[FM Discuss] FM Meet Up Report *important*

[Anne GOLDENBERG]

What a beautiful and energizing email and perspective.
I'm very very happy that all this is happening,
:-)

Anne


2011/10/13 adam <adam at flossmanuals.net>

> hi,
>
> So we had a fantastic 3 day meet up in berlin (Oct 3,4,5). We hired a large
> apartment for everyone to stay in and then hired an equally cool venue (a
> cafe in a park which used to be no-mans-land). It turned out the cheapest
> AND most comfortable way to do things.
>
> Attending were:
> Janet Swisher
> Tomi Toivio
> Elisa de Castro Guerra
> Laurent Giacobino
> Tuukka Hastrup
> Aleksandar Erkalovic
> Luka Frelih
> Mick Fuzz
> Michael McAndrew
> Sacha van Geffen
> Helen Varley Jamieson
> Adam Hyde
>
> So, before we go one...a few announcements. First and foremost, part of the
> meeting was to choose a new board for FLOSS Manuals. It is now in place and
> consists of:
> Sacha van Geffen (Chair)
> Janet Swisher
> Tuukka Hastrup
> Elisa de Castro Guerra
> Eric Kluitenberg
>
> This is *big* news for us. Its a great board and signals a new era for
> FLOSS Manuals. The board will introduce themselves to the list over the
> days...I am extremely happy to see this board in place. It is a great
> selection of people that know FM for a long time and from many different
> perspectives. I'm looking forward *very* much to this new era with this new
> board.
>
> Other outcomes from the meet - I am appointed Chief Executive, a fancy and
> overly formal title which means pretty much that I do what I do now but
> perhaps not all of it (shedding some of the sysadmin and other tasks I have
> been doing by default). Essentially that means I keep my role with 'staying
> the ship' and am trusted to play somewhat of a leadership role. You might
> read this as 'more of the same' from me ;)
>
> So the meeting put in place this board and we covered a lot of other
> terrain including :
> * discussing new part-time staff roles
> * establishment of FLOSS Manuals ORG
> * strategic discussions about Booki
> * organising a new series of events
> * establishing a budget for the next 6 months
> * establishing new admin list
>
> and more...
>
> If you wish to read the full minutes (35 pages) of the meeting please visit
> the new FM.org (www.flossmanuals.org)  site....and check under the 'staff
> & meetings' tab (or get direct from http://www.flossmanuals.org/**
> sites/default/files/minutes_**Feb_2011.odt<http://www.flossmanuals.org/sites/default/files/minutes_Feb_2011.odt>
> ).
>
> So, kicking it off - big news for us is that we have some new part-time
> staff. First - we have a new part-time Fundraising Manager. I am astounded
> that we have been lucky enough to have Laurent Giacobino (formerly of
> Internews) join us in this role. Laurent is working approximately half time
> for FM for the next 6 months. We are working now to get funds in the bank to
> keep him, and FM in general, going after that period. Any tips for
> fundraising for Laurent please send them to laurent at flossmanuals.net (or
> [name]@flossmanuals.org, this works for all fm email addresses eg
> laurent at flossmanuals.org, adam at flossmanuals.org etc).
>
> Also Camille Acey is onboard for 5 hours a week working on PR for FLOSS
> Manuals. We are also extremely lucky to have Camille onboard. Camille is
> based in NYC and also works on questioncopyright.org (if you don't know
> that site you should!). Any press contacts (we need them all!) please send
> my sleuth or sail to camille at flossmanuals.net
>
> John Curwood is now going to be managing the FM admin side (he currently
> does this) AND the online (lulu.com) FM book shop - updating all the books
> etc...so any help needed send an email to this list and i am sure he will
> respond quickly.
>
> Tuukka Hastrup and Luka Frelih share the role of technical managers. Both
> extremely capable and we are lucky to have them...tech issues? send them to
> the discuss list (this one) and call them out by name.
>
> And...the new FM ORG I hear you ask? