Week 6 already!! Meeting time

[Leigh Blackall]

Some of you who are using your RSS news readers will have noticed that the course blog has been updated :) There's another meeting coming!! I hope you can make it...


____Start copy of blog post____

There will be a meeting in the 24/7 Meeting Room to discuss this and next week. There are two meeting times to choose from. UTC 8am Thursday the 4th of September (8pm 4th Sept in NZ) or UTC 9pm Wednesday the 3rd of September (9am 4th Sept in NZ).

So we're focusing in on discussion forums this week, and only for the week. We have been going slowly up until now, spending 2 weeks on the foundation topics. Now we get down to business looking for evidence of community in a range of online environments, and thinking about what facilitation techniques might be appropriate in that context.

So, find yourself a few discussion forums. Preferably open access ones so we can all refer to what you are looking at. Browse Google Groups if you like, but there are many many other forum services to choose from.

Then go back to the question, what is an online community? See if you can settle on at least three indicators of an online community to use to analyse those you are looking at, such as: Has at least 10 active members, has a leader, is current and regular in postings.. (just off the top of my head - yours might be different indicators). Compare and contrast the forums you have found based on the indicators you are using.

Finally, consider the question of facilitation, teaching and moderation.. and make a suggestion of how you might go about facilitating one of the discussion forums you are looking at. What communication skills might you use or not use? Would you use the telephone to contact members of the discussion forum community? Would you email people privately? Would you moderate arguments and delete insulting content? Would you require dialog in the discussion forum - or will announcements be ok. etc.

Good luck, and hope to see you in the meetings.

--
Posted By Leigh Blackall to Facilitating Online Communities at 9/02/2008 04:29:00 PM

--
--
Leigh Blackall
+64(0)21736539
skype - leigh_blackall
SL - Leroy Goalpost
http://learnonline.wordpress.com

[artie]

Thanks for that extra info on this part. It gets me motivated to think and write.

[Amy Lenzo]

Thanks Leigh,

In previous meeting announcements you’ve included a link to a page with the times in various zones. Can you do that again, as I’m embarrassed to say I’m having trouble translating these times into my own.

Amy



Leigh Blackall9/1/08 10:20 PM

Some of you who are using your RSS news readers will have noticed that the course blog has been updated :) There's another meeting coming!! I hope you can make it...

____Start copy of blog post <http://facilitatingonlinecommunities.blogspot.com/2008/09/week-6-already-meeting-time.html> ____



 <http://flickr.com/photos/cogdog/265744860/> There will be a meeting in the 24/7 Meeting Room <http://tinyurl.com/6ne2uv>  to discuss this and next week. There are two meeting times to choose from. UTC 8am Thursday the 4th of September (8pm 4th Sept in NZ) or UTC 9pm Wednesday the 3rd of September (9am 4th Sept in NZ).

So we're focusing in on discussion forums this week, and only for the week. We have been going slowly up until now, spending 2 weeks on the foundation topics. Now we get down to business looking for evidence of community in a range of online environments, and thinking about what facilitation techniques might be appropriate in that context.

So, find yourself a few discussion forums. Preferably open access ones so we can all refer to what you are looking at. Browse Google Groups if you like, but there are many many other forum services to choose from.

Then go back to the question, what is an online community? See if you can settle on at least three indicators of an online community to use to analyse those you are looking at, such as: Has at least 10 active members, has a leader, is current and regular in postings.. (just off the top of my head - yours might be different indicators). Compare and contrast the forums you have found based on the indicators you are using.

Finally, consider the question of facilitation, teaching and moderation.. and make a suggestion of how you might go about facilitating one of the discussion forums you are looking at. What communication skills might you use or not use? Would you use the telephone to contact members of the discussion forum community? Would you email people privately? Would you moderate arguments and delete insulting content? Would you require dialog in the discussion forum - or will announcements be ok. etc.

Good luck, and hope to see you in the meetings.

--
Posted By  Leigh Blackall  to  Facilitating Online Communities <http://facilitatingonlinecommunities.blogspot.com/2008/09/week-6-already-meeting-time.html>   at  9/02/2008 04:29:00 PM

[Barbara Dieu]

Hello Amy,
Here are the converted times, from what I have managed to understand. Check the corresponding time in your area from these URLs
UTC 9pm Wednesday 3rd of September  = <http://tinyurl.com/6h95ts>
UTC 8am Thursday 4th of September = < http://tinyurl.com/5kpbq7>

Warm regards from Brazil,
Bee

--
Barbara Dieu
http://dekita.org
http://beespace.net

[Leigh Blackall]

Thanks Barbara,

Amy, all.. it is a good thing to know how many hours you are + or - in relation to Universal Time Code (UTC). NZ, for example is +12 hours - so when someone says to me, "meeting at 9am UTC" I know that means 9pm for me, because I simply add 12 hours. If you are minus 6 hours, then you know the time for you will be 3am (poor devil :)

Once you know how many hours you are in relation to UTC (GMT) then it becomes much easier to coordinate meetings.

Unfortunately, people in the USA are not well practiced at this, and confuse us all with their EST, PST etc. EST Stands for Eastern Standard Time and PST for Pacific Standard Time. Not helpful at all! Not only do we all now have to know how many hours we are in relation to those American continent time zones - other continents also have EST - such as Australia, where their EST is Sydney time!

Much easier if we all coordinate around Universal Time Code (UTC) which is the same is Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)

[artie]

Workshop

Workshop

 

Clocks and Time

Clocks and Time

 

Arranging Appointments

Arranging Appointments

 

Workshop

Workshop

 

On 02/09/2008, Leigh Blackall <leighb...@gmail.com> wrote:

[mireille]

There goes my beauty sleep. I'm at 4am in the morning Toronto time.

