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Need feedback: early notes on Drumbeat event strategy

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Mark Surman

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Feb 3, 2010, 3:49:31 PM2/3/10
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Hi all

As most of you know, creating many small local events is critical to the
Drumbeat strategy.

After speaking w/ a number of you, I've written up some notes to help us
develop a concrete strategy on these events:

https://wiki.mozilla.org/Drumbeat/events

Allen Gunn from Aspiration (http://aspirationtech.org) is helping to
turn these notes into a plan. Will have something in the next week or so.

In the meantime, it would be great to hear:

- What do people think of this general plan? What are the obvious ways
we could improve it?

- Who is already thinking they would like to host an event? It would be
good to start building a list?

We'll also talk through this at FOSDEM w/ those of Drumbeaters in
Europe. But good to get the discussion rolling here first.

ms

PS. Here is a cut and paste version of what's in the wiki:

this is a placeholder page for coordination of the Drumbeat events
strategy. right now, it's just a bunch of notes. we'll be adding more
details and sub-pages throughout february 2010.

[edit] Goals - why we're doing events

* central tone and theme of all Drumbeat events:
o growing the circle of participation for people who want to
keep the web open -- forever
* main focus is on NEW KINDS OF PARTICIPATION -> beyond making software
o art, writing, movies, teaching, lawyering ... non-tech
people making web better

[edit] short term goals (small events)

* intro drumbeat, invite people to help shape it w/ their own goals
and projects
* set the 'let's make things' tone -- build projects, artifacts,
videos, etc.
* build local communities around creating a more open web, then
link them
* find and train community leaders who can run events and grow networks
* build online buzz -- blogging, photos, etc from events are
critical in explaining what the open web is and what drumbeat is about

[edit] long term goals (big festival)

* connect across lots of different worlds and people that care
about the web
* showcase and improve / hack / evolve cool projects already in the
drum circle
* paint a big picture of where we want the web to go (and the risks)
o create a shared dream re: where we're all going next

[edit] Audience

* who: people who want to make sure the web stays open -- forever

* 60% people you wouldn't expect
o artists
o filmmakers
o lawyers
o teachers
o gov't people
o etc.

* 40% the people we know
o mozilla people
o social media people
o open source and free software people
o web rightsish people (global voices)
o web standards hackers and advocates

obviously, the 60% is both the hard part -- and the part that is most
important REALLY NEED TO REFLECT 60/40 split in write up
[edit] Structure - small events

* many small city-level events lead to big global festival once per
year
* do as many as we can Q1 and Q2 this year

* small events -> pick 3 - 5 cities where we have good networks and
ground people
* run mini-Drumbeat Festivals (need a name a good as Penguin Day)
* could be 1 day events, like a barcamp but w/ more focus and energy
* primarily local, not residential or paid travel except as below

* CRITICAL DESIGN QUESTION:
o are these on the general open web and participation theme
(like Pengiun Day), or do we pick a sub-theme where we have local skills
(e.g. privacy or web education)?

* use these as a staging grounds for people who will run similar
events in other cities
* invite people to propose other events in advance online / in wiki
etc.
* give plane tickets to (top 5? top 10?) pitches / people
* these people get training day before event, plus help run event

* write up very simple online instructions re: how to org your own
event
* steal a little bit from ignite and tedx in terms of simplicity of
instructions
* obviously, wiki / photo / video blog outputs also critical to
replication and buzz

[edit] Structure - big event

* major 'festival' -- feels fun, very strong 'make things' energy,
feels like you're with the people who are making the future of the
internet happen
* details on this already in our notes from the holidays

[edit] Opportunities and locales

* rio and sao paulo -> late march
* berlin in april?
o mozilla italia also wants to do event in Rome
* berkman / harvanrd in late april?
* also want to do something in India and Middle East if possible
o but requires discussion and thinking some more

Alex Kozak

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Feb 3, 2010, 4:53:19 PM2/3/10
to The community mailing list for Mozilla Drumbeat
Mark,

I like the idea of decentralized events where local organizers are empowered to beat the drum of the open web, so to speak. I think one important aspect of that will be to figure out meaningful ways for those local events to feed back into the larger Drumbeat community to ensure that participants in the local events feel connected to the larger movement.

