay up-to-date with your payments, including payments for shipping. The Archives is a very small organization that has little or no ability to absorb a deficit for this project. If you think about the value that you are receiving, the investment of $9,000 per center in this project is very modest. Please make your commitment to ARP a priority.
We are preparing to send the first Vajrayana recordings to you within a few months. In order to do so, we need your signed letter returned to us, agreeing to the restrictions placed on the use of these recordings. If you have misplaced your e-mail from Sandra about this, contact her at : archives@shambhala.org
Finally, please join with me in wishing Chris Levy all good things in his marriage to Brenda Campbell on Aug 11. The ceremony was auspicious and well received by all. Congratulations Chris.
To all or you: thank you for your continued support of this project.
Best wishes,
Carolyn Gimian and the ARP Staff
cgimian@suchns.com
Dear Audio Recovery Project Subscribers and Supporters,
The Audio Recovery Project is entering its final year. We had hoped to complete the project by April 4th 2008, but we expect now to continue on into the summer of 2008. We have more than 2,500 recordings—many more than we anticipated. We will be sending our subscribers 1,500 CDs, but we still have to complete the digitization of all of the material. Some of the “overflow” will be packaged for sale; some will remain largely archival material. However, we want and need to finish it all.
Audio Recovery Blog
Many of you asked for a place online where you could review the information about Audio Recovery that we have sent out previously. I’m happy to report that there is now an Audio Recovery Project blog that contains the text of all the newsletters previously sent out. This one is also posted there. The address of the blog is:
http://audiorecoveryproject.blogspot.com/
Go there for information in past newsletters on purchasing ARP cabinets, recommendations for storage, a list of participating organizations, and updates on our progress to digitize the Vidyadhara’s teachings.
Audio Recovery Staff Consult with Canadian Conservation Institute
In June Gordon Kidd, Director of Kalapa Recordings, and Chris Levy, Audio Recovery Technician, were invited by the Canadian Conservation Institute to attend a one day workshop on digital media preservation strategies in Ottawa, all expenses paid. The work of the Shambhala Archives in this area was identified by CCI as a model project in Canada! Chris’s report on the visit follows:
The Shambhala Archives joined two other national institutions in a one day workshop to discuss the strategies employed by each and how they might be of benefit to other smaller organizations. CCI and others were quite impressed with our strategies and methods, and how they show that it is possible to undertake such a large project with a modest budget.
As well, last May Chris was invited to conduct an information session at the Nova Scotia Council of Archives in Halifax. He was able to share information with organizations from all around the Maritimes about the Audio Recovery Project. Many other institutions are interested in our low-cost but high-quality approach to digitization.
Summer Audio Recovery News:
Summer Intern
For the second year in a row, the Shambhala Archives received a grant from Young Canada Works that allowed us to have a young person helping with Audio Recovery over the summer. Our intern this year, Cobee McNaughton, is a student at the Nova Scotia Community College. He worked closely with Chris and Sandra Kipis and did a great deal of CD duplication over the course of the summer.
Audio Recovery at the Stupa
Chris Levy attended the Vajrayana Seminary at Shambhala Mountain Center this summer, where he was also in charge of sound recording for events during Seminary. Auspiciously, this summer Bob King and other staff of the Great Stupa of Dharmakaya are working on finishing the archival storage space within the Stupa for a complete set of the digitized audio recordings of the Vidyadhara, Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche. Every center participating in Audio Recovery has been contributing a small portion of the money to underwrite a set of special gold CDs of all 2,500 recordings that are being digitized for the Stupa. This will be a set of recordings that we will keep as preservation copies and a gift to the future. Chris consulted with Bob King and others while at SMC. In another auspicious twist, former Archives Director John Perkins was working on the Stupa for a few weeks and also consulted on the long term control of humidity in the archival storage area. John is a world expert in this field, having working on projects as far flung as the Buddhist caves on the Silk Route in China.
Next summer, we hope to have a ceremony at SMC to install the CDs as wonderful “speech relics” of the Vidyadhara in the storage space. All of you will be invited to attend.
ARP in Our Centers
In New York, Tina Meyerhoff and Ellen Green are doing further organization and cataloging of the ARP CDs they receive. If you are interested in the work they’re doing, contact Tina at: oxherding@gmail.com.
In Toronto, Harald Dienes is using the ARP CDs as the basis for seminars for members of the Shambhala Center. Harald can be reached at: haraldd@rogers.com
In Halifax, the cabinets containing ARP CD’s were placed in the main shrine room on the Parinirvana of the Vidyadhara, April 4. They sit next to the visiting teachers’ throne.
If you have news of ARP in your center, please share it with us.
General Update:
We continue to push ahead with the digitization and duplication of the Audio Recovery CD’s. In July shipment six was sent to you, and we expect the next shipment to go out by the end of September. If you have questions about a shipment or want more information about the recordings, including database entries, please contact Chris Levy: clevy@shambhala.org or Sandra Kipis: archives@shambhala.org
Recently, statements were sent to all centers, to encourage you to stay up-to-date with your payments, including payments for shipping. The Archives is a very small organization that has little or no ability to absorb a deficit for this project. If you think about the value that you are receiving, the investment of $9,000 per center in this project is very modest. Please make your commitment to ARP a priority.
We are preparing to send the first Vajrayana recordings to you within a few months. In order to do so, we need your signed letter returned to us, agreeing to the restrictions placed on the use of these recordings. If you have misplaced your e-mail from Sandra about this, contact her at : archives@shambhala.org
Finally, please join with me in wishing Chris Levy all good things in his marriage to Brenda Campbell on Aug 11. The ceremony was auspicious and well received by all. Congratulations Chris.
To all or you: thank you for your continued support of this project.
Best wishes,
Carolyn Gimian and the ARP Staff
cgimian@suchns.com
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
March 2007 ARP Letter
March 15, 2007
Dear Friends and Supporters of the Audio Recovery Project,
We are approaching the end of the second full year of the Audio Recovery Project. In this letter, I hope to share what we’ve been up to for the last two years, what has gone right, what has gone wrong, and in the end, how you can help us to complete the project in a timely fashion, without anyone suffering the slings and arrows of financial misfortune. This is a long letter, but I think that the ARP donors deserve a full accounting. In the future, more pithy pitches will undoubtedly be sent your way.
In the first year, the main concentration was on enrolling centres in the program, refining our methodology for digitizing and improving the sound quality, obtaining the equipment, and finally getting the whole system up and running. Finetuning the system for copying the CDs was a fairly daunting task. The technical staff, Gordon Kidd and Chris Levy, had to make many adjustments in the equipment we purchased and work with the manufacturers to get the system working up to the standards we had established. After several months of tinkering, we were able to begin making high quality CDs. Both those technosavvy and technophobic, like myself, breathed a sigh of relief. We were actually going to be able to deliver the CDs as promised!
At the end of the first year, the digitizing was proceeding, the sound correction was occurring, our first batches of CDs were being shipped, but things were moving more slowly than we had anticipated. The technical wizard who has designed many of the systems we’re using and is carrying out a great deal of the work, Chris Levy, realized that we could increase the efficiency of the system dramatically. In part, we needed to do this because we had realized that at the rate we were going, three years was easily going to turn into five or six. There was so much more material than we had anticipated and so many more things to be done to correct the sound and create good recordings to send out.
Chris, consulting with Gordon Kidd, James Hoagland, and others, figured out how to bring in four analogue recordings at the same time, when previously the recordings were coming in one at a time. Simple as this sounds, it was an impressive innovation, one that is saving a great deal of time and money. The savings were used to install a sophisticated RAID unit, which Chris put together himself, to house the digital files. RAID is short for Redundant Array of Independent (or Inexpensive) Disks, a category of disk drives that employ two or more drives in combination for fault tolerance and performance. I have no idea what fault tolerance is, but I’m sure it’s important. It may be this: On a RAID, the information is backed-up in several places, and if one drive goes bad, the system can reconstruct the data from the remaining drives, plus it tells you that a drive has gone bad. (It does not actually speak to you, but I think it beeps or turns green or something.) RAID disk drives are used frequently on servers but aren't generally necessary for personal computers. This is probably good, since most of us computing personally would be seriously RAID-challenged.
So good is the system that Chris developed that Media Matters—a technical consultancy in Manhattan, specializing in archival audio and video material—brought the head of Public Television in Puerto Rico to the Shambhala Archives to learn how our system works. So good is the technician, Chris Levy, that he’s being considered for a job at the Library of Congress at the conclusion of the ARP. The head of Media Matters, Jim Lindner, wrote to thank us:
I would like to offer my sincere congratulations at putting together a very cohesive system for your project – one that will get the job done in a very cost efficient way. I wanted to thank you for your great generosity in sharing your success with me and CPRDP (Public Television Puerto Rico) and very much appreciate your help.
Jim was very impressed by how economical a system we had put together. We have been pinching every penny—absolutely every one—to get the job done for a reasonable, in fact ridiculously reasonable, price.
Last fall, while in Boulder, Colorado to attend a conference on the life and teachings of Chogyam Trungpa at Naropa University, I spent a day at the Naropa Archives. The archivist there shared a lot of information about the audio recovery they did on the poetry archives at Naropa. It’s quite impressive, and they have made the material available on-line. They had quite a large grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to help with the project. I learned that they spent approximately twice as much as we are spending and they copied about half as many recordings—and they were not including multiple archival CD libraries, as we are, in their budget. Theirs is considered to be an efficient, cost-effective project. Indeed, it is. By that standard, the Shambhala Archives project is a miracle of economy.
As year two has progressed, we’ve been able to pick up the pace, due both to the technical changes noted above as well as to additional help provided by the Archives’ office manager and administrative assistant, Sandra Kipis, and by a student hired through grants from the Young Canada Works program. Production has gone well, and we are now duplicating shipment (insert number).
In Year Three, beginning in April, 2007, in addition to shipping close to 750 CDs to each center, we will be sending you a database containing information about all of the recordings you are receiving. The Shambhala Archives is working with the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project on a much more ambitious database project that will include an extensive online catalogue. That won’t be completed this year, but the basic DB will be provided to you. This is one of the main requests we’ve had, and we’re working hard to honor it.
So a lot has been and is still being accomplished, at a very modest price. But….
Here comes the but!
There was no way we could have anticipated that the U. S. dollar would lose such significant value against the Canadian dollar, just at the time that we were conducting the Audio Recovery Project. Originally, we estimated the full cost of the project at around $250,000 Canadian, or $185,000 U.S at the then-current rate of exchange.. Today, $185,000 US is worth just $217,000 Canadian, and since two-thirds of the ARP centers are in the United States or paying in US dollars, their decline in value reduced our income for the project by close to $25,000. This is now an anticipated deficit in year three of the project.
Two other things affected the budget to actual: shipping and schedule. Not including shipping charges in our budgeting was my fault. I just forgot to include shipping when I made up the budget, and it’s a very significant expense. We have asked centers to reimburse us for ARP shipping charges but many have not responded in a….timely fashion. This has added another $5,000 to the deficit.
Finally, we did not anticipate the length of the recordings, especially the early recordings, many of which are 90 to 120 minutes long. That man could talk, when he chose to! We didn’t accurately count all the events in advance. I know that sounds lame, but we had a number of recordings that had not been fully “accessioned” or catalogued in any way when we started the project. Somewhere between 300 and 600 new recordings have popped up. Although we’re only sending 1,500 CDs to each center – only – we have more than 2,500 events to digitize as part of the project. We might go beyond 3,000 recordings when we include special collections such as the translation meetings that the Vidyadhara had with the Nalanda Translation Committee and events involving the Dorje Kasung. As a result, the project will continue for four to six months beyond the three years we anticipated. This will add another $10,000 to $15,000 to the deficit.
All together, based on the original income projections, we will be short about $40,000 to $45,000. That’s less than 20% of the total, and considering the currency shift, it’s impressively small. But quite real!
We are looking at our expenses, in the hope that we can cut the deficit by cutting fat out of the budget. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be much fat. Very very little fat. Almost no fat. In fact, the staff is already working for low wages, and the department is charging almost no overhead. We can’t send you wooden CDs, so to speak. So we have to raise additional funds to cover the deficit and complete the project on time.
We hope to fund part of the deficit through new recordings that we will be making available to individuals and centers in the coming year. Those of you who are connected to our major contributing ARP centers will already have these recordings. Many other Shambhala Centers and individuals will now be able to access seminars and talks by the Vidyadhara, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche. In some cases, we can offer audio CDs together with books based on the material and a syllabus, so that centers will be able to offer a new course based on ARP material.
We have a number of other strategies, but additionally, we are hoping that many of our ARP subscribers will be able to help, which could include making an additional donation to the project. There are several ways you can help:
1) Please pay on time and please let us know if you will have difficulty meeting your obligation to ARP.
2) Please pay your shipping charges.
3) Hold an ARP fundraiser at your centre to help cover our deficit. This is the 20th anniversary of the Parinirvana of the Vidyadhara. It’s a powerful time to celebrate him and invite the community to support the wonderful audio legacy of his teachings.