Mireille

On Sep 2, 1:20 am, "Leigh Blackall" <leighblack...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Some of you who are using your RSS news readers will have noticed that the
> course blog has been updated :) There's another meeting coming!! I hope you
> can make it...
>
> ____Start copy of blog

> post<http://facilitatingonlinecommunities.blogspot.com/2008/09/week-6-alre...>
> ____
>
> <http://flickr.com/photos/cogdog/265744860/>There will be a meeting in the
> 24/7 Meeting Room <http://tinyurl.com/6ne2uv> to discuss this and next week.

> Communities<http://facilitatingonlinecommunities.blogspot.com/2008/09/week-6-alre...>at

[Leigh Blackall]

Mireille

There goes my beauty sleep.  I'm at 4am in the morning Toronto time.

There were 2 meeting times Mireille. One at 9pm and another at 8am UTC.

[artie]

"There goes my beauty sleep.  I'm at 4am in the morning Toronto time" - Mireille

 

That's why we need to learn how to tell online time and arrange online appointments.


 

[artie]

Here's a world map of time zones.
http://www.physicalgeography.net/fundamentals/images/world_time2.gif
+-12 Leigh
+11
+10
+9
+8
+7
+6
+5
+4 Vida (night shift?) Minhaaj ur Rehman (night shift)
+3
+2 Nellie
+1 Illya
0 GMT
-1
-2
-3 Bee, Pedro, Doris, Carla Arena, phefland
-4 Artie, Greg?, Sean?
-5 Nancy, Bruna, Mireille (night shift?)
-6 ElderBob?
-7
-8 Meldinme?
-9
-10
-11

How accurate is this? Anybody missing? Note that 12 of the 17 listed
are in the Americas, so it's natural that we should speak of CST and
EST etc. If we are going to learn online time, then let's do it as a
coordinated effort in small 3 or 4 person workshops scheduled to our
local time zone neighborhoods. That way we can build increased
knowledge of online time upon what we already know about it.

Although I know that we are all adults, I don't think that anyone
here, including myself, is any more knowledgeable than a kindergartner
at telling online time. It might be good to get humble about the very
basic elements of communication arts, admit our ignorance, and make
some commitment to helping eachother learn.

[Barbara Dieu]

Or 5 pm for you today, Mireille. You are just one hour behind me  so it will be 6pm for me :-)
The World Clock is an easy way for everyone to check their times if unsure. Once you have positioned yourself in UTC as Leigh suggested, you can set a fixed time and everyone else will check their own times. An explanation on how to do it here:
<http://groups.google.com/group/facilitating-online-communities/msg/9f0b290ba2628fdd>

Leigh has chosen two different times - one am and the other pm so many more can participate. Not everyone will because we all have our own things to do - so if you cannot, you have the possibility of reading the text chat and listening to the exchange.

Another way of deciding on an appointment of a more "general consensus" is by using one of the tools Sylvia Currie suggested in a previous post.
<http://groups.google.com/group/facilitating-online-communities/msg/4552f7f202912f0b>
And you can see an example of how this happens here (takes more time to set up...but then you have a better idea of when people are free and can be present, independently  of their time zone)
<http://www.doodle.ch/participation.html?pollId=vphf6g7x4yziyaau>

Warm regards from São Paulo (-3 UTC),

[artie]

Leigh,

 

Do you have a link to the audio so I can get up to date?

 

On 02/09/2008, Leigh Blackall <leighb...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Barbara Dieu]

Artie,
The audio of tonight's meeting or tomorrow's will (obviously) only be ready later.
The ones from the previous meetings can be found on the wiki.
<http://elluminate.tekotago.ac.nz/play_recording_confirmation.html> you have to log into Elluminate and listen to the whole thing.
and here for the second one
<http://www.wikieducator.org/Facilitating_online_communities/Meetings/Week_3_-_5_Facilitating%2C_teaching_and_moderating>
You have an option to follow the text, listen to the recording or log into Elluminate.
Warm regards,

[artie]

I've been listening to all of the meetings on audio. Leigh puts up a link. I just want to know when that link will go up. I thought that the meeting already happened. But it doesn't make any difference because I won't be at any of these meetings. I'm just listening and blogging and commenting.

[Barbara Dieu]

>I just want to know when that link will go up.

Only time and Leigh will tell then (he is sleeping now, so patience) :-)

"Time will explain it all. He is a talker, and needs no questioning
before he speaks" (William Shakespeare)
"Time is the cruelest teacher; first she gives the test, then teaches
the lesson."

[Vida Thompson]

Hi Artie,
My time is the same as Leigh's +12 not +4. So my meeting time will be 8pm tonight.
Cheers,
Vida

>>> artie <artistsf...@gmail.com> 09/04/08 12:45 AM >>>

[Bronwyn Stuckey]

Tried to join the meeting that is happening right now but the elluminate
site only lists the later meeting. There is no link for the meeting that
has start 18 minutes ago (time when I first tried to get in). Does the
link expire a while after the start time?

Bron

[Sylvia Currie]

How odd. We're in the meeting room now. Jeffrey was able to join a few
minutes late + it's just one room that's open all the time. Maybe if
you close what you've opened and try again?
http://tinyurl.com/6ne2uv

Sylvia

[Jeffrey Keefer]

Did you just try to join at
http://elluminate.tekotago.ac.nz/join_meeting.html?meetingId=1216941157361
Regardless of what time it says?

-----
Jeffrey Keefer
jef...@silenceandvoice.com

Blog: http://silenceandvoice.com
Website: http://www.jeffreykeefer.com