I've been toying with a couple ideas on how to encourage that, and I thought I'd throw this one out there:

What if by attending a local event you are given badges, awards, or some intangible signifier on a Drumbeat profile? By attending Drumbeat events, you could start to build a kind of open web portfolio. For example, an event on "Design on the Open Web" in NYC could get Drumbeat "approval" which basically means that the organizers are given enough unique IDs to be handed out at the event, which can then be applied to a profile on Drumbeat. It would show you were present and participated.

This idea was inspired by some projects in the open source community: http://openhatch.org/ and http://www.ohloh.net/

I think it would be a very low cost, low barrier way to start building community by encouraging physical participation, while building the Drumbeat brand in a very decentralized manner. Community leaders could start to emerge, and that could be built upon in some meaningful way, allowing people to quickly build upon past work and organize new events quickly.

This is just an idea though. It would require some technical infrastructure (which isn't zero cost), and would need to be sensitively implemented.

- Alex

_______________________________________________
community-drumbeat mailing list
community...@lists.mozilla.org
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/community-drumbeat



--
Alex Kozak
Program Assistant
Creative Commons

Campbell Vertesi

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Feb 4, 2010, 9:12:57 AM2/4/10
to community...@lists.mozilla.org
Hey everyone - first poster here :)

I'm Campbell Vertesi, one of the Project Managers who worked on the Drumbeat alpha site for Trellon.  I've been wanting to put in my oar for awhile...

Alex, that's a really cool idea for a way to make RL events cross over into the digital domain.  In fact, Matt talked with us a bit about the idea of using badges , awards, or ranks as a kind of social currency within the drumbeat site, and this ties in nicely with that.  On a technical level, it's totally doable... and I think it would be really effective.

We should look for examples in other online communities that have a significant RL component.  How does Meetup.com make the RL events feed back into the website?  How do they keep the members of individual meetup communities feeling like a part of the larger whole?  What about change.org, the Ron Paul net campaign, or even facebook? Just brainstorming ideas here, I suppose.

One idea that presents itself to me is building out events and profiles into a much larger sub-section of the site.  Forums where people discuss events, personal or group photo galleries of events.  Or conversely, create resources so event hosters can involve the website with their event.  For instance, Drupal conferences include code sprints where an ad hoc group of programmers will take a piece of code, and jump on it for a day together, posting an irc log, sometimes a live blog, and ultimately the finished product to the website.  Even empowering event organizers with ideas like that could be useful... site administrators could help projects with active events gain prominence by putting it on the front page or something: "watch stopbadware's code sprint in action!" with a link to the project page (or a special, live updating version of it that we build for this kind of thing?)

I'm still brainstorming things at the moment.  What are your thoughts?

Thanks

Campbell

Campbell Vertesi | Project Manager | Trellon, LLC

web www.trellon.com | email cver...@trellon.com
tel 347.329.2981

Matthew Thompson

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Feb 4, 2010, 10:47:18 AM2/4/10
to The community mailing list for Mozilla Drumbeat
Just to add some context to Alex and Campbell's posts, here's the first iteration "events" page on the staging server:

This is all still placeholder content (we'll be adding real content over the next several days -- let me know if you're interested in helping out!)

But thought it might be useful to start thinking about how we can evolve this page to support some of the ideas here.

--Matt

Alex Kozak

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Feb 4, 2010, 4:00:57 PM2/4/10
to The community mailing list for Mozilla Drumbeat
Matt,

Will events have their own page on the site (as a kind of object) or is the point to point to external URLs for events? If there were pages for each event, it might be easier to have a kind of "who attended" or "who's attending" list pulled from the People pages, and similarly, to connect the People pages with the Events.

- Alex

Xavier Borderie

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Feb 5, 2010, 1:03:39 PM2/5/10
to The community mailing list for Mozilla Drumbeat
>    * main focus is on NEW KINDS OF PARTICIPATION -> beyond making software
>          o art, writing, movies, teaching, lawyering ... non-tech people

This actually reminds me of weekly, informal, beer-centered evening
(hey, inspiration is everywhere! :) ), where the theme is: bring
someone who's never been to this event. Event name is "Unrelated
Party", which might be more telling. The nice thing is, while some
participant just come by themselves just to see familiar faces, some
just like to play the game by its rules, and actually try to bring
someone new (and, well, unrelated every single time. This has both the
interest of bringing fresh blood every time, and "replace" those
people who cannot participate in further events.
DBeat events could maybe profit from such game-minded participatory rules.