4) If you can send us between $500 and $1,000 in addition to the amount you have already committed to, that would be a huge help. If twenty centers can raise and contribute $1,000, that will handle half of the deficit.
Lots of projects need financial assistance and regularly ask for our help. Undoubtedly, your center has many needs as well. We hope you will nevertheless consider additional support for the Audio Recovery Project, not just because we are delivering excellent value—a priceless library of CDs—but also because of the great importance of this project.
And finally, thank you for your ongoing support of the Audio Recovery Project. Because of your support, we can honor a direct request from Chögyam Trungpa, who told his Board of Directors: “Please save the tapes. Please save my voice.” He made that request around 1985. More than twenty years later, we will be able to say, “Mission accomplished, Sir.”
I have faith now that, although the globe may warm, the tides may rise in Halifax, and the winds may howl in Boulder, with all of these libraries of his audio teachings preserving his teachings around the world, the voice of the Vidyadhara will be with us for many generations. What you are supporting and being given is a precious library. I hope you’ll treat it that way—consider installing the library it in your shrine room as a relic of the speech of the Vidyadhara.
We are almost there. A few more steps, a few more digital bits and bytes, a few more dollars. Please help if you can. If you’d like to discuss any aspect of the Audio Recovery Project, please feel free to e-mail me at cgimian@suchns.com.
Thank you,
Carolyn Rose Gimian
Director Emeritus
Shambhala Archives
Dear Friends and Supporters of the Audio Recovery Project,
We are approaching the end of the second full year of the Audio Recovery Project. In this letter, I hope to share what we’ve been up to for the last two years, what has gone right, what has gone wrong, and in the end, how you can help us to complete the project in a timely fashion, without anyone suffering the slings and arrows of financial misfortune. This is a long letter, but I think that the ARP donors deserve a full accounting. In the future, more pithy pitches will undoubtedly be sent your way.
In the first year, the main concentration was on enrolling centres in the program, refining our methodology for digitizing and improving the sound quality, obtaining the equipment, and finally getting the whole system up and running. Finetuning the system for copying the CDs was a fairly daunting task. The technical staff, Gordon Kidd and Chris Levy, had to make many adjustments in the equipment we purchased and work with the manufacturers to get the system working up to the standards we had established. After several months of tinkering, we were able to begin making high quality CDs. Both those technosavvy and technophobic, like myself, breathed a sigh of relief. We were actually going to be able to deliver the CDs as promised!
At the end of the first year, the digitizing was proceeding, the sound correction was occurring, our first batches of CDs were being shipped, but things were moving more slowly than we had anticipated. The technical wizard who has designed many of the systems we’re using and is carrying out a great deal of the work, Chris Levy, realized that we could increase the efficiency of the system dramatically. In part, we needed to do this because we had realized that at the rate we were going, three years was easily going to turn into five or six. There was so much more material than we had anticipated and so many more things to be done to correct the sound and create good recordings to send out.
Chris, consulting with Gordon Kidd, James Hoagland, and others, figured out how to bring in four analogue recordings at the same time, when previously the recordings were coming in one at a time. Simple as this sounds, it was an impressive innovation, one that is saving a great deal of time and money. The savings were used to install a sophisticated RAID unit, which Chris put together himself, to house the digital files. RAID is short for Redundant Array of Independent (or Inexpensive) Disks, a category of disk drives that employ two or more drives in combination for fault tolerance and performance. I have no idea what fault tolerance is, but I’m sure it’s important. It may be this: On a RAID, the information is backed-up in several places, and if one drive goes bad, the system can reconstruct the data from the remaining drives, plus it tells you that a drive has gone bad. (It does not actually speak to you, but I think it beeps or turns green or something.) RAID disk drives are used frequently on servers but aren't generally necessary for personal computers. This is probably good, since most of us computing personally would be seriously RAID-challenged.
So good is the system that Chris developed that Media Matters—a technical consultancy in Manhattan, specializing in archival audio and video material—brought the head of Public Television in Puerto Rico to the Shambhala Archives to learn how our system works. So good is the technician, Chris Levy, that he’s being considered for a job at the Library of Congress at the conclusion of the ARP. The head of Media Matters, Jim Lindner, wrote to thank us:
I would like to offer my sincere congratulations at putting together a very cohesive system for your project – one that will get the job done in a very cost efficient way. I wanted to thank you for your great generosity in sharing your success with me and CPRDP (Public Television Puerto Rico) and very much appreciate your help.
Jim was very impressed by how economical a system we had put together. We have been pinching every penny—absolutely every one—to get the job done for a reasonable, in fact ridiculously reasonable, price.
Last fall, while in Boulder, Colorado to attend a conference on the life and teachings of Chogyam Trungpa at Naropa University, I spent a day at the Naropa Archives. The archivist there shared a lot of information about the audio recovery they did on the poetry archives at Naropa. It’s quite impressive, and they have made the material available on-line. They had quite a large grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to help with the project. I learned that they spent approximately twice as much as we are spending and they copied about half as many recordings—and they were not including multiple archival CD libraries, as we are, in their budget. Theirs is considered to be an efficient, cost-effective project. Indeed, it is. By that standard, the Shambhala Archives project is a miracle of economy.
As year two has progressed, we’ve been able to pick up the pace, due both to the technical changes noted above as well as to additional help provided by the Archives’ office manager and administrative assistant, Sandra Kipis, and by a student hired through grants from the Young Canada Works program. Production has gone well, and we are now duplicating shipment (insert number).
In Year Three, beginning in April, 2007, in addition to shipping close to 750 CDs to each center, we will be sending you a database containing information about all of the recordings you are receiving. The Shambhala Archives is working with the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project on a much more ambitious database project that will include an extensive online catalogue. That won’t be completed this year, but the basic DB will be provided to you. This is one of the main requests we’ve had, and we’re working hard to honor it.
So a lot has been and is still being accomplished, at a very modest price. But….
Here comes the but!
There was no way we could have anticipated that the U. S. dollar would lose such significant value against the Canadian dollar, just at the time that we were conducting the Audio Recovery Project. Originally, we estimated the full cost of the project at around $250,000 Canadian, or $185,000 U.S at the then-current rate of exchange.. Today, $185,000 US is worth just $217,000 Canadian, and since two-thirds of the ARP centers are in the United States or paying in US dollars, their decline in value reduced our income for the project by close to $25,000. This is now an anticipated deficit in year three of the project.
Two other things affected the budget to actual: shipping and schedule. Not including shipping charges in our budgeting was my fault. I just forgot to include shipping when I made up the budget, and it’s a very significant expense. We have asked centers to reimburse us for ARP shipping charges but many have not responded in a….timely fashion. This has added another $5,000 to the deficit.
Finally, we did not anticipate the length of the recordings, especially the early recordings, many of which are 90 to 120 minutes long. That man could talk, when he chose to! We didn’t accurately count all the events in advance. I know that sounds lame, but we had a number of recordings that had not been fully “accessioned” or catalogued in any way when we started the project. Somewhere between 300 and 600 new recordings have popped up. Although we’re only sending 1,500 CDs to each center – only – we have more than 2,500 events to digitize as part of the project. We might go beyond 3,000 recordings when we include special collections such as the translation meetings that the Vidyadhara had with the Nalanda Translation Committee and events involving the Dorje Kasung. As a result, the project will continue for four to six months beyond the three years we anticipated. This will add another $10,000 to $15,000 to the deficit.
All together, based on the original income projections, we will be short about $40,000 to $45,000. That’s less than 20% of the total, and considering the currency shift, it’s impressively small. But quite real!
We are looking at our expenses, in the hope that we can cut the deficit by cutting fat out of the budget. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be much fat. Very very little fat. Almost no fat. In fact, the staff is already working for low wages, and the department is charging almost no overhead. We can’t send you wooden CDs, so to speak. So we have to raise additional funds to cover the deficit and complete the project on time.
We hope to fund part of the deficit through new recordings that we will be making available to individuals and centers in the coming year. Those of you who are connected to our major contributing ARP centers will already have these recordings. Many other Shambhala Centers and individuals will now be able to access seminars and talks by the Vidyadhara, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche. In some cases, we can offer audio CDs together with books based on the material and a syllabus, so that centers will be able to offer a new course based on ARP material.
We have a number of other strategies, but additionally, we are hoping that many of our ARP subscribers will be able to help, which could include making an additional donation to the project. There are several ways you can help:
1) Please pay on time and please let us know if you will have difficulty meeting your obligation to ARP.
2) Please pay your shipping charges.
3) Hold an ARP fundraiser at your centre to help cover our deficit. This is the 20th anniversary of the Parinirvana of the Vidyadhara. It’s a powerful time to celebrate him and invite the community to support the wonderful audio legacy of his teachings.
4) If you can send us between $500 and $1,000 in addition to the amount you have already committed to, that would be a huge help. If twenty centers can raise and contribute $1,000, that will handle half of the deficit.
Lots of projects need financial assistance and regularly ask for our help. Undoubtedly, your center has many needs as well. We hope you will nevertheless consider additional support for the Audio Recovery Project, not just because we are delivering excellent value—a priceless library of CDs—but also because of the great importance of this project.
And finally, thank you for your ongoing support of the Audio Recovery Project. Because of your support, we can honor a direct request from Chögyam Trungpa, who told his Board of Directors: “Please save the tapes. Please save my voice.” He made that request around 1985. More than twenty years later, we will be able to say, “Mission accomplished, Sir.”
I have faith now that, although the globe may warm, the tides may rise in Halifax, and the winds may howl in Boulder, with all of these libraries of his audio teachings preserving his teachings around the world, the voice of the Vidyadhara will be with us for many generations. What you are supporting and being given is a precious library. I hope you’ll treat it that way—consider installing the library it in your shrine room as a relic of the speech of the Vidyadhara.
We are almost there. A few more steps, a few more digital bits and bytes, a few more dollars. Please help if you can. If you’d like to discuss any aspect of the Audio Recovery Project, please feel free to e-mail me at cgimian@suchns.com.
Thank you,
Carolyn Rose Gimian
Director Emeritus
Shambhala Archives
December 2006 ARP Newsletter
Audio Recovery Project Newsletter 4 December 2006
Dear Friends,
This is the fourth issue of the Audio Recovery Newsletter, which is being sent to all of the centres that are participating in the Audio Recovery Project (ARP) to digitally remaster the recordings of the teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and create digital CD libraries in many locations. The newsletter is also being sent to supporters of the Audio Recovery Project, including individual donors and groups such as the Shambhala Trust, as well as to other interested parties.
The purpose of this newsletter is to provide practical information, inspiration, discussion and updates on the project.
Change in Schedule
We are about to send out the fourth ARP shipment, containing 150 CDs. This brings the total shipped to 532 CDs. We expect to continue shipping CDs 3 times per year, with the final shipment expected Summer 2008. This represents a change in schedule. We now anticipate needing an additional four to six months to complete the project.
Schedule updates will be sent in future newsletters. Production is going extremely well, but this is turning out to be a bigger project than we could have anticipated!
Cataloging the ARP Material and Educational Guides
We have heard from a number of centers that you are anxious to receive an electronic catalogue of all the ARP material and that many centers would also like syllabi and guides for using the material. We hear you! In association with the Shambhala Archives, the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project is beginning an online archive project. In 2007, we are planning a pilot project that includes an online catalogue of all of the Vidyadhara’s talks. Not all the information about each talk will be available initially, but there will be information to identify Place, Name of Talk, Date, ARP Number etc. We also hope to begin the much bigger task of organizing all the material and providing syllabi, keywords, abstracts, etc for the talks. We think that we will need the help of many volunteers in the sangha to complete this aspect of the catalogue. We are looking at various variations on a “Wiki” to help us move forward with transcribing and cataloguing this precious collection.
Please see the attached letter of support for the Legacy Project from Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche as well as the attached description of the project.
The Search for Syllabi Is On: You Can Contribute
Before we start new curriculum initiatives, we want to gather all or many of the existing syllabi that pertain to the Vidyadhara’s teachings. Many centers have a “stash” of old and venerable syllabi that pertain to the Audio Recovery material. Senior students also have syllabi that we hope they will share. We invite all Shambhala Centers to send us copies of syllabi that use the Vidyadhara’s talks/book/and transcripts. We will post them to an electronic work space, so that they can be shared. There will need to be updating, some cleaning up of material, etc, but this is a good way to begin to access what is already a great archival mine of educational material.
We will also be looking in the Shambhala practice and education office for material that dates back to the Office of Three Yana Studies, which created many syllabi with this material during the 1970s and 80s.
If you have curriculum material to send in, you can mail it to the Shambhala Archives, 1084 Tower Road, Halifax, Nova Scotia B3H2Y5 Canada or you can send it as an electronic file to archives@shambhala.org.
Financial Update: Deficit in 2008
We now estimate that there will be cost overruns of about 15%, or approximately $40,000 for the cost of the entire Audio Recovery Project. This is due to a number of factors, including the following: 1) change in US dollar. The US dollar has dropped in value approximately 20% against the Canadian dollar since ARP began. All Canadian businesses/non-profits that rely on US income have been affected. This has reduced our ARP income by over 15% of the total expected. 2) It will take us four to six months longer than originally anticipated to complete the project. We will have additional salary expenses connected with this. 3) We have more material than originally calculated. This is largely because early talks often exceed one hour in length. We were not able to calculate the total number of hours in advance. So we have additional mastering and copying expenses.
