Hustling for Funding

Abstract

This chapter focuses on the role of finance and the politics of collaboration, charting the development of the Digital Repository of Ireland (DRI). DRI have been beset with institutional politics concerning its framing, development, and operation. The future funding issue was just the latest example in a long list of fraught exchanges that could be traced back to its original conception and funding mechanism. The DRI was born out of a funding opportunity, but seemed destined to die due to a funding failure. Without a political solution, the data life cycle would turn full circle much more quickly than initially anticipated. Unless there is a means of covering the costs for labour, equipment and other essential inputs, data are not generated or stored, and thus cannot be used or shared. Even in open data projects, the data might be free to use but they were not free to create, or to process and host.