> obviously, the 60% is both the hard part -- and the part that is most
> important REALLY NEED TO REFLECT 60/40 split in write up

This, to me, is both indeed the hard part, and the most needed one.
The "the people we know" are mostly already sold on the concept, and
just reuniting with people who think alive would of course help
improve the global IQ, but would not increase the number of
braincells, if I may say so. Again, bringing fresh blood to the table
is key.
Thus, I think this part is really one that should be worked-out in
this draft note. How to get various, non-geeky people to gather in
such a sort-of-geeky event, how to get them psyched by the whole theme
of the event and the mission behind DBeat, etc.
Many people have already a hard time getting to launch something as
easy and self-organized as a barcamp, and giving them such a 60/40
ratio is sure a good way to remind them of the needed propagation of
the Good Word, but also might hinder their enthusiasm by setting high
expectations. A proper how-to, something step-by-step-y, might be of
great value here.


>    * run mini-Drumbeat Festivals (need a name a good as Penguin Day)

I might have missed that idea, how are "mini-Drumbeat Festivals"
defined? Is that a simpler/shorter barcamp? An evening around beers
and a whiteboard?


>          o are these on the general open web and participation theme (like
> Pengiun Day), or do we pick a sub-theme where we have local skills (e.g.
> privacy or web education)?

Depends on the venue I guess, but I'd put my votte down for more such
events in unexpected places, with unexpected crowds: universities,
music festivals/debates, ubuntu install-parties...


>    * use these as a staging grounds for people who will run similar events
> in other cities

We at Paris-Web (http://www.paris-web.fr/2009/, yearly webdev event),
after 4 editions, feel the need to have some sort of "train the
trainers" event, where we would help the potential speakers,
unaccustomed to public speaking, to learn to face the crowd and focus
their talk.
While this idea might also be interesting for local DBeat
enthousiasts, it shall be better suited as a separate event: "if
you're interested, we're doing this and that tomorrow, feel free to
come by".


> * these people get training day before event, plus help run event

Ah, well, that's why one should read everything before reacting :)
But the post-event training day idea remains: some might be inspired
by the event, and the organizer need to strike while the iron is hot.


--
Xavier Borderie

Xavier Borderie

unread,
Feb 5, 2010, 1:06:03 PM2/5/10
to The community mailing list for Mozilla Drumbeat
> http://drumbeat.stage.mozilla.com/events

Looks truly nice!


--
Xavier Borderie

gina cooper

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Feb 5, 2010, 1:18:31 PM2/5/10
to The community mailing list for Mozilla Drumbeat
I say this being 100% in support of growing the base of supporters and believing in the necessity of meeting in person to make any movement real...

To get that 60%, the Drumbeat project needs to engage them on their own terms. What I mean, so far the only people who are being asked to contribute ideas are developers and people who have the ability to create open source options.

The project has yet to ask that 60% what they want and then make the argument on their terms, followed by a demonstration,  as to how an open web will address what is important to them.

I think, until the project is ready to take their input and create projects that address their concerns as they have stated them, that Drumbeat is going to have a hard time engaging that 60% audience. And if year 1 is all about targeting the tech community, then considering how to bring others aboard is premature. People don't support causes just because they are good, they support causes because they can personally relate to the importance of that cause and they believe that their concerns will be represented and addressed. Until they are asked what is important to them, we're just telling them, top down, daddy-like, what they should do and believe.

Sheepishly yours,
Gina



On Fri, Feb 5, 2010 at 10:03 AM, Xavier Borderie <xav...@borderie.net> wrote:
>    * main focus is on NEW KINDS OF PARTICIPATION -> beyond making software
>          o art, writing, movies, teaching, lawyering ... non-tech people

This actually reminds me of weekly, informal, beer-centered evening
(hey, inspiration is everywhere! :) ), where the theme is: bring
someone who's never been to this event. Event name is "Unrelated
Party", which might be more telling. The nice thing is, while some
participant just come by themselves just to see familiar faces, some
just like to play the game by its rules, and actually try to bring
someone new (and, well, unrelated every single time. This has both the
interest of bringing fresh blood every time, and "replace" those
people who cannot participate in further events.
DBeat events could maybe profit from such game-minded participatory rules.
> obviously, the 60% is both the hard part -- and the part that is most
> important REALLY NEED TO REFLECT 60/40 split in write up