Overall, we are extremely proud of how far we have been stretching every dollar and pleased at the amount of work that has been accomplished. Of course, we also wish the budgeting had been 100% accurate. However, the size of the deficit seems manageable if we begin addressing it now.
Financing the Deficit
We are looking at options for handling this deficit. We hope that centers will be able to contribute an additional something additional to the project. We will be contacting you about this in the months to come. In addition, we are looking at other options: 1) a fundraising campaign to solicit additional help from committed donors; 2) an ARP lottery among centres (those not participating in ARP could win almost a complete set of CDs) and also for individuals – with the grand prize being 1,000 ARP CDs or an IPOD loaded with the Vidyadhara’s talks; 3) sales of several smaller CD sets ( such as seminary transcripts and Vajrayogini tris for non ARP centers and individuals), and 4) other creative ideas. We are giving you a heads up now, so that the shortfall will not come as a last minute shock.
ARP Financial Statements
To help all of us keep track of payments made, owing, and due, the Shambhala Archives has begun sending financial statements to you every quarter, indicating when your ARP contributions are due, as well as other charges such as shipping and insurance. We hope these statements will serve as a reminder, to help centres stay up to date in their contributions.
Storage
We continue to highly recommend the MC3D20 cabinets from CanAm, which can be seen at http://www.can-am.ca/ Please mention that you are part of the Audio Recovery Project when you order. If enough centers order, we may receive an additional rebate in the future. Now that you have 500 CDs, you probably can see why you need a cabinet for them!
General storage considerations:
Humidity and Temperature Recommendations
In order to maximize the longevity of the CDs you receive, they should be stored at a cool or moderate temperature, with low to moderate humidity. It is preferable to keep the CDs in a stable temperature- and humidity-controlled environment. If a climate- controlled room is not available, a home dehumidifier can help to remove a great deal of excess humidity from the environment. A window/room air conditioner is very helpful to control high temperatures in the summer. If you cannot provide air-conditioning, then be sure to have adequate ventilation of the room. You can use a window fan to help bring in cool air in the evenings and early mornings. High humidity and temperatures can greatly decrease the life expectancy of the CDs. Specific recommendations for your space can be discussed with Gordon Kidd or Carolyn Gimian.
Additional Information on Storage
If you decide to use some other means of storage, we would suggest that you check out the cabinets on the Can-Am website, to give you some idea of the features you may want to consider. We will be happy to provide you with advice. The key features of your storage system would be: security (a locking cabinet is essential if you want to keep the collection intact) and an inert archival environment (low light and cabinets made of inert materials that don’t off gas. If you choose to use wood shelving, it should be specially treated before use.)
Care and handling of the CDs
Always handle CDs by the edges or inner hub.
Press down on the inner hub to take a CD off the tray (pulling from the edges can bend the disc).
Press on the hub to return the CD to the case.
Remove fingerprints and other embellishments with a soft cloth in a center to edge radial direction (watch for scratches - stop if you make one and use a softer cloth!)
Wash with warm soapy (non-chemical) water if CD is very soiled, dry with a soft cloth in a center to edge radial direction.
Avoid leaving a CD in direct sunlight - i.e. near a sunny window or the dash of a car; sunlight breaks down plastic polymers over time and the CD will not play.
Avoid leaving the CDs out of their cases.
ARP Staff Updates
The names, duties and contact information for all ARP staff appear at the end of the newsletter, in case you need to speak with any of us.
Duplication
Please refer to the attached policy on the duplication of ARP CDs. If you have any questions, please contact us.
Restricted Materials
All centres participating in the Audio Recovery Project will receive 1,500 CDs of the Vidyadhara’s teachings. Access to the content of some recordings is restricted. There may be restrictions on reproduction of these materials for participating centres who are not Shambhala Centres. If due to access restrictions we are not able to provide some recordings to centres outside of Shambhala International, we will provide alternative recordings or a partial refund. This will be negotiated and discussed on an individual basis. We will endeavour to provide the most complete set to the largest number of centres.
Finally
Once again, thank you thank you thank you all – for your participation in the Audio Recovery Project. Please feel free to post this e-mail newsletter in your centre and please forward it to other members of your centre or other parties interested in the Audio Recovery Project.
Yours in Oceans of Dharma,
The Staff of the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives
Centres Participating in the Audio Recovery Project as of Dec 2006
Please note: in some cases, more than one centre is sharing a set of CDs. New participants are indicated in italics.
Canada
1. Halifax Shambhala Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia
2. Dorje Denma Ling, Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia
3. Gampo Abbey, Pleasant Bay, Nova Scotia
4. Toronto Shambhala Centre, Toronto, Ontario
5. Vancouver Shambhala Centre, Vancouver, British Columbia
6. Khyentse Foundation, Vancouver, British Columbia
Mexico
7. Mexico Shambhala Centre
Chile
8. Chile Shambhala Centre
United States of America
9. Washington/Philadelphia
Washington Shambhala Centre, Washington, D.C.
Philadelphia Shambhala Centre, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
10. New York Shambhala Centre, New York, New York
11. Boston Shambhala Centre, Boston, Massachusetts.
12. Karme-Choling Meditation Centre, Barnet, Vermont
13. Southeast Shambhala Centres
Atlanta Shambhala Centre, Atlanta, Georgia
Durham Shambhala Centre, Durham, North Carolina
Birmingham Shambhala Centre, Birmingham, Alabama
14. Chicago Shambhala Centre, Chicago, Illinois
15. Boulder Shambhala Centre, Boulder, Colorado
16. The Naropa University, Boulder, Colorado
17. Shambhala Mountain Centre, Red Feather Lakes, Colorado
18. Dharma Ocean Foundation, Crestone, Colorado
19. Los Angeles Shambhala Centre, Los Angeles, California
20. Ojai Valley Dharma Centre, Ojai, California First Year Only
21. Bay Area Shambhala Centres, California
Berkeley Shambhala Centre, Berkeley
Davis Shambhala Centre, Davis
San Francisco Shambhala Centre, San Francisco
Sonoma Shambhala Centre, Sonoma
Santa Cruz Shambhala Centre, Santa Cruz
Grass Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Grass Valley
Monterey Shambhala Meditation Group, Monterey
Santa Rosa Shambhala Meditation Group, Santa Rosa
Silicon Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Mountain View
Tamalpais Shambhala Meditation Group, San Rafael
Europe
22. Shambhala Europe, Cologne, Germany
23. Longchen Foundation, Oxford, England
Nepal
24. Pullahari Monastery and Retreat Center, Kathmandu, Nepal
Other
25. Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project
26. Shambhala International, Practice and Study Department
27. The family of Chögyam Trungpa
28. Shambhala Archives Reference Set
Audio Recovery Staff and Contact Information
Sandra Kipis: 425-4275 x 22. archives@shambhala.org Administrative Support. Questions about your contract, financial contributions or other administrative details. Also contact Sandra if you have questions about donations to other Archives projects.
Gordon Kidd: 425-4275 x 21. gkidd@shambhala.org Technical Director of the project. Contact Gordon with general as well as specific questions about your participation in ARP. Technical questions can be directed to Gordon or to:
Chris Levy: 425-4275 x 22. clevy@shambhala.org ARP Technician.
Carolyn Gimian: 420-0009. cgimian@suchns.com Overview. Send questions to Carolyn about any aspect of the project that aren’t covered above. Also questions about the content of the tapes, database overview, etc. may be directed to Carolyn or other staff members.
If you do not wish to receive future newsletters and would like to be removed from the distribution list, please send an e-mail to that effect to cgimian@suchns.com
The Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives
Duplication Policy
May 2006
1. The recordings included in the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives are copyrighted materials. These copyrights must be respected. No duplication for commercial purposes, broadcast or for use in any published material is allowed without the express written permission of the Shambhala Archives.
2. Definitions for the purposes of this document:
a. Master: refers to the archival copy provided by the Shambhala Archives to the participating ARP centre.
b. On demand: means that a centre will not duplicate ALL of its ARP masters, but will only duplicate individual CDs as requested by members of the centre or other participating centres.
3. Centres participating in the Audio Recovery Project may make a copy of an individual ARP CD in the following situations or for the following purposes:
a. Where more than one centre is participating in ARP, the centre library that has the master CDs may provide a copy of an individual CD, on demand, to one of the other participating centres.
b. A single copy may be provided to a retreatant, to a teacher preparing for a class, and to a student or teacher wishing to pursue private study.
c. The centre may choose to make an individual copy, on demand, to be played in educational classes, rather than playing the master recording.
4. If a centre not participating in ARP requests a copy of an ARP CD from one of the participating centres, after consulting with Kalapa Recordings or the Shambhala Archives, the participating ARP centre may provide a copy, subject to the requesting centre sending a negotiated payment to the Shambhala Archives.
5. Participating centres will not duplicate the ARP CDs or their contents in any other formats without the express written permission of the Shambhala Archives.
6. If a centre wishes to replace an ARP CD, the replacement charge will be $15/CD up to 10 CDs and 10$/CD thereafter, plus shipping. Replacements may take 6 to 8 weeks.
7. Please contact the Archives if for any reason you want to make multiple copies of a CD. We are working on a license agreement to cover that possibility.
8. As a participating centre, you agree to keep a log of all CDs duplicated, for what purpose copies are made and to whom they are given.
To the Noble Sangha,
I would like to offer my blessings to the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project. The heart of this project is the intention to support and enhance the preservation, propagation, and publication of Trungpa Rinpoche’s vast and profound teachings. Like presidential libraries in the United States, this project will focus on the legacy of my father and help to ensure the living continuity of his priceless teachings.
As scholars, practitioners, and social innovators around the world increasingly come to appreciate the impact of my father on so many aspects of human culture, the need for a specialized reservoir of his teachings becomes ever more necessary. Keeping it under the protection of the Sakyong lineage will be a wonderful step forward in fulfilling the aspirations of the Vidyadhara.
The Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project will also initiate new projects. For example, next year, the twentieth anniversary of his parinirvana, a traveling exhibit of his artwork and belongings might be mounted.
Lady Diana Mukpo has been supporting this project for some time now, and she and other members of the Mukpo family will continue to play a leading role. President Reoch is working closely with the project's acting director, Ms. Carolyn Rose Gimian, to ensure that this initiative proceeds with the encouragement and support of the Shambhala mandala. Within the coming year, there will be a process of consultation on the structure of the foundation, after which the way it will function and be governed will be announced.
I want to express my great appreciation to Carolyn Rose Gimian, whose work as the acting director has been vital in bringing the legacy project into being. She has my full support. All students, young and old, new and senior, please consider how you might contribute in any way you can.
Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche
THE CHÖGYAM TRUNGPA LEGACY PROJECT: DEC 2006
April 4, 2007 will mark the twentieth anniversary of the death of Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche [1940-1987]. We are only now beginning to realize the tremendous scope of his personal contribution to the introduction of authentic Buddhist practice and knowledge in the West. His books are considered classics on meditation and the Buddhist path, and he is certainly one of the most important and influential spiritual teachers of the 20th century.
Chögyam Trungpa presented a truly vast view. He proclaimed not only the entire nine yanas [stages] of the Tibetan Buddhist path, but also the Shambhala path of warriorship and compassionate action. His vision was that the Shambhala teachings could apply equally to practitioners from all of the world’s traditional religious approaches, providing a fundamental ground on which all religious traditions could flourish. He himself was an artist, a poet, and many would say a warrior-statesman. He practiced and offered innumerable skillful means to wake people up, in fields as diverse as art, poetry, psychology, theater, and politics.
In his honor and in his footsteps, please join in establishing the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project. We envision this project as creating a very large tent of dharma—a space as vast and open as Trungpa Rinpoche’s mind, or as close to that as we can project. We want to establish a place for everyone who connects with Rinpoche’s legacy, now and in the future, and we invite you to contribute to manifesting that legacy, keeping it alive in the deepest sense of the word.
Chogyam Trungpa himself described this as the proclamation of “open house.” At the opening of the first Karma Dzong meditation center in Boulder, Colorado in 1972, he said:
This event is a proclamation of open house. Those who want to practice are invited to take part in meditation, to go through the pain, go through the bliss, whatever you experience. Creating an open house situation is a gesture proclaiming that our aim and object are not related with dogma but on trying to encompass all areas of openness. That knowledge can be found throughout the teachings of Tibetan Buddhism or Buddhism in general --Sanskrit Buddhism, Pali Buddhism, or other schools of Buddhism. Since it is known that all dharmas are marked with emptiness, therefore all dharma is marked with openness, at the same time. There is tremendous room to work with chaos or confusion.
