Documentation Sprint - What we should think/create/write/document during AlaveteliCon

[Daniela B. Silva]

Hi everyone!

I am Daniela, from Brazil (collaborator to the Queremos Saber website) and I am helping to build a "Campaigners Stream" to the AlaveteliCon - sessions and activities for campaigners and activists, that happen in parallel to the "Hackers Stream".

There are already some sessions predicted to this: a debate on the "Build-it-how-it-is X Build-it-how-it-should-be" question (on if/how much should we adapt Alaveteli to different FOI contexts and laws), an "Alaveteli for Activism" session, a "Alaveteli Administration Workshop" and a "Brainstorm for New Features" session. With the main sessions of the conference, these will be great for who is coming to conference to get to know more about Alaveteli, or to those who already collaborate to an Alaveteli websites, but want to share experience or get some more thoughts on these issues (they will be all very collaborative sessions, so get ready to speak up and do some work :P)

But the idea is having time for us to also go to the practical side, get more hands-on and help to build things the Alaveteli community needs in order to work better.

So the question is: What you guys think we need to think / create / write / document during the AlaveteliCon, to collaborate to the project and community?

Talking to some of the facilitators of the sessions, some ideas already came up:

- Gathering information on Alaveteli's instances that are running around the world (having a space for sharing experiences)

- Kicking off an administration section at the Alaveteli's wiki

- Creating communication pieces for recruiting volunteers and helping out new users

What else should we work on during the conference? Ideas?

Looking forward to meet you all and see you in Oxford,

Daniela

[Seb Bacon]

Hi,

Here are some more ideas:

- discuss and document the differences in laws. make a table or
similar so they can be compared and contrasted.
- ditto for cultural context. e.g. in some countries people making
FOI requests can put their lives at risk (e.g. in India)
- brainstorm how an "offline" version of Alaveteli might work with
respect to the current political realities in many jurisdictions. Many
countries will realistically only accept (and reply to) requests on
paper -- including the US, India, Moldova, etc. Alaveteli should
probably have some way to support this.
- brainstorm other features that the survey of different contexts and
laws have brought up

Seb

--
skype: seb.bacon
mobile: 07790 939224
land: 01531 671074

[Myfanwy Nixon]

Hi all,

I've been in touch with a few of you before. I'm mySociety's Marketing and Communications person. Sadly, I won't be at the conference, which is a shame as it's shaping up to look really exciting - I'd never have booked my holiday for this week if I'd known!

On Monday, March 26, 2012 5:30:27 AM UTC+1, Daniela B. Silva wrote:

So the question is: What you guys think we need to think / create / write / document during the AlaveteliCon, to collaborate to the project and community?

Talking to some of the facilitators of the sessions, some ideas already came up:

- Gathering information on Alaveteli's instances that are running around the world (having a space for sharing experiences)

[snip]

- Creating communication pieces for recruiting volunteers and helping out new users

I would be really glad to be included on any documentation/photos/blog posts that come out of the two days. I'd like to spread the word on our blog and via other channels - maybe also on Storify? It'd be good if I could gather together all the press/blog posts/tweets in one central place.

Also, on the DIY mySociety blog, we try to spread practical advice on building Alaveteli sites. My plan is to profile some of your projects on there, mentioning any advice you have, difficulties you've faced, and a bit about the political landscape you're launching/have launched into. If anyone has time to answer a few questions, then please do drop me a line. It doesn't have to be immediately, if you are tied up with travel arrangements right now :)

Finally, I just wanted to let you know that there will be two UK journalists at the conference. They too will be particularly interested to speak to delegates - so please keep an eye open for them.

I hope you all enjoy AlaveteliCon - I am looking forward to seeing everything that comes out of it.

Myf