This, to me, is both indeed the hard part, and the most needed one.
The "the people we know" are mostly already sold on the concept, and
just reuniting with people who think alive would of course help
improve the global IQ, but would not increase the number of
braincells, if I may say so. Again, bringing fresh blood to the table
is key.
Thus, I think this part is really one that should be worked-out in
this draft note. How to get various, non-geeky people to gather in
such a sort-of-geeky event, how to get them psyched by the whole theme
of the event and the mission behind DBeat, etc.
Many people have already a hard time getting to launch something as
easy and self-organized as a barcamp, and giving them such a 60/40
ratio is sure a good way to remind them of the needed propagation of
the Good Word, but also might hinder their enthusiasm by setting high
expectations. A proper how-to, something step-by-step-y, might be of
great value here.
>    * run mini-Drumbeat Festivals (need a name a good as Penguin Day)

I might have missed that idea, how are "mini-Drumbeat Festivals"
defined? Is that a simpler/shorter barcamp? An evening around beers
and a whiteboard?
>          o are these on the general open web and participation theme (like
> Pengiun Day), or do we pick a sub-theme where we have local skills (e.g.
> privacy or web education)?

Depends on the venue I guess, but I'd put my votte down for more such
events in unexpected places, with unexpected crowds: universities,
music festivals/debates, ubuntu install-parties...
>    * use these as a staging grounds for people who will run similar events
> in other cities

We at Paris-Web (http://www.paris-web.fr/2009/, yearly webdev event),
after 4 editions, feel the need to have some sort of "train the
trainers" event, where we would help the potential speakers,
unaccustomed to public speaking, to learn to face the crowd and focus
their talk.
While this idea might also be interesting for local DBeat
enthousiasts, it shall be better suited as a separate event: "if
you're interested, we're doing this and that tomorrow, feel free to
come by".
>    * these people get training day before event, plus help run event

Ah, well, that's why one should read everything before reacting :)
But the post-event training day idea remains: some might be inspired
by the event, and the organizer need to strike while the iron is hot.


--
Xavier Borderie
_______________________________________________
community-drumbeat mailing list
community...@lists.mozilla.org
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/community-drumbeat



--
Gina Cooper
707.888.5977
http://middlecoastllc.com/
http://ginacooper.com/
http://twitter.com/ginacooper

Matthew Thompson

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Feb 5, 2010, 2:59:36 PM2/5/10
to The community mailing list for Mozilla Drumbeat
Hi, Alex. Yes, each event will have their own page, as a Drupal node, with their own URL.

Great idea about adding the "who's attending" functionality drawn directly from People. Have added it to our list for next iteration. Working on making that process and list of fixes and bug tracking more visible now -- more soon!

M



- Alex

   * main focus is on NEW KINDS OF PARTICIPATION -> beyond making software
obviously, the 60% is both the hard part -- and the part that is most important REALLY NEED TO REFLECT 60/40 split in write up
[edit] Structure - small events

   * many small city-level events lead to big global festival once per year
   * do as many as we can Q1 and Q2 this year

   * small events -> pick 3 - 5 cities where we have good networks and ground people
   * run mini-Drumbeat Festivals (need a name a good as Penguin Day)
   * could be 1 day events, like a barcamp but w/ more focus and energy
   * primarily local, not residential or paid travel except as below

   * CRITICAL DESIGN QUESTION:
         o are these on the general open web and participation theme (like Pengiun Day), or do we pick a sub-theme where we have local skills (e.g. privacy or web education)?

   * use these as a staging grounds for people who will run similar events in other cities
   * invite people to propose other events in advance online / in wiki etc.
   * give plane tickets to (top 5? top 10?) pitches / people
   * these people get training day before event, plus help run event

   * write up very simple online instructions re: how to org your own event
   * steal a little bit from ignite and tedx in terms of simplicity of instructions
   * obviously, wiki / photo / video blog outputs also critical to replication and buzz

[edit] Structure - big event

   * major 'festival' -- feels fun, very strong 'make things' energy, feels like you're with the people who are making the future of the internet happen
   * details on this already in our notes from the holidays

[edit] Opportunities and locales

   * rio and sao paulo -> late march
   * berlin in april?
         o mozilla italia also wants to do event in Rome
   * berkman / harvanrd in late april?
   * also want to do something in India and Middle East if possible
         o but requires discussion and thinking some more
_______________________________________________
community-drumbeat mailing list
community...@lists.mozilla.org
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/community-drumbeat