The sole purpose of the Chogyam Trungpa Legacy Project is to promote and support the dharma legacy of Chogyam Trungpa, Rinpoche. The Legacy Project will be an independent non-profit foundation incorporated in the United States, in Canada (as a charitable organization) and in Europe, serving to preserve, disseminate and expand Chögyam Trungpa’s legacy. The Legacy Project will support and augment the preservation, propagation and publication of Trungpa Rinpoche’s dharma teachings. It will further these goals through support for existing programs as well as the initiation of new projects and programming. This will include the creation of a comprehensive virtual archive and learning community. The project will also help to create the financial base for current and future generations to support this mission. Through this process, the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project will enhance, enrich, and further inspire existing institutions and other manifestations of the Shambhala world Chögyam Trungpa created.
Chögyam Trungpa came out of a largely monastic and nomadic culture, which had many elements that were still medieval. He moved from that into twentieth century life in the West and embraced the changes, the technologies, and the secular culture he encountered. At the time of his death, the revolution in the home and individual use of computers and the internet was just beginning to be felt. Now, we have the opportunity to use these technologies to create a strong on-line presence and community as one of the cornerstones of the Legacy Project. This project will be based, not in one physical location, but will have an international membership. Like the nomadic culture of Tibet, the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project could set up its tent, sponsoring programs in any number of locations, and then the caravan can move on. Much of the continuity of the project will be maintained and enhanced through communications and information shared via the internet and other electronic means.
The Legacy Project will supplement existing support for activities of the Shambhala Archives, such as the Audio Recovery Project to digitize the recordings of the Vidyadhara’s teachings and make available a complete online inventory of his work. The project may also help to fund and to encourage funding for programs and initiatives already underway at Naropa University to explore the heritage of its founder. These include several new academic courses, an annual series of conferences, and the endowed Vidyadhara Vision Fund, which will support these activities, building toward the possibility of an endowed Chögyam Trungpa chair. Other institutions now and in the future may also sponsor academic research or courses of study which make use of Chogyam Trungpa’s writings. In a spirit of open inquiry, the Legacy Project may provide support for these efforts in the form of funding editors, teachers, and students; providing access to relevant documents and syllabi; and/or providing staff and other expert help. This, in turn, could lead to the publication of new scholarly papers or books building upon Chögyam Trungpa’s original work.
The Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project may also initiate new projects that expand access to the teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, in ways that complement existing efforts or in completely new ways. For example, a traveling exhibit of his artwork and belongings could be initiated, or a series of summer seminars could be offered at various practice centers. In general, the project will support and present both the prajna and the upaya aspects of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche’s dharma legacy. That is to say, we will be working with both the knowledge he imparted and the many methods that he created to transmit his wisdom.
Finally, the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project will establish an endowment to fund its activities and to ensure that the dharma legacy of Chögyam Trungpa remains available to future generations.
The timing is clearly right for the launch of this endeavor. This October, Naropa University begins its yearly conference on Chögyam Trungpa’s life and work. A major documentary film on his life is in the offing. The Collected Works of Chögyam Trungpa were recently published, and a number of books about his life are emerging. The Chronicles of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche (www.chronicleproject.com) has established a major oral history project on the life and teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche. By 2008, all of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche’s oral teachings—more than 5,000 hours of material—will have been digitized. Carolyn Rose Gimian, founding director of the Shambhala Archives, has agreed to act as the director of the Legacy Project during its inception. Lady Diana Mukpo is involved in the planning and execution of the project. Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche has given his blessing to the project. Many of Chögyam Trungpa’s senior students, a number of whom are now teachers, are supporting this endeavor. This is an excellent ground on which to manifest the Big Tent of the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project. We invite you to join in creating something truly worthy of the great gift of teachings which we have received.
How the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project will evolve depends on all of us. We are now in the early planning stages of this project. Please join us at one of the meetings this fall, or send us your inquiries and suggestions. Individual consultations and meetings can be arranged, if you are unable to attend one of the group meetings.
For information and updates, visit the website: ChogyamTrungpa.com. For more information or to express your interest, please write to: The Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project c/o ctlp@chogyamtrungpa.com
Legacy Meetings have already occurred or are being scheduled, including the following:
October 23, Boulder, Colorado, Boulder Shambhala Center
November 4, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Halifax Shambhala Center
December 6 to 16 (exact dates not yet confirmed):
Paris, France
London, England
Cologne, Germany
Vienna, Austria
January, 2007, New York, New York
May 2007 Bay Area, California
May 2007, Los Angeles, California
A videotape of the meeting held in Halifax, Nova Scotia, is available, and can be used by groups in other areas wishing to schedule a meeting.
Dear Friends,
This is the fourth issue of the Audio Recovery Newsletter, which is being sent to all of the centres that are participating in the Audio Recovery Project (ARP) to digitally remaster the recordings of the teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and create digital CD libraries in many locations. The newsletter is also being sent to supporters of the Audio Recovery Project, including individual donors and groups such as the Shambhala Trust, as well as to other interested parties.
The purpose of this newsletter is to provide practical information, inspiration, discussion and updates on the project.
Change in Schedule
We are about to send out the fourth ARP shipment, containing 150 CDs. This brings the total shipped to 532 CDs. We expect to continue shipping CDs 3 times per year, with the final shipment expected Summer 2008. This represents a change in schedule. We now anticipate needing an additional four to six months to complete the project.
Schedule updates will be sent in future newsletters. Production is going extremely well, but this is turning out to be a bigger project than we could have anticipated!
Cataloging the ARP Material and Educational Guides
We have heard from a number of centers that you are anxious to receive an electronic catalogue of all the ARP material and that many centers would also like syllabi and guides for using the material. We hear you! In association with the Shambhala Archives, the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project is beginning an online archive project. In 2007, we are planning a pilot project that includes an online catalogue of all of the Vidyadhara’s talks. Not all the information about each talk will be available initially, but there will be information to identify Place, Name of Talk, Date, ARP Number etc. We also hope to begin the much bigger task of organizing all the material and providing syllabi, keywords, abstracts, etc for the talks. We think that we will need the help of many volunteers in the sangha to complete this aspect of the catalogue. We are looking at various variations on a “Wiki” to help us move forward with transcribing and cataloguing this precious collection.
Please see the attached letter of support for the Legacy Project from Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche as well as the attached description of the project.
The Search for Syllabi Is On: You Can Contribute
Before we start new curriculum initiatives, we want to gather all or many of the existing syllabi that pertain to the Vidyadhara’s teachings. Many centers have a “stash” of old and venerable syllabi that pertain to the Audio Recovery material. Senior students also have syllabi that we hope they will share. We invite all Shambhala Centers to send us copies of syllabi that use the Vidyadhara’s talks/book/and transcripts. We will post them to an electronic work space, so that they can be shared. There will need to be updating, some cleaning up of material, etc, but this is a good way to begin to access what is already a great archival mine of educational material.
We will also be looking in the Shambhala practice and education office for material that dates back to the Office of Three Yana Studies, which created many syllabi with this material during the 1970s and 80s.
If you have curriculum material to send in, you can mail it to the Shambhala Archives, 1084 Tower Road, Halifax, Nova Scotia B3H2Y5 Canada or you can send it as an electronic file to archives@shambhala.org.
Financial Update: Deficit in 2008
We now estimate that there will be cost overruns of about 15%, or approximately $40,000 for the cost of the entire Audio Recovery Project. This is due to a number of factors, including the following: 1) change in US dollar. The US dollar has dropped in value approximately 20% against the Canadian dollar since ARP began. All Canadian businesses/non-profits that rely on US income have been affected. This has reduced our ARP income by over 15% of the total expected. 2) It will take us four to six months longer than originally anticipated to complete the project. We will have additional salary expenses connected with this. 3) We have more material than originally calculated. This is largely because early talks often exceed one hour in length. We were not able to calculate the total number of hours in advance. So we have additional mastering and copying expenses.
Overall, we are extremely proud of how far we have been stretching every dollar and pleased at the amount of work that has been accomplished. Of course, we also wish the budgeting had been 100% accurate. However, the size of the deficit seems manageable if we begin addressing it now.
Financing the Deficit
We are looking at options for handling this deficit. We hope that centers will be able to contribute an additional something additional to the project. We will be contacting you about this in the months to come. In addition, we are looking at other options: 1) a fundraising campaign to solicit additional help from committed donors; 2) an ARP lottery among centres (those not participating in ARP could win almost a complete set of CDs) and also for individuals – with the grand prize being 1,000 ARP CDs or an IPOD loaded with the Vidyadhara’s talks; 3) sales of several smaller CD sets ( such as seminary transcripts and Vajrayogini tris for non ARP centers and individuals), and 4) other creative ideas. We are giving you a heads up now, so that the shortfall will not come as a last minute shock.
ARP Financial Statements
To help all of us keep track of payments made, owing, and due, the Shambhala Archives has begun sending financial statements to you every quarter, indicating when your ARP contributions are due, as well as other charges such as shipping and insurance. We hope these statements will serve as a reminder, to help centres stay up to date in their contributions.
Storage
We continue to highly recommend the MC3D20 cabinets from CanAm, which can be seen at http://www.can-am.ca/ Please mention that you are part of the Audio Recovery Project when you order. If enough centers order, we may receive an additional rebate in the future. Now that you have 500 CDs, you probably can see why you need a cabinet for them!
General storage considerations:
Humidity and Temperature Recommendations
In order to maximize the longevity of the CDs you receive, they should be stored at a cool or moderate temperature, with low to moderate humidity. It is preferable to keep the CDs in a stable temperature- and humidity-controlled environment. If a climate- controlled room is not available, a home dehumidifier can help to remove a great deal of excess humidity from the environment. A window/room air conditioner is very helpful to control high temperatures in the summer. If you cannot provide air-conditioning, then be sure to have adequate ventilation of the room. You can use a window fan to help bring in cool air in the evenings and early mornings. High humidity and temperatures can greatly decrease the life expectancy of the CDs. Specific recommendations for your space can be discussed with Gordon Kidd or Carolyn Gimian.
Additional Information on Storage
If you decide to use some other means of storage, we would suggest that you check out the cabinets on the Can-Am website, to give you some idea of the features you may want to consider. We will be happy to provide you with advice. The key features of your storage system would be: security (a locking cabinet is essential if you want to keep the collection intact) and an inert archival environment (low light and cabinets made of inert materials that don’t off gas. If you choose to use wood shelving, it should be specially treated before use.)
Care and handling of the CDs
Always handle CDs by the edges or inner hub.
Press down on the inner hub to take a CD off the tray (pulling from the edges can bend the disc).
Press on the hub to return the CD to the case.
Remove fingerprints and other embellishments with a soft cloth in a center to edge radial direction (watch for scratches - stop if you make one and use a softer cloth!)
Wash with warm soapy (non-chemical) water if CD is very soiled, dry with a soft cloth in a center to edge radial direction.
Avoid leaving a CD in direct sunlight - i.e. near a sunny window or the dash of a car; sunlight breaks down plastic polymers over time and the CD will not play.
Avoid leaving the CDs out of their cases.
ARP Staff Updates
The names, duties and contact information for all ARP staff appear at the end of the newsletter, in case you need to speak with any of us.
Duplication
Please refer to the attached policy on the duplication of ARP CDs. If you have any questions, please contact us.
Restricted Materials
All centres participating in the Audio Recovery Project will receive 1,500 CDs of the Vidyadhara’s teachings. Access to the content of some recordings is restricted. There may be restrictions on reproduction of these materials for participating centres who are not Shambhala Centres. If due to access restrictions we are not able to provide some recordings to centres outside of Shambhala International, we will provide alternative recordings or a partial refund. This will be negotiated and discussed on an individual basis. We will endeavour to provide the most complete set to the largest number of centres.
Finally
Once again, thank you thank you thank you all – for your participation in the Audio Recovery Project. Please feel free to post this e-mail newsletter in your centre and please forward it to other members of your centre or other parties interested in the Audio Recovery Project.
Yours in Oceans of Dharma,
The Staff of the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives
Centres Participating in the Audio Recovery Project as of Dec 2006
Please note: in some cases, more than one centre is sharing a set of CDs. New participants are indicated in italics.
Canada
1. Halifax Shambhala Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia
2. Dorje Denma Ling, Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia
3. Gampo Abbey, Pleasant Bay, Nova Scotia
4. Toronto Shambhala Centre, Toronto, Ontario
5. Vancouver Shambhala Centre, Vancouver, British Columbia
6. Khyentse Foundation, Vancouver, British Columbia
Mexico
7. Mexico Shambhala Centre
Chile
8. Chile Shambhala Centre
United States of America
9. Washington/Philadelphia
Washington Shambhala Centre, Washington, D.C.
