Re: [atlarge-discuss] call for a webmaster

[Jeff Williams <jwkckid1@ix.netcom.com>]

Andrew and all stakeholders or other interested parties,

  Andrew, I for one am glad your on board.  I really hope
you will stay on board as well. Members such as yourself
are sorely needed.  I sympathize with, and understand
your comments below, especially in the area of outreach.

Andrew Bloch wrote:

> From: "Gary Osbourne" <gro@direct.ca>
> Sent: Monday, July 15, 2002 8:55 PM
> > If the atlarge can't find enough folks willing
> > and able to provide pro bono the necessary time
> > and expertise out of 850 members (and perhaps
> > others as I thought you'd agreed with) to run a
> > website then I can't see why ICANN should take
> > them seriously. If 850+ folks can't even manage
> > to run one website, why should their opinions
> > be taken seriously about running the internet?
> >
> > Why must collective ownership be due to cash,
> > why can donations not be made in kind? Because
> > that way the work gets done but no money changes
> > hands? I don't see that as a bug, it's a feature.
>
> I agree.  I can't believe that an upstart organization that is supposed to
> be democratic and bottom-up would even think about paying for a webmaster.
> I was shocked when I heard that Joop submitted an invoice (even if he did it
> primarily to spur the panel to act). If you truly want this to be a
> bottom-up, democratic organization, you should try to involve as many people
> as possible as full participants in the organization.  Setting up and
> running a website of the sort that At-large currently needs is a fairly
> trivial task for someone with the right (free) software and a minimal amount
> of experience, and there are probably dozens of At-large members who have
> this ability (including myself, though I'm not sure I even want to remain a
> member after the last 2 months of nonsense).
>
> Creating and updating the content is a much more time consuming task, but
> one which can and ought to be shared by as many people as possible.  Think
> of a community of people like slashdot.org.
>
> Speaking of slashdot, that and other websites like it would be a good place
> to do outreach.  Get stories posted about this atlarge effort and I'm sure
> you'd see a spike in new membership (and probably find a few willing
> webmasters in the process).  But outreach should have been done well before
> elections.  I can't imagine that many people would be interested in joining
> after the elections with the next one so far down the road.
>
> Finally, a comment about outreach.  It's not enough just to get people to
> join.  You also want to get them involved and keep them involved, and keep
> them from leaving.  You should try to get people to join discussions that
> haven't before, and encourage them to continue.  Take me, for example.  Last
> month I sent an email to this list, and I got exactly 2 private responses.
> Here's the full body of those responses: "Thanks" and "Vote early, and
> often."  If you take outreach and bottom-up participation seriously, at
> minimum I should have gotten 7 brief responses (but at least 2 sentences),
> one from each panel member.  Someone should have encouraged me to get more
> involved.
>
> Right now, I'd have to call the current atlarge effort a near disaster.  But
> I'm an optimist and there may be some slim window of opportunity left.
>
> Andy Bloch
>
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Regards,
--
Jeffrey A. Williams
Spokesman for INEGroup - (Over 124k members/stakeholders strong!)
CEO/DIR. Internet Network Eng/SR. Java/CORBA Development Eng.
Information Network Eng. Group. INEG. INC.
E-Mail jwkckid1@ix.netcom.com
Contact Number:  972-244-3801 or 214-244-4827
Address: 5 East Kirkwood Blvd. Grapevine Texas 75208



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