-- 

Alex Kozak
Program Assistant
Creative Commons

_______________________________________________
community-drumbeat mailing list
community...@lists.mozilla.org
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/community-drumbeat
_______________________________________________
community-drumbeat mailing list
community...@lists.mozilla.org
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/community-drumbeat
- Alex

   * main focus is on NEW KINDS OF PARTICIPATION -> beyond making software
obviously, the 60% is both the hard part -- and the part that is most important REALLY NEED TO REFLECT 60/40 split in write up
[edit] Structure - small events

   * many small city-level events lead to big global festival once per year
   * do as many as we can Q1 and Q2 this year

   * small events -> pick 3 - 5 cities where we have good networks and ground people
   * run mini-Drumbeat Festivals (need a name a good as Penguin Day)
   * could be 1 day events, like a barcamp but w/ more focus and energy
   * primarily local, not residential or paid travel except as below

   * CRITICAL DESIGN QUESTION:
         o are these on the general open web and participation theme (like Pengiun Day), or do we pick a sub-theme where we have local skills (e.g. privacy or web education)?

   * use these as a staging grounds for people who will run similar events in other cities
   * invite people to propose other events in advance online / in wiki etc.
   * give plane tickets to (top 5? top 10?) pitches / people
   * these people get training day before event, plus help run event

   * write up very simple online instructions re: how to org your own event
   * steal a little bit from ignite and tedx in terms of simplicity of instructions
   * obviously, wiki / photo / video blog outputs also critical to replication and buzz

[edit] Structure - big event

   * major 'festival' -- feels fun, very strong 'make things' energy, feels like you're with the people who are making the future of the internet happen
   * details on this already in our notes from the holidays

[edit] Opportunities and locales

   * rio and sao paulo -> late march
   * berlin in april?
         o mozilla italia also wants to do event in Rome
   * berkman / harvanrd in late april?
   * also want to do something in India and Middle East if possible
         o but requires discussion and thinking some more
_______________________________________________
community-drumbeat mailing list
community...@lists.mozilla.org
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/community-drumbeat



-- 

Alex Kozak
Program Assistant
Creative Commons

_______________________________________________
community-drumbeat mailing list
community...@lists.mozilla.org
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/community-drumbeat
_______________________________________________
community-drumbeat mailing list
community...@lists.mozilla.org
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/community-drumbeat

_______________________________________________
community-drumbeat mailing list
community...@lists.mozilla.org
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/community-drumbeat




--
Alex Kozak
Program Assistant
Creative Commons

Nathan Willis

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Feb 5, 2010, 3:25:52 PM2/5/10
to The community mailing list for Mozilla Drumbeat
On Fri, Feb 5, 2010 at 12:03 PM, Xavier Borderie <xav...@borderie.net> wrote:
>    * main focus is on NEW KINDS OF PARTICIPATION -> beyond making software
>          o art, writing, movies, teaching, lawyering ... non-tech people

> obviously, the 60% is both the hard part -- and the part that is most
> important REALLY NEED TO REFLECT 60/40 split in write up

This, to me, is both indeed the hard part, and the most needed one.
The "the people we know" are mostly already sold on the concept, and
just reuniting with people who think alive would of course help
improve the global IQ, but would not increase the number of
braincells, if I may say so. Again, bringing fresh blood to the table
is key.

I doubleagree that the 60% is the critical part, and also the tricky part.  I wonder; do you think that one small/single-day event can effectively draw in all of those new kinds of participants, and listen to each one?  Or would it be better for a local event to reach out _to_ teachers, and another event -- same format, same goals, same tone, but different "let's build things" -- reach out to writers / lawyers / visual artists?

Nate

--
Come to Texas Linux Fest, April 10 - registration now open at www.texaslinuxfest.org
--
nathan.p.willis
nwi...@glyphography.com
aim/ym/gtalk:n8willis
identi.ca/n8

Nathaniel James

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Feb 8, 2010, 4:07:18 PM2/8/10
to The community mailing list for Mozilla Drumbeat
Great thread.  Had some time today to consider.  Responses below...