Philadelphia Shambhala Centre, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
10. New York Shambhala Centre, New York, New York
11. Boston Shambhala Centre, Boston, Massachusetts.
12. Karme-Choling Meditation Centre, Barnet, Vermont
13. Southeast Shambhala Centres
Atlanta Shambhala Centre, Atlanta, Georgia
Durham Shambhala Centre, Durham, North Carolina
Birmingham Shambhala Centre, Birmingham, Alabama
14. Chicago Shambhala Centre, Chicago, Illinois
15. Boulder Shambhala Centre, Boulder, Colorado
16. The Naropa University, Boulder, Colorado
17. Shambhala Mountain Centre, Red Feather Lakes, Colorado
18. Dharma Ocean Foundation, Crestone, Colorado
19. Los Angeles Shambhala Centre, Los Angeles, California
20. Ojai Valley Dharma Centre, Ojai, California First Year Only
21. Bay Area Shambhala Centres, California
Berkeley Shambhala Centre, Berkeley
Davis Shambhala Centre, Davis
San Francisco Shambhala Centre, San Francisco
Sonoma Shambhala Centre, Sonoma
Santa Cruz Shambhala Centre, Santa Cruz
Grass Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Grass Valley
Monterey Shambhala Meditation Group, Monterey
Santa Rosa Shambhala Meditation Group, Santa Rosa
Silicon Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Mountain View
Tamalpais Shambhala Meditation Group, San Rafael
Europe
22. Shambhala Europe, Cologne, Germany
23. Longchen Foundation, Oxford, England
Nepal
24. Pullahari Monastery and Retreat Center, Kathmandu, Nepal
Other
25. Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project
26. Shambhala International, Practice and Study Department
27. The family of Chögyam Trungpa
28. Shambhala Archives Reference Set
Audio Recovery Staff and Contact Information
Sandra Kipis: 425-4275 x 22. archives@shambhala.org Administrative Support. Questions about your contract, financial contributions or other administrative details. Also contact Sandra if you have questions about donations to other Archives projects.
Gordon Kidd: 425-4275 x 21. gkidd@shambhala.org Technical Director of the project. Contact Gordon with general as well as specific questions about your participation in ARP. Technical questions can be directed to Gordon or to:
Chris Levy: 425-4275 x 22. clevy@shambhala.org ARP Technician.
Carolyn Gimian: 420-0009. cgimian@suchns.com Overview. Send questions to Carolyn about any aspect of the project that aren’t covered above. Also questions about the content of the tapes, database overview, etc. may be directed to Carolyn or other staff members.
If you do not wish to receive future newsletters and would like to be removed from the distribution list, please send an e-mail to that effect to cgimian@suchns.com
The Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives
Duplication Policy
May 2006
1. The recordings included in the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives are copyrighted materials. These copyrights must be respected. No duplication for commercial purposes, broadcast or for use in any published material is allowed without the express written permission of the Shambhala Archives.
2. Definitions for the purposes of this document:
a. Master: refers to the archival copy provided by the Shambhala Archives to the participating ARP centre.
b. On demand: means that a centre will not duplicate ALL of its ARP masters, but will only duplicate individual CDs as requested by members of the centre or other participating centres.
3. Centres participating in the Audio Recovery Project may make a copy of an individual ARP CD in the following situations or for the following purposes:
a. Where more than one centre is participating in ARP, the centre library that has the master CDs may provide a copy of an individual CD, on demand, to one of the other participating centres.
b. A single copy may be provided to a retreatant, to a teacher preparing for a class, and to a student or teacher wishing to pursue private study.
c. The centre may choose to make an individual copy, on demand, to be played in educational classes, rather than playing the master recording.
4. If a centre not participating in ARP requests a copy of an ARP CD from one of the participating centres, after consulting with Kalapa Recordings or the Shambhala Archives, the participating ARP centre may provide a copy, subject to the requesting centre sending a negotiated payment to the Shambhala Archives.
5. Participating centres will not duplicate the ARP CDs or their contents in any other formats without the express written permission of the Shambhala Archives.
6. If a centre wishes to replace an ARP CD, the replacement charge will be $15/CD up to 10 CDs and 10$/CD thereafter, plus shipping. Replacements may take 6 to 8 weeks.
7. Please contact the Archives if for any reason you want to make multiple copies of a CD. We are working on a license agreement to cover that possibility.
8. As a participating centre, you agree to keep a log of all CDs duplicated, for what purpose copies are made and to whom they are given.
To the Noble Sangha,
I would like to offer my blessings to the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project. The heart of this project is the intention to support and enhance the preservation, propagation, and publication of Trungpa Rinpoche’s vast and profound teachings. Like presidential libraries in the United States, this project will focus on the legacy of my father and help to ensure the living continuity of his priceless teachings.
As scholars, practitioners, and social innovators around the world increasingly come to appreciate the impact of my father on so many aspects of human culture, the need for a specialized reservoir of his teachings becomes ever more necessary. Keeping it under the protection of the Sakyong lineage will be a wonderful step forward in fulfilling the aspirations of the Vidyadhara.
The Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project will also initiate new projects. For example, next year, the twentieth anniversary of his parinirvana, a traveling exhibit of his artwork and belongings might be mounted.
Lady Diana Mukpo has been supporting this project for some time now, and she and other members of the Mukpo family will continue to play a leading role. President Reoch is working closely with the project's acting director, Ms. Carolyn Rose Gimian, to ensure that this initiative proceeds with the encouragement and support of the Shambhala mandala. Within the coming year, there will be a process of consultation on the structure of the foundation, after which the way it will function and be governed will be announced.
I want to express my great appreciation to Carolyn Rose Gimian, whose work as the acting director has been vital in bringing the legacy project into being. She has my full support. All students, young and old, new and senior, please consider how you might contribute in any way you can.
Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche
THE CHÖGYAM TRUNGPA LEGACY PROJECT: DEC 2006
April 4, 2007 will mark the twentieth anniversary of the death of Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche [1940-1987]. We are only now beginning to realize the tremendous scope of his personal contribution to the introduction of authentic Buddhist practice and knowledge in the West. His books are considered classics on meditation and the Buddhist path, and he is certainly one of the most important and influential spiritual teachers of the 20th century.
Chögyam Trungpa presented a truly vast view. He proclaimed not only the entire nine yanas [stages] of the Tibetan Buddhist path, but also the Shambhala path of warriorship and compassionate action. His vision was that the Shambhala teachings could apply equally to practitioners from all of the world’s traditional religious approaches, providing a fundamental ground on which all religious traditions could flourish. He himself was an artist, a poet, and many would say a warrior-statesman. He practiced and offered innumerable skillful means to wake people up, in fields as diverse as art, poetry, psychology, theater, and politics.
In his honor and in his footsteps, please join in establishing the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project. We envision this project as creating a very large tent of dharma—a space as vast and open as Trungpa Rinpoche’s mind, or as close to that as we can project. We want to establish a place for everyone who connects with Rinpoche’s legacy, now and in the future, and we invite you to contribute to manifesting that legacy, keeping it alive in the deepest sense of the word.
Chogyam Trungpa himself described this as the proclamation of “open house.” At the opening of the first Karma Dzong meditation center in Boulder, Colorado in 1972, he said:
This event is a proclamation of open house. Those who want to practice are invited to take part in meditation, to go through the pain, go through the bliss, whatever you experience. Creating an open house situation is a gesture proclaiming that our aim and object are not related with dogma but on trying to encompass all areas of openness. That knowledge can be found throughout the teachings of Tibetan Buddhism or Buddhism in general --Sanskrit Buddhism, Pali Buddhism, or other schools of Buddhism. Since it is known that all dharmas are marked with emptiness, therefore all dharma is marked with openness, at the same time. There is tremendous room to work with chaos or confusion.
The sole purpose of the Chogyam Trungpa Legacy Project is to promote and support the dharma legacy of Chogyam Trungpa, Rinpoche. The Legacy Project will be an independent non-profit foundation incorporated in the United States, in Canada (as a charitable organization) and in Europe, serving to preserve, disseminate and expand Chögyam Trungpa’s legacy. The Legacy Project will support and augment the preservation, propagation and publication of Trungpa Rinpoche’s dharma teachings. It will further these goals through support for existing programs as well as the initiation of new projects and programming. This will include the creation of a comprehensive virtual archive and learning community. The project will also help to create the financial base for current and future generations to support this mission. Through this process, the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project will enhance, enrich, and further inspire existing institutions and other manifestations of the Shambhala world Chögyam Trungpa created.
Chögyam Trungpa came out of a largely monastic and nomadic culture, which had many elements that were still medieval. He moved from that into twentieth century life in the West and embraced the changes, the technologies, and the secular culture he encountered. At the time of his death, the revolution in the home and individual use of computers and the internet was just beginning to be felt. Now, we have the opportunity to use these technologies to create a strong on-line presence and community as one of the cornerstones of the Legacy Project. This project will be based, not in one physical location, but will have an international membership. Like the nomadic culture of Tibet, the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project could set up its tent, sponsoring programs in any number of locations, and then the caravan can move on. Much of the continuity of the project will be maintained and enhanced through communications and information shared via the internet and other electronic means.
The Legacy Project will supplement existing support for activities of the Shambhala Archives, such as the Audio Recovery Project to digitize the recordings of the Vidyadhara’s teachings and make available a complete online inventory of his work. The project may also help to fund and to encourage funding for programs and initiatives already underway at Naropa University to explore the heritage of its founder. These include several new academic courses, an annual series of conferences, and the endowed Vidyadhara Vision Fund, which will support these activities, building toward the possibility of an endowed Chögyam Trungpa chair. Other institutions now and in the future may also sponsor academic research or courses of study which make use of Chogyam Trungpa’s writings. In a spirit of open inquiry, the Legacy Project may provide support for these efforts in the form of funding editors, teachers, and students; providing access to relevant documents and syllabi; and/or providing staff and other expert help. This, in turn, could lead to the publication of new scholarly papers or books building upon Chögyam Trungpa’s original work.
The Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project may also initiate new projects that expand access to the teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, in ways that complement existing efforts or in completely new ways. For example, a traveling exhibit of his artwork and belongings could be initiated, or a series of summer seminars could be offered at various practice centers. In general, the project will support and present both the prajna and the upaya aspects of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche’s dharma legacy. That is to say, we will be working with both the knowledge he imparted and the many methods that he created to transmit his wisdom.
Finally, the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project will establish an endowment to fund its activities and to ensure that the dharma legacy of Chögyam Trungpa remains available to future generations.
The timing is clearly right for the launch of this endeavor. This October, Naropa University begins its yearly conference on Chögyam Trungpa’s life and work. A major documentary film on his life is in the offing. The Collected Works of Chögyam Trungpa were recently published, and a number of books about his life are emerging. The Chronicles of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche (www.chronicleproject.com) has established a major oral history project on the life and teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche. By 2008, all of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche’s oral teachings—more than 5,000 hours of material—will have been digitized. Carolyn Rose Gimian, founding director of the Shambhala Archives, has agreed to act as the director of the Legacy Project during its inception. Lady Diana Mukpo is involved in the planning and execution of the project. Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche has given his blessing to the project. Many of Chögyam Trungpa’s senior students, a number of whom are now teachers, are supporting this endeavor. This is an excellent ground on which to manifest the Big Tent of the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project. We invite you to join in creating something truly worthy of the great gift of teachings which we have received.
How the Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project will evolve depends on all of us. We are now in the early planning stages of this project. Please join us at one of the meetings this fall, or send us your inquiries and suggestions. Individual consultations and meetings can be arranged, if you are unable to attend one of the group meetings.
For information and updates, visit the website: ChogyamTrungpa.com. For more information or to express your interest, please write to: The Chögyam Trungpa Legacy Project c/o ctlp@chogyamtrungpa.com
Legacy Meetings have already occurred or are being scheduled, including the following:
October 23, Boulder, Colorado, Boulder Shambhala Center
November 4, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Halifax Shambhala Center
December 6 to 16 (exact dates not yet confirmed):
Paris, France
London, England
Cologne, Germany
Vienna, Austria
January, 2007, New York, New York
May 2007 Bay Area, California
May 2007, Los Angeles, California
A videotape of the meeting held in Halifax, Nova Scotia, is available, and can be used by groups in other areas wishing to schedule a meeting.
May 2006 ARP Newsletter
Audio Recovery Project Newsletter 3 May 2006
Dear Friends,
This is the third issue of the Audio Recovery Newsletter, which is being sent to all of the centres that are participating in the Audio Recovery Project (ARP) to digitally remaster the recordings of the teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and create digital CD libraries in many locations. The newsletter is also being sent to supporters of the Audio Recovery Project, including individual donors and groups such as the Shambhala Trust, as well as to other interested parties.
The purpose of this newsletter is to provide practical information and updates on the project.
Schedule
This week we will be sending you the second ARP shipment, containing 150 CDs. This brings the total shipped to 250. We expect to ship CDs 2 to 3 times per year, with the final shipment expected just before Shambhala Day 2008.
Schedule updates will be sent in future newsletters. We had hoped to ship 500 CDs by this time, so we are slightly behind. However, production is picking up and is going well in the Archives. We just received word of a grant from the Young Canada Works program of the Government of Canada, which will allow us to have a student for the summer working on ARP production.
Shipping and Insurance
Beginning with the second shipment (the one currently on its way to you), we will begin charging a shipping and insurance fee to all participating ARP centers. The cost of insurance will be approximately $10/shipment for $1,000 of coverage in the US and $1500 coverage in Canada. We are still investigating insurance for Europe, South America and Asia. The insurance will help to cover replacement costs. However, it will be difficult for us to replace a large number of damaged or lost CDs, so we are looking at shipping methods that are both safe and economical.