Nathaniel James
Executive Director | OneWebDay, Inc.
202.470.6059 | Skype: james.nathaniel
nja...@onewebday.org | @OWD on Twitter

Get Organized, Get Support at my.OneWebDay.org


On Feb 5, 2010, at 1:18 PM, gina cooper wrote:


To get that 60%, the Drumbeat project needs to engage them on their own terms. What I mean, so far the only people who are being asked to contribute ideas are developers and people who have the ability to create open source options.

The project has yet to ask that 60% what they want and then make the argument on their terms, followed by a demonstration,  as to how an open web will address what is important to them.


I'm with Gina here.  In a world where the "get involved" message is bombarding everyone, especially active people and leaders, I think you succeed with a message and events that say "Drumbeat is here to help you succeed through open Web tech and community.  What do you need from technology?  Let's make it happen"

-------


On Feb 5, 2010, at 3:25 PM, Nathan Willis wrote:

On Fri, Feb 5, 2010 at 12:03 PM, Xavier Borderie <xav...@borderie.net> wrote:

I doubleagree that the 60% is the critical part, and also the tricky part.  I wonder; do you think that one small/single-day event can effectively draw in all of those new kinds of participants, and listen to each one?  Or would it be better for a local event to reach out _to_ teachers, and another event -- same format, same goals, same tone, but different "let's build things" -- reach out to writers / lawyers / visual artists?


If I'm reading it correctly, Nate's recommendation is a model really worth considering, and will make it easier to build in Gina's recommendation.  Local DB organizers could host "San Diego DrumCamp for Artists" or "Berlin DrumCamp for Teachers" events.  This has a few virtues.  1) Doesn't overwhelm the local DB lead volunteers with a mandate to get everyone involved all at once - they can start by reaching out to an adjacent social/professional network in a specific field where they have some relationships.  2) Per Gina, it doesn't communicate an assumption that YOU (or "everyone") should "get involved with Drumbeat," but rather that "Drumbeat can help you (ie specific groups, like educators)."  3) Less problems with the different "languages" spoken by diverse communities of practice.  Engages specific local communities of practice with a lot in common - jargon, skills, social networks, and problem sets - you're way more likely to have concrete, actionable project ideas come out of meetings like this.

I would add to this model that DB should respect the enormous technical expertise and creativity going on in fields "outside the 40%."  Lots of people who don't identify as open Web advocates are still, in fact, making the Web great, and you get more buy in by recognizing that.  It assumes "hey, you're making the Web great, we're making the Web great, it's a natural fit."  

One specific way to build this into the plan is to have the local organizer find one person or organization doing great things with technology in field X (education, law, art, etc) as the keynote (10 minutes + Q&A), followed by the Drumbeat pitch (5 minutes), then open dialogue that starts with "based on this example of tech advancing field X here in our town and Drumbeat's vision of an open Web for 100 years, what other problems/opportunities does the group see that we can roll into a Drumbeat Open Web project?"

--------


On Feb 3, 2010, at 3:49 PM, Mark Surman wrote:



   * 60% people you wouldn't expect
         o artists
         o filmmakers
         o lawyers
         o teachers
         o gov't people
         o etc.

   * 40% the people we know
         o mozilla people
         o social media people
         o open source and free software people
         o web rightsish people (global voices)
         o web standards hackers and advocates


Mark's lists are very helpful, specific markers for beginning to figure out how to open the doors for DB.  If you want to be strategic about outreach to the 60%, I think it would help to identify people and communities of practice that can be bridges from the 40% to the 60%.  What kind of people understand tech's role in advancing community AND have relationships with artists or filmmakers, etc?

I'd love to have a broader brainstorm about fleshing out who these "bridge people" can be.  

From my experience, there's an obvious group - people working on digital literacy, digital inclusion, and some who also talk in terms of "digital justice."  In the US at least, this could include people from One Economy, the Allied Media Project, Zero Divide, the Media Action Grassroots Network.  These are national networks, but at the local level you have dozens or hundreds of groups and individuals working to connect the most marginalized communities to technology.

Why are digital inclusion (DI) people good bridges?  They often have great contacts in local government  (some who actually work in government), artist/creators communities (so many social impact arts/media/creative projects), educators (because that's what they do).  They always need support.  Also, I think it's a net gain if Drumbeat, through some (not all) of its project development support, was working specifically to help marginalized communities (here in the US or abroad) use Open Web tech to build the online content, services, a solutions they need from the ground up.  Again, I feel like this connects to Gina's comment - go to where the need is and communicate why Drumbeat and the Open Web are part of the solution.   There are so many programs teaching young people in poverty how to USE tech - wouldn't be great if they were also learning how to MAKE tech or going beyond the individual to help "train young trainers" to help their communities understand tech?

Besides DI folks, other "bridge people" to consider:

for artists and filmmakers - the National Alliance for Media Arts and Culture, Grantmakers in Film and Electronic Media, Fractured Atlas, the Future of Music Coalition, the Alliance for Community Media
lawyers - the Internet Society
teachers/educators - Educause, Action Coalition for Media Education
for government - the National Association of Telecommunications Officers and Advisory, the American Library Association

Note: not all of these organizations, within their missions, are focused on Open Web, but inside each of them there are plenty of people who are and could help to reveal networks that would be great outreach candidates.

Cheers,

Nathan


Kaliya *

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Feb 13, 2010, 3:29:04 AM2/13/10
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Hi I have been wanting to contribute to respond to this thread for a week. 
 I found the time. :) 
 responses in line. 

Kaliya Hamlin  kal...@mac.com
Internet Identity Workshop
Identity Woman
Unconference designer and Facilitator
On Mon, Feb 8, 2010 at 1:07 PM, Nathaniel James <nja...@onewebday.org> wrote:
Great thread.  Had some time today to consider.  Responses below...

Nathaniel James
Executive Director | OneWebDay, Inc.
202.470.6059 | Skype: james.nathaniel
nja...@onewebday.org | @OWD on Twitter

Get Organized, Get Support at my.OneWebDay.org


On Feb 5, 2010, at 1:18 PM, gina cooper wrote:


To get that 60%, the Drumbeat project needs to engage them on their own terms. What I mean, so far the only people who are being asked to contribute ideas are developers and people who have the ability to create open source options.

The project has yet to ask that 60% what they want and then make the argument on their terms, followed by a demonstration,  as to how an open web will address what is important to them. 
I'm with Gina here. In a world where the "get involved" message is bombarding everyone, especially active people and leaders, I think you succeed with a message and events that say "Drumbeat is here to help you succeed through open Web tech and community.  What do you need from technology?  Let's make it happen"

This sounds great. 
Is part of this project also going to work on helping those "open web tech communities" be more open, receptive and responsive to non-tech programmers and their needs?
 
I was one of those people interested in engaging and using "open source software" for an visionary project in 2004.  The "core developers" I encountered had little interest in my needs as a small business person and a vague distain cause I was not a programmer. 

I wrote this essay on O'Reilly (that I had forgotten about) 

It articulates this not insignificant challenge - to bring together "users" and "developers" I would add to that standards developers and implementors. 

This past fall on lists around open standards all pulled together by Google Buzz I raised issues about how these new standards would be communicated to users - by implementors (like Google).  My questions/concerns were brushed aside because they were not about "how the code worked by the implementors" and dismissed.  

I am literate in these standards and know the guys working them. It would be helpful to have a community of people who can advocate for use cases beyond the "mean" demographic implementing. 


 

-------
On Feb 5, 2010, at 3:25 PM, Nathan Willis wrote:
On Fri, Feb 5, 2010 at 12:03 PM, Xavier Borderie <xav...@borderie.net> wrote:
I doubleagree that the 60% is the critical part, and also the tricky part.  I wonder; do you think that one small/single-day event can effectively draw in all of those new kinds of participants, and listen to each one?  Or would it be better for a local event to reach out _to_ teachers, and another event -- same format, same goals, same tone, but different "let's build things" -- reach out to writers / lawyers / visual artists?


If I'm reading it correctly, Nate's recommendation is a model really worth considering, and will make it easier to build in Gina's recommendation.  Local DB organizers could host "San Diego DrumCamp for Artists" or "Berlin DrumCamp for Teachers" events.

Are you all committed to the use of the word "camp"?
Yes, there is some familiarity in the tech community about what they are AND they have some draw backs.
BarCamp instructions are strong on getting people to an event and sort of loose logistics. 
Weak on good practices of invitation and inclusiveness.  
* The "rules of barcamp" explicitly don't welcome anyone who is not presenting - "yes" you can go and volunteer but it doesn't really feel that way and if you're shy and introverted you won't. 
* There is almost no information about how to support/facilitate agenda creation at the event to ensure that those who are shy get a chance to present.  
* Also there is an emphasis on presentation rather then dialogue and discussion.  
* If you are wiki literate and feel like, it you might put some notes on the camp wiki.  Documentation and continuing the conversation seems like it would be important for these events the drumbeat does. 