ARP Financial Statements
To help all of us keep track of payments made, owing, and due, the Shambhala Archives will begin sending financial statements to you every quarter, indicating when your ARP contributions are due, as well as other charges such as shipping and insurance. We hope these statements will serve as a reminder, to help centres stay up to date in their contributions.
Storage
We continue to recommend the MC3D20 cabinets from CanAm, which can be seen at http://www.can-am.ca/ Please mention that you are part of the Audio Recovery Project when you order. If enough centers order, we may receive an additional rebate in the future.
General storage considerations:
Humidity and Temperature Recommendations
In order to maximize the longevity of the CDs you receive, they should be stored at a cool or moderate temperature, with low to moderate humidity. It is preferable to keep the CDs in a stable temperature- and humidity-controlled environment. If a climate- controlled room is not available, a home dehumidifier can help to remove a great deal of excess humidity from the environment. A window/room air conditioner is very helpful to control high temperatures in the summer. If you cannot provide air-conditioning, then be sure to have adequate ventilation of the room. You can use a window fan to help bring in cool air in the evenings and early mornings. High humidity and temperatures can greatly decrease the life expectancy of the CDs. Specific recommendations for your space can be discussed with Gordon Kidd or Carolyn Gimian.
Additional Information on Storage
If you decide to use some other means of storage, we would suggest that you check out the cabinets on the Can-Am website, to give you some idea of the features you may want to consider. We will be happy to provide you with advice. The key features of your storage system would be: security (a locking cabinet is essential if you want to keep the collection intact) and an inert archival environment (low light and cabinets made of inert materials that don’t off gas. If you choose to use wood shelving, it should be specially treated before use.)
Care and handling of the CDs
Always handle CDs by the edges or inner hub.
Press down on the inner hub to take a CD off the tray (pulling from the edges can bend the disc).
Press on the hub to return the CD to the case.
Remove fingerprints and other embellishments with a soft cloth in a center to edge radial direction (watch for scratches - stop if you make one and use a softer cloth!)
Wash with warm soapy (non-chemical) water if CD is very soiled, dry with a soft cloth in a center to edge radial direction.
Avoid leaving a CD in direct sunlight - i.e. near a sunny window or the dash of a car; sunlight breaks down plastic polymers over time and the CD will not play.
Avoid leaving the CDs out of their cases.
ARP Staff Updates
The names, duties and contact information for all ARP staff appear at the end of the newsletter, in case you need to speak with any of us. We would like to welcome Sandra Kipis, who will be helping with duplication, record keeping and shipping. We also wish to thank departing staff members Dominique LeGrande, Helen Bonzi and Rhiannon Wells for their contributions to ARP. (Helen continues to oversee the Great Transcription Project of the Archives.)
Duplication
Please read the attached policy on the duplication of ARP CDs. If you have any questions, please contact us.
Restricted Materials
All centres participating in the Audio Recovery Project will receive 1,500 CDs of the Vidyadhara’s teachings. Access to the content of some recordings is restricted. There may be restrictions on reproduction of these materials for participating centres who are not Shambhala Centres. If due to access restrictions we are not able to provide some recordings to centres outside of Shambhala International, we will provide alternative recordings or a partial refund. This will be negotiated and discussed on an individual basis. We will endeavor to provide the most complete set to the largest number of centres.
A Gift to Say Thank You
We would like to express our thanks to all participating centres and donors by sending a special gift to ARP donors from your centre. We apologize for the delay. In June we will be sending ARP donors a number of copies of one of the newly restored talks by the Vidyadhara. If you have not already done so, please send a list of contributors and others interested in the project to Sandra Kipis: archives@shambhala.org. Please include the address of the donor. We are happy to send a thank-you CD to volunteers who have helped fundraise for ARP in your center or who are helping with another aspect of the project, such as maintaining the library of CDS. We have budgeted for approximately 6 to 10 CDs for each ARP center.
Finally
Once again, thank you thank you thank you all – for your participation in the Audio Recovery Project. Please feel free to post this e-mail newsletter in your centre and please forward it to other members of your centre or other parties interested in the Audio Recovery Project.
Yours in Oceans of Dharma,
The Staff of the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives
Centres Participating in the Audio Recovery Project as of May 2006
Please note: in some cases, more than one centre is sharing a set of CDs. New participants are indicated in italics.
Canada
1. Halifax Shambhala Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia
2. Dorje Denma Ling, Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia
3. Gampo Abbey, Pleasant Bay, Nova Scotia
4. Toronto Shambhala Centre, Toronto, Ontario
5. Vancouver Shambhala Centre, Vancouver, British Columbia
6. Khyentse Foundation, Vancouver, British Columbia
Mexico
7. Mexico Shambhala Centre
Chile
8. Chile Shambhala Centre
United States of America
9. Washington/Philadelphia
Washington Shambhala Centre, Washington, D.C.
Philadelphia Shambhala Centre, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
10. New York Shambhala Centre, New York, New York
11. Boston Shambhala Centre, Boston, Massachusetts.
12. Karme-Choling Meditation Centre, Barnet, Vermont
13. Southeast Shambhala Centres
Atlanta Shambhala Centre, Atlanta, Georgia
Durham Shambhala Centre, Durham, North Carolina
Birmingham Shambhala Centre, Birmingham, Alabama
14. Chicago Shambhala Centre, Chicago, Illinois
15. Boulder Shambhala Centre, Boulder, Colorado
16. The Naropa University, Boulder, Colorado
17. Shambhala Mountain Centre, Red Feather Lakes, Colorado
18. Dharma Ocean Foundation, Crestone, Colorado
19. Los Angeles Shambhala Centre, Los Angeles, California
20. Ojai Valley Dharma Centre, Ojai, California
21. Bay Area Shambhala Centres, California
Berkeley Shambhala Centre, Berkeley
Davis Shambhala Centre, Davis
San Francisco Shambhala Centre, San Francisco
Sonoma Shambhala Centre, Sonoma
Santa Cruz Shambhala Centre, Santa Cruz
Grass Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Grass Valley
Monterey Shambhala Meditation Group, Monterey
Santa Rosa Shambhala Meditation Group, Santa Rosa
Silicon Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Mountain View
Tamalpais Shambhala Meditation Group, San Rafael
Europe
22. Shambhala Europe, Cologne, Germany
23. Longchen Foundation, Oxford, England
Nepal
24. Pullahari Monastery and Retreat Center, Kathmandu, Nepal
Other
25. Chögyam Trungpa Foundation and Institute
26. Shambhala International, Practice and Study Department
27. The family of Chögyam Trungpa
28. Shambhala Archives Reference Set
Audio Recovery Staff and Contact Information
Sandra Kipis: 425-4275 x 22. archives@shambhala.org Administrative Support. Questions about your contract, financial contributions or other administrative details. Also contact Sandra if you have questions about donations to other Archives projects.
Gordon Kidd: 425-4275 x 21. gkidd@shambhala.org Technical Director of the project. Contact Gordon with general as well as specific questions about your participation in ARP. Technical questions can be directed to Gordon or to:
Chris Levy: 425-4275 x 22. clevy@shambhala.org ARP Technician.
Carolyn Gimian: 420-0009. cgimian@suchns.com Overview. Send questions to Carolyn about any aspect of the project that aren’t covered above. Also questions about the content of the tapes, database overview, etc. may be directed to Carolyn or other staff members.
If you do not wish to receive future newsletters and would like to be removed from the distribution list, please send an e-mail to that effect to cgimian@suchns.com
The Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives
Duplication Policy
May 2006
1. The recordings included in the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives are copyrighted materials. These copyrights must be respected. No duplication for commercial purposes, broadcast or for use in any published material is allowed without the express written permission of the Shambhala Archives.
2. Definitions for the purposes of this document:
a. Master: refers to the archival copy provided by the Shambhala Archives to the participating ARP centre.
b. On demand: means that a centre will not duplicate ALL of its ARP masters, but will only duplicate individual CDs as requested by members of the centre or other participating centres.
3. Centres participating in the Audio Recovery Project may make a copy of an individual ARP CD in the following situations or for the following purposes:
a. Where more than one centre is participating in ARP, the centre library that has the master CDs may provide a copy of an individual CD, on demand, to one of the other participating centres.
b. A single copy may be provided to a retreatant, to a teacher preparing for a class, and to a student or teacher wishing to pursue private study.
c. The centre may choose to make an individual copy, on demand, to be played in educational classes, rather than playing the master recording.
4. If a centre not participating in ARP requests a copy of an ARP CD from one of the participating centres, after consulting with Kalapa Recordings or the Shambhala Archives, the participating ARP centre may provide a copy, subject to the requesting centre sending a negotiated payment to the Shambhala Archives.
5. Participating centres will not duplicate the ARP CDs or their contents in any other formats without the express written permission of the Shambhala Archives.
6. If a centre wishes to replace an ARP CD, the replacement charge will be $15/CD up to 10 CDs and 10$/CD thereafter, plus shipping. Replacements may take 6 to 8 weeks.
7. Please contact the Archives if for any reason you want to make multiple copies of a CD. We are working on a license agreement to cover that possibility.
8. As a participating centre, you agree to keep a log of all CDs duplicated, for what purpose copies are made and to whom they are given.
Dear Friends,
This is the third issue of the Audio Recovery Newsletter, which is being sent to all of the centres that are participating in the Audio Recovery Project (ARP) to digitally remaster the recordings of the teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and create digital CD libraries in many locations. The newsletter is also being sent to supporters of the Audio Recovery Project, including individual donors and groups such as the Shambhala Trust, as well as to other interested parties.
The purpose of this newsletter is to provide practical information and updates on the project.
Schedule
This week we will be sending you the second ARP shipment, containing 150 CDs. This brings the total shipped to 250. We expect to ship CDs 2 to 3 times per year, with the final shipment expected just before Shambhala Day 2008.
Schedule updates will be sent in future newsletters. We had hoped to ship 500 CDs by this time, so we are slightly behind. However, production is picking up and is going well in the Archives. We just received word of a grant from the Young Canada Works program of the Government of Canada, which will allow us to have a student for the summer working on ARP production.
Shipping and Insurance
Beginning with the second shipment (the one currently on its way to you), we will begin charging a shipping and insurance fee to all participating ARP centers. The cost of insurance will be approximately $10/shipment for $1,000 of coverage in the US and $1500 coverage in Canada. We are still investigating insurance for Europe, South America and Asia. The insurance will help to cover replacement costs. However, it will be difficult for us to replace a large number of damaged or lost CDs, so we are looking at shipping methods that are both safe and economical.
ARP Financial Statements
To help all of us keep track of payments made, owing, and due, the Shambhala Archives will begin sending financial statements to you every quarter, indicating when your ARP contributions are due, as well as other charges such as shipping and insurance. We hope these statements will serve as a reminder, to help centres stay up to date in their contributions.
Storage
We continue to recommend the MC3D20 cabinets from CanAm, which can be seen at http://www.can-am.ca/ Please mention that you are part of the Audio Recovery Project when you order. If enough centers order, we may receive an additional rebate in the future.
General storage considerations:
Humidity and Temperature Recommendations
In order to maximize the longevity of the CDs you receive, they should be stored at a cool or moderate temperature, with low to moderate humidity. It is preferable to keep the CDs in a stable temperature- and humidity-controlled environment. If a climate- controlled room is not available, a home dehumidifier can help to remove a great deal of excess humidity from the environment. A window/room air conditioner is very helpful to control high temperatures in the summer. If you cannot provide air-conditioning, then be sure to have adequate ventilation of the room. You can use a window fan to help bring in cool air in the evenings and early mornings. High humidity and temperatures can greatly decrease the life expectancy of the CDs. Specific recommendations for your space can be discussed with Gordon Kidd or Carolyn Gimian.
Additional Information on Storage
If you decide to use some other means of storage, we would suggest that you check out the cabinets on the Can-Am website, to give you some idea of the features you may want to consider. We will be happy to provide you with advice. The key features of your storage system would be: security (a locking cabinet is essential if you want to keep the collection intact) and an inert archival environment (low light and cabinets made of inert materials that don’t off gas. If you choose to use wood shelving, it should be specially treated before use.)
Care and handling of the CDs
Always handle CDs by the edges or inner hub.
Press down on the inner hub to take a CD off the tray (pulling from the edges can bend the disc).
Press on the hub to return the CD to the case.
Remove fingerprints and other embellishments with a soft cloth in a center to edge radial direction (watch for scratches - stop if you make one and use a softer cloth!)
Wash with warm soapy (non-chemical) water if CD is very soiled, dry with a soft cloth in a center to edge radial direction.
Avoid leaving a CD in direct sunlight - i.e. near a sunny window or the dash of a car; sunlight breaks down plastic polymers over time and the CD will not play.
Avoid leaving the CDs out of their cases.
ARP Staff Updates
The names, duties and contact information for all ARP staff appear at the end of the newsletter, in case you need to speak with any of us. We would like to welcome Sandra Kipis, who will be helping with duplication, record keeping and shipping. We also wish to thank departing staff members Dominique LeGrande, Helen Bonzi and Rhiannon Wells for their contributions to ARP. (Helen continues to oversee the Great Transcription Project of the Archives.)
Duplication
Please read the attached policy on the duplication of ARP CDs. If you have any questions, please contact us.
Restricted Materials
All centres participating in the Audio Recovery Project will receive 1,500 CDs of the Vidyadhara’s teachings. Access to the content of some recordings is restricted. There may be restrictions on reproduction of these materials for participating centres who are not Shambhala Centres. If due to access restrictions we are not able to provide some recordings to centres outside of Shambhala International, we will provide alternative recordings or a partial refund. This will be negotiated and discussed on an individual basis. We will endeavor to provide the most complete set to the largest number of centres.
A Gift to Say Thank You
We would like to express our thanks to all participating centres and donors by sending a special gift to ARP donors from your centre. We apologize for the delay. In June we will be sending ARP donors a number of copies of one of the newly restored talks by the Vidyadhara. If you have not already done so, please send a list of contributors and others interested in the project to Sandra Kipis: archives@shambhala.org. Please include the address of the donor. We are happy to send a thank-you CD to volunteers who have helped fundraise for ARP in your center or who are helping with another aspect of the project, such as maintaining the library of CDS. We have budgeted for approximately 6 to 10 CDs for each ARP center.
Finally
Once again, thank you thank you thank you all – for your participation in the Audio Recovery Project. Please feel free to post this e-mail newsletter in your centre and please forward it to other members of your centre or other parties interested in the Audio Recovery Project.
Yours in Oceans of Dharma,
The Staff of the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives
Centres Participating in the Audio Recovery Project as of May 2006
Please note: in some cases, more than one centre is sharing a set of CDs. New participants are indicated in italics.
Canada
1. Halifax Shambhala Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia
2. Dorje Denma Ling, Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia
3. Gampo Abbey, Pleasant Bay, Nova Scotia
4. Toronto Shambhala Centre, Toronto, Ontario
5. Vancouver Shambhala Centre, Vancouver, British Columbia
6. Khyentse Foundation, Vancouver, British Columbia
Mexico
7. Mexico Shambhala Centre
Chile
8. Chile Shambhala Centre
United States of America
9. Washington/Philadelphia
Washington Shambhala Centre, Washington, D.C.
Philadelphia Shambhala Centre, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
10. New York Shambhala Centre, New York, New York
11. Boston Shambhala Centre, Boston, Massachusetts.
12. Karme-Choling Meditation Centre, Barnet, Vermont
13. Southeast Shambhala Centres
Atlanta Shambhala Centre, Atlanta, Georgia
Durham Shambhala Centre, Durham, North Carolina
Birmingham Shambhala Centre, Birmingham, Alabama
14. Chicago Shambhala Centre, Chicago, Illinois
15. Boulder Shambhala Centre, Boulder, Colorado
16. The Naropa University, Boulder, Colorado
17. Shambhala Mountain Centre, Red Feather Lakes, Colorado
18. Dharma Ocean Foundation, Crestone, Colorado
19. Los Angeles Shambhala Centre, Los Angeles, California
20. Ojai Valley Dharma Centre, Ojai, California
21. Bay Area Shambhala Centres, California
Berkeley Shambhala Centre, Berkeley
Davis Shambhala Centre, Davis
San Francisco Shambhala Centre, San Francisco
Sonoma Shambhala Centre, Sonoma
Santa Cruz Shambhala Centre, Santa Cruz
Grass Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Grass Valley
Monterey Shambhala Meditation Group, Monterey
Santa Rosa Shambhala Meditation Group, Santa Rosa
Silicon Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Mountain View
Tamalpais Shambhala Meditation Group, San Rafael
Europe
22. Shambhala Europe, Cologne, Germany
23. Longchen Foundation, Oxford, England
Nepal
24. Pullahari Monastery and Retreat Center, Kathmandu, Nepal
Other
25. Chögyam Trungpa Foundation and Institute
26. Shambhala International, Practice and Study Department
27. The family of Chögyam Trungpa
28. Shambhala Archives Reference Set
Audio Recovery Staff and Contact Information
Sandra Kipis: 425-4275 x 22. archives@shambhala.org Administrative Support. Questions about your contract, financial contributions or other administrative details. Also contact Sandra if you have questions about donations to other Archives projects.
Gordon Kidd: 425-4275 x 21. gkidd@shambhala.org Technical Director of the project. Contact Gordon with general as well as specific questions about your participation in ARP. Technical questions can be directed to Gordon or to:
Chris Levy: 425-4275 x 22. clevy@shambhala.org ARP Technician.
Carolyn Gimian: 420-0009. cgimian@suchns.com Overview. Send questions to Carolyn about any aspect of the project that aren’t covered above. Also questions about the content of the tapes, database overview, etc. may be directed to Carolyn or other staff members.
If you do not wish to receive future newsletters and would like to be removed from the distribution list, please send an e-mail to that effect to cgimian@suchns.com
The Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives
Duplication Policy
May 2006
1. The recordings included in the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives are copyrighted materials. These copyrights must be respected. No duplication for commercial purposes, broadcast or for use in any published material is allowed without the express written permission of the Shambhala Archives.
2. Definitions for the purposes of this document:
a. Master: refers to the archival copy provided by the Shambhala Archives to the participating ARP centre.
b. On demand: means that a centre will not duplicate ALL of its ARP masters, but will only duplicate individual CDs as requested by members of the centre or other participating centres.
3. Centres participating in the Audio Recovery Project may make a copy of an individual ARP CD in the following situations or for the following purposes:
a. Where more than one centre is participating in ARP, the centre library that has the master CDs may provide a copy of an individual CD, on demand, to one of the other participating centres.
b. A single copy may be provided to a retreatant, to a teacher preparing for a class, and to a student or teacher wishing to pursue private study.
c. The centre may choose to make an individual copy, on demand, to be played in educational classes, rather than playing the master recording.
4. If a centre not participating in ARP requests a copy of an ARP CD from one of the participating centres, after consulting with Kalapa Recordings or the Shambhala Archives, the participating ARP centre may provide a copy, subject to the requesting centre sending a negotiated payment to the Shambhala Archives.
5. Participating centres will not duplicate the ARP CDs or their contents in any other formats without the express written permission of the Shambhala Archives.
6. If a centre wishes to replace an ARP CD, the replacement charge will be $15/CD up to 10 CDs and 10$/CD thereafter, plus shipping. Replacements may take 6 to 8 weeks.
7. Please contact the Archives if for any reason you want to make multiple copies of a CD. We are working on a license agreement to cover that possibility.
8. As a participating centre, you agree to keep a log of all CDs duplicated, for what purpose copies are made and to whom they are given.
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Here comes the ARP Blog
I am posting the newsletters from the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives. Somehow I lost the text of the first one, but here is the second newsletter:
Audio Recovery Project Newsletter 2 December 2005
*** PLEASE NOTE TIME SENSITIVE SPECIAL OFFER BELOW ***
Dear Friends,
This is the second issue of the Audio Recovery Newsletter, which is being sent to all of the centres that are participating in the Audio Recovery Project (ARP) to digitally remaster the recordings of the teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and create digital CD libraries in many locations. The newsletter is also being sent to supporters of the Audio Recovery Project, including individual donors and groups such as the Shambhala Trust, as well as to other interested parties.
The purpose of this newsletter is to provide practical information and updates on the project. However, we want to begin again with a big
WELCOME
to everyone who is joining in. We have several new groups joining us since the summer. A list of participating centres appears at the end of the newsletter.
Storage: Special Offer Extended Until December 31, 2005
SPECIAL OFFER: Recommended Storage Cabinets
THIS IS A GREAT OFFER! WHERE ARE YOU GOING TO PUT 1,500 CDs?
We recommend the MC3D20 cabinets from Can-Am, which can be seen at http://www.can-am.ca/. Two cabinets will hold all 1,500 of the ARP CDs. They are quite reasonably priced at $499 CAN or $469 US each. The Shambhala Archives will be using these cabinets for our storage of the master sets of the CDs. In addition to meeting archival standards, the cabinets are compact and secure. Between now and December 15th, you can order these cabinets at a 10% discount directly from Can-Am at the website above. Please mention that you are part of the Audio Recovery Project when you order. If enough centers order, we may receive an additional rebate in the future. In the new year, prices may increase, so we recommend you order now.
Originally, we hoped to place a bulk order. However, it is easier for us and for Can-Am if you order directly and simply mention your association with us. We will notify you if there is a rebate.
General storage considerations:
Humidity and Temperature Recommendations
In order to maximize the longevity of the CDs you receive, they should be stored at a cool or moderate temperature, with low to moderate humidity. It is preferable to keep the CDs in a stable temperature- and humidity-controlled environment. If a climate- controlled room is not available, a home dehumidifier can help to remove a great deal of excess humidity from the environment. A window/room air conditioner is very helpful to control high temperatures in the summer. If you cannot provide air-conditioning, then be sure to have adequate ventilation of the room. You can use a window fan to help bring in cool air in the evenings and early mornings. High humidity and temperatures can greatly decrease the life expectancy of the CDs. Specific recommendations for your space can be discussed with Gordon Kidd or Carolyn Gimian.
Additional Information on Storage
If you decide to use some other means of storage, we would suggest that you check out the cabinets on the Can-Am website, to give you some idea of the features you may want to consider. We will be happy to provide you with advice. The key features of your storage system would be: security (a locking cabinet is essential if you want to keep the collection intact) and an inert archival environment (low light and cabinets made of inert materials that don’t off gas. If you choose to use wood shelving, it should be specially treated before use.)
New Staff Member Joins ARP:
The names, duties and contact information for all ARP staff appears at the end of the newsletter, in case you need to speak with any of us. We would like to welcome our new Audio Recovery Assistant, Rhiannon Wells, who will be helping with duplication, record keeping and shipping. She is included in the staff list at the end of the newsletter.
Schedule
The first shipment of ARP CDs was planned for October. Duplication of the first 100 CDs was delayed, due to compatibility problems between the duplicator, the printer and the CDs themselves. These have now been resolved, and we are sending this newsletter with the first shipment, as well as e-mailing it to all parties. We decided to start with a smaller group of CDs, in order to fine tune our systems and work out the “kinks.” A list of the first group of CDs is appended to this newsletter. They are all from 1970 and 1971. This is a terrific body of material.
Between now and Shambhala Day, February 27, 2006, we expect to ship another 200 CDs, which will put us almost on schedule. We’ll update you as soon as we have a firm date for the next shipment.
We expect to ship CDs 2 to 3 times per year, with the final shipment expected just before Shambhala Day 2008. We plan to hire students over the summer to do full time duplication, so expect big shipments in August and September!
In 2007, we will provide a database for the material, which will also include information on the content of the CDs, for educational and research purposes.
Schedule updates will be sent in future newsletters.
Making Copies
We are currently working on a general policy for copying of the CDs provided to you. We invite your input. The policy will allow limited copying for educational and conservation purposes within your “ARP network.” Thus, if two or more centres are sharing a set of CD’s we will allow you to make individual copies of CD’s as needed for your educational needs. Additionally, if you want to use CDs for a weekend at your centre but you prefer not to use your master set, we will allow you to make a single copy so that the masters remain in your library. We will ask you to send us a record of copies made each year. We are discussing the pros and cons of allowing limited creation of MP3 files for your duplicating needs. We must respect the copyrights to these recordings; at the same time, we want to make it possible for you to use this collection widely. We will ask you to agree not to publish any materials based on the CDs without the express written permission of the Archives and of the copyright holder. Please send your comments and suggestions for the copying policy to Carolyn Gimian at cgimian@suchns.com. We will finalize the policy between now and Shambhala Day, 2007. If you want to make any copies before then, please contact me directly at the e-mail address above. Please keep a record of any copies you make. Thank you.
Restricted Materials
All centres participating in the Audio Recovery Project will receive 1,500 CDs of the Vidyadhara’s teachings. Access to the content of some recordings is restricted. There may be restrictions on reproduction of these materials for participating centres who are not Shambhala Centres. If due to access restrictions we are not able to provide some recordings to centres outside of Shambhala International, we will provide alternative recordings or a partial refund. This will be negotiated and discussed on an individual basis. We will endeavor to provide the most complete set to the largest number of centres. We will update you when we have more information on this.
Shipping
We have not discussed shipping charges with most of the participating centres. We are investigating what it will cost to ship the CDs to you by various methods. We hope to be able to cover most of the costs of shipping within North America, depending on how you want the CDs shipped to you. For participating centres outside of the U.S., we will work with you to find a reasonable but secure method of shipping to your location. As you know, shipping costs have increased with the rising costs of fuel. We are covering the shipping charges within North America for the first shipment. We will contact you regarding charges related to future shipments.
A Gift to Say Thank You
We would like to express our thanks to all participating centres and donors by sending a special gift for your centre. Between now and Shambhala Day, we will be sending a number of copies of one of the newly restored talks by the Vidyadhara to you, to give to contributors and others interested in the project.
Future Newsletters
We will be sending updates on the progress of the Audio Recovery Project on a regular basis, as the project develops.
Finally
Once again, our deepest thanks for your participation in the Audio Recovery Project.
Please feel free to post this e-mail newsletter in your centre and please forward it to other members of your centre or other parties interested in the Audio Recovery Project.