I have been blogging about good unconference methods and practices since 2005. In part to put information out there publicly on the web and available for all to use to make grassroots events great. 

Personally I invite most of my clients to consider names other then camps for their events. 

 
 This has a few virtues.  1) Doesn't overwhelm the local DB lead volunteers with a mandate to get everyone involved all at once - they can start by reaching out to an adjacent social/professional network in a specific field where they have some relationships.  2) Per Gina, it doesn't communicate an assumption that YOU (or "everyone") should "get involved with Drumbeat," but rather that "Drumbeat can help you (ie specific groups, like educators)."  3) Less problems with the different "languages" spoken by diverse communities of practice.  Engages specific local communities of practice with a lot in common - jargon, skills, social networks, and problem sets - you're way more likely to have concrete, actionable project ideas come out of meetings like this.

Yep. 
 

I would add to this model that DB should respect the enormous technical expertise and creativity going on in fields "outside the 40%."  Lots of people who don't identify as open Web advocates are still, in fact, making the Web great, and you get more buy in by recognizing that.  It assumes "hey, you're making the Web great, we're making the Web great, it's a natural fit."  

One specific way to build this into the plan is to have the local organizer find one person or organization doing great things with technology in field X (education, law, art, etc) as the keynote (10 minutes + Q&A), followed by the Drumbeat pitch (5 minutes), then open dialogue that starts with "based on this example of tech advancing field X here in our town and Drumbeat's vision of an open Web for 100 years, what other problems/opportunities does the group see that we can roll into a Drumbeat Open Web project?"

There are several options that exist for cool interactive evening events. 
I wrote this for what was to be a collaboratively community written book but became a slow book - Art of Community.  

One that works particularly well for building community and is how I as a non-tech person grew into being part of a tech community, learned bout digital identity & began to work on it.  The format was used by Planetwork, a community that met for many years in SF bridging between IT and social/environ good. 

- They opened at 6pm with munchies and networking (paid for a donation via a basket on the table).  
- At 7pm we started the presentations - 5 or 6 in an evening.  They were 5 min long with 2 min of questions following each one. 
- We had an online web form where anyone could submit a presentation.  There was a community leader who would basically let anyone whose topic seemed within scope to present.  The reason this worked was that they were 5 min long, so if the presentations were "not good" it was ok, they were only 5 min.  If they are great and people wanted to know more...
We followed the talks with 2 hours of networking time, leaving our venue at 10pm.  This was critical. It created the community and helped projects connect and emerge and really involved the audience. 

Basically even if you didn't know "who was talking" about what you could go and know you would learn something new and connect with the community.  

Events that end and then ask everyone to leave within 15 min really are missing the point of their event. Same with those that "fill" all the time. It is my belief that evening events should not have more then an hour of content of any kind and have 2 hours available to support community connection and formation. 


I am unclear about what you are looking for around feedback on the specifics of the event plan. Are we to jump in the wiki and change things, or is there a discussion list of people who have experience doing community events. 

One example is the proposal to have people post their topics on the wiki ahead of time. I do this but don't schedule anything. I really focus on opening up the space the day of the event to create the agenda live.  I can't tell you how many times people at the unconferences I facilitate/produce put topics for discussion for the day of the event they were not planning for.

Looking forward to working with you all. 
-Kaliya

Mark Surman

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Feb 25, 2010, 12:11:14 PM2/25/10
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Hey all

Thanks to everyone for all of this amazing thinking on Drumbeat events.
Amazing stuff, especially re:

- Making sure this isn't just about techies
- Thematic Drumbeat events (e.g. teachers or filmmakers)
- Making good event organizing pages on drumbeat.org
- How to feed event energy back into the site

I've rolled some bits of this (eg. not just techies) but not all (eg.
thematic events) into a next rev event description. Will post on that in
a new thread.

Also, I've asked Allen Gunn from Aspiration to take on a leadership
role in Drumbeat event strategy and design (aspirationtech.org). He's
amazing at these kind of events and will be a good person to roll alot
of these ideas in our event strategy.

More in next thread ... MS

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