Yours in Oceans of Dharma,
The Staff of the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives
Helen Bonzi: 425-4275 x 22. hbonzi@shambhala.org Administrative Support. Questions about your contract, financial contributions or other administrative details.
Gordon Kidd: 425-4275 x 21. gkidd@shambhala.org Technical Director of the project. Contact Gordon with general as well as specific questions about your participation in ARP. Technical questions can be directed to Gordon or to:
Chris Levy: 425-4275 x 22. clevy@shambhala.org ARP Technician.
Rhiannon Wells: 425-4275 x 22. rwells@shambhala.org ARP Assistant
Carolyn Gimian: 902-420-0009. cgimian@suchns.com Overview. Send questions to Carolyn about any aspect of the project that aren’t covered above. Also questions about the content of the tapes, database overview, etc. may be directed to Carolyn or other staff members.
Dominique Le Grand: 421-1550, x 2. dlegrand@shambhala.org If you have questions about donations to other Archives related activities.
Centres Participating in the Audio Recovery Project, November 2005
Please note: in some cases, more than one centre is sharing a set of CDs.
Canada
Halifax Shambhala Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia
Dorje Denma Ling, Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia
Gampo Abbey, Pleasant Bay, Nova Scotia
Toronto Shambhala Centre, Toronto, Ontario
Vancouver Shambhala Centre, Vancouver, British Columbia
Khyentse Foundation, Vancouver, British Columbia
Mexico
Mexico Shambhala Centre
Chile
Chile Shambhala Centre
United States of America
Washington/Philadelphia
Washington Shambhala Centre, Washington, D.C.
Philadelphia Shambhala Centre, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
New York Shambhala Centre, New York, New York
Karme-Choling Meditation Centre, Barnet, Vermont
Southeast Shambhala Centres
Atlanta Shambhala Centre, Atlanta, Georgia
Durham Shambhala Centre, Durham, North Carolina
Birmingham Shambhala Centre, Birmingham, Alabama
Chicago Shambhala Centre, Chicago, Illinois
Boulder Shambhala Centre, Boulder, Colorado
The Naropa University, Boulder, Colorado
Shambhala Mountain Centre, Red Feather Lakes, Colorado
Dharma Ocean Foundation, Crestone, Colorado
Los Angeles Shambhala Centre, Los Angeles, California
Ojai Valley Dharma Centre, Ojai, California
Bay Area Shambhala Centres, California
Berkeley Shambhala Centre, Berkeley
Davis Shambhala Centre, Davis
San Francisco Shambhala Centre, San Francisco
Sonoma Shambhala Centre, Sonoma
Santa Cruz Shambhala Centre, Santa Cruz
Grass Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Grass Valley
Monterey Shambhala Meditation Group, Monterey
Santa Rosa Shambhala Meditation Group, Santa Rosa
Silicon Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Mountain View
Tamalpais Shambhala Meditation Group, San Rafael
Europe
Shambhala Europe, Cologne, Germany
Nepal
Pullahari Monastery and Retreat Center, Kathmandu, Nepal
Institutional Sets within Shambhala International
Shambhala International Practice and Study
Shambhala Archives
Family of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche
Future Home of the Chogyam Trungpa Institute
Several other groups are considering joining the Audio Recovery Project. Future newsletters will include updates.
Audio Recovery Project Newsletter 2 December 2005
*** PLEASE NOTE TIME SENSITIVE SPECIAL OFFER BELOW ***
Dear Friends,
This is the second issue of the Audio Recovery Newsletter, which is being sent to all of the centres that are participating in the Audio Recovery Project (ARP) to digitally remaster the recordings of the teachings of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and create digital CD libraries in many locations. The newsletter is also being sent to supporters of the Audio Recovery Project, including individual donors and groups such as the Shambhala Trust, as well as to other interested parties.
The purpose of this newsletter is to provide practical information and updates on the project. However, we want to begin again with a big
WELCOME
to everyone who is joining in. We have several new groups joining us since the summer. A list of participating centres appears at the end of the newsletter.
Storage: Special Offer Extended Until December 31, 2005
SPECIAL OFFER: Recommended Storage Cabinets
THIS IS A GREAT OFFER! WHERE ARE YOU GOING TO PUT 1,500 CDs?
We recommend the MC3D20 cabinets from Can-Am, which can be seen at http://www.can-am.ca/. Two cabinets will hold all 1,500 of the ARP CDs. They are quite reasonably priced at $499 CAN or $469 US each. The Shambhala Archives will be using these cabinets for our storage of the master sets of the CDs. In addition to meeting archival standards, the cabinets are compact and secure. Between now and December 15th, you can order these cabinets at a 10% discount directly from Can-Am at the website above. Please mention that you are part of the Audio Recovery Project when you order. If enough centers order, we may receive an additional rebate in the future. In the new year, prices may increase, so we recommend you order now.
Originally, we hoped to place a bulk order. However, it is easier for us and for Can-Am if you order directly and simply mention your association with us. We will notify you if there is a rebate.
General storage considerations:
Humidity and Temperature Recommendations
In order to maximize the longevity of the CDs you receive, they should be stored at a cool or moderate temperature, with low to moderate humidity. It is preferable to keep the CDs in a stable temperature- and humidity-controlled environment. If a climate- controlled room is not available, a home dehumidifier can help to remove a great deal of excess humidity from the environment. A window/room air conditioner is very helpful to control high temperatures in the summer. If you cannot provide air-conditioning, then be sure to have adequate ventilation of the room. You can use a window fan to help bring in cool air in the evenings and early mornings. High humidity and temperatures can greatly decrease the life expectancy of the CDs. Specific recommendations for your space can be discussed with Gordon Kidd or Carolyn Gimian.
Additional Information on Storage
If you decide to use some other means of storage, we would suggest that you check out the cabinets on the Can-Am website, to give you some idea of the features you may want to consider. We will be happy to provide you with advice. The key features of your storage system would be: security (a locking cabinet is essential if you want to keep the collection intact) and an inert archival environment (low light and cabinets made of inert materials that don’t off gas. If you choose to use wood shelving, it should be specially treated before use.)
New Staff Member Joins ARP:
The names, duties and contact information for all ARP staff appears at the end of the newsletter, in case you need to speak with any of us. We would like to welcome our new Audio Recovery Assistant, Rhiannon Wells, who will be helping with duplication, record keeping and shipping. She is included in the staff list at the end of the newsletter.
Schedule
The first shipment of ARP CDs was planned for October. Duplication of the first 100 CDs was delayed, due to compatibility problems between the duplicator, the printer and the CDs themselves. These have now been resolved, and we are sending this newsletter with the first shipment, as well as e-mailing it to all parties. We decided to start with a smaller group of CDs, in order to fine tune our systems and work out the “kinks.” A list of the first group of CDs is appended to this newsletter. They are all from 1970 and 1971. This is a terrific body of material.
Between now and Shambhala Day, February 27, 2006, we expect to ship another 200 CDs, which will put us almost on schedule. We’ll update you as soon as we have a firm date for the next shipment.
We expect to ship CDs 2 to 3 times per year, with the final shipment expected just before Shambhala Day 2008. We plan to hire students over the summer to do full time duplication, so expect big shipments in August and September!
In 2007, we will provide a database for the material, which will also include information on the content of the CDs, for educational and research purposes.
Schedule updates will be sent in future newsletters.
Making Copies
We are currently working on a general policy for copying of the CDs provided to you. We invite your input. The policy will allow limited copying for educational and conservation purposes within your “ARP network.” Thus, if two or more centres are sharing a set of CD’s we will allow you to make individual copies of CD’s as needed for your educational needs. Additionally, if you want to use CDs for a weekend at your centre but you prefer not to use your master set, we will allow you to make a single copy so that the masters remain in your library. We will ask you to send us a record of copies made each year. We are discussing the pros and cons of allowing limited creation of MP3 files for your duplicating needs. We must respect the copyrights to these recordings; at the same time, we want to make it possible for you to use this collection widely. We will ask you to agree not to publish any materials based on the CDs without the express written permission of the Archives and of the copyright holder. Please send your comments and suggestions for the copying policy to Carolyn Gimian at cgimian@suchns.com. We will finalize the policy between now and Shambhala Day, 2007. If you want to make any copies before then, please contact me directly at the e-mail address above. Please keep a record of any copies you make. Thank you.
Restricted Materials
All centres participating in the Audio Recovery Project will receive 1,500 CDs of the Vidyadhara’s teachings. Access to the content of some recordings is restricted. There may be restrictions on reproduction of these materials for participating centres who are not Shambhala Centres. If due to access restrictions we are not able to provide some recordings to centres outside of Shambhala International, we will provide alternative recordings or a partial refund. This will be negotiated and discussed on an individual basis. We will endeavor to provide the most complete set to the largest number of centres. We will update you when we have more information on this.
Shipping
We have not discussed shipping charges with most of the participating centres. We are investigating what it will cost to ship the CDs to you by various methods. We hope to be able to cover most of the costs of shipping within North America, depending on how you want the CDs shipped to you. For participating centres outside of the U.S., we will work with you to find a reasonable but secure method of shipping to your location. As you know, shipping costs have increased with the rising costs of fuel. We are covering the shipping charges within North America for the first shipment. We will contact you regarding charges related to future shipments.
A Gift to Say Thank You
We would like to express our thanks to all participating centres and donors by sending a special gift for your centre. Between now and Shambhala Day, we will be sending a number of copies of one of the newly restored talks by the Vidyadhara to you, to give to contributors and others interested in the project.
Future Newsletters
We will be sending updates on the progress of the Audio Recovery Project on a regular basis, as the project develops.
Finally
Once again, our deepest thanks for your participation in the Audio Recovery Project.
Please feel free to post this e-mail newsletter in your centre and please forward it to other members of your centre or other parties interested in the Audio Recovery Project.
Yours in Oceans of Dharma,
The Staff of the Audio Recovery Project of the Shambhala Archives
Helen Bonzi: 425-4275 x 22. hbonzi@shambhala.org Administrative Support. Questions about your contract, financial contributions or other administrative details.
Gordon Kidd: 425-4275 x 21. gkidd@shambhala.org Technical Director of the project. Contact Gordon with general as well as specific questions about your participation in ARP. Technical questions can be directed to Gordon or to:
Chris Levy: 425-4275 x 22. clevy@shambhala.org ARP Technician.
Rhiannon Wells: 425-4275 x 22. rwells@shambhala.org ARP Assistant
Carolyn Gimian: 902-420-0009. cgimian@suchns.com Overview. Send questions to Carolyn about any aspect of the project that aren’t covered above. Also questions about the content of the tapes, database overview, etc. may be directed to Carolyn or other staff members.
Dominique Le Grand: 421-1550, x 2. dlegrand@shambhala.org If you have questions about donations to other Archives related activities.
Centres Participating in the Audio Recovery Project, November 2005
Please note: in some cases, more than one centre is sharing a set of CDs.
Canada
Halifax Shambhala Centre, Halifax, Nova Scotia
Dorje Denma Ling, Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia
Gampo Abbey, Pleasant Bay, Nova Scotia
Toronto Shambhala Centre, Toronto, Ontario
Vancouver Shambhala Centre, Vancouver, British Columbia
Khyentse Foundation, Vancouver, British Columbia
Mexico
Mexico Shambhala Centre
Chile
Chile Shambhala Centre
United States of America
Washington/Philadelphia
Washington Shambhala Centre, Washington, D.C.
Philadelphia Shambhala Centre, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
New York Shambhala Centre, New York, New York
Karme-Choling Meditation Centre, Barnet, Vermont
Southeast Shambhala Centres
Atlanta Shambhala Centre, Atlanta, Georgia
Durham Shambhala Centre, Durham, North Carolina
Birmingham Shambhala Centre, Birmingham, Alabama
Chicago Shambhala Centre, Chicago, Illinois
Boulder Shambhala Centre, Boulder, Colorado
The Naropa University, Boulder, Colorado
Shambhala Mountain Centre, Red Feather Lakes, Colorado
Dharma Ocean Foundation, Crestone, Colorado
Los Angeles Shambhala Centre, Los Angeles, California
Ojai Valley Dharma Centre, Ojai, California
Bay Area Shambhala Centres, California
Berkeley Shambhala Centre, Berkeley
Davis Shambhala Centre, Davis
San Francisco Shambhala Centre, San Francisco
Sonoma Shambhala Centre, Sonoma
Santa Cruz Shambhala Centre, Santa Cruz
Grass Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Grass Valley
Monterey Shambhala Meditation Group, Monterey
Santa Rosa Shambhala Meditation Group, Santa Rosa
Silicon Valley Shambhala Meditation Group, Mountain View
Tamalpais Shambhala Meditation Group, San Rafael
Europe
Shambhala Europe, Cologne, Germany
Nepal
Pullahari Monastery and Retreat Center, Kathmandu, Nepal
Institutional Sets within Shambhala International
Shambhala International Practice and Study
Shambhala Archives
Family of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche
Future Home of the Chogyam Trungpa Institute
Several other groups are considering joining the Audio Recovery Project. Future newsletters will include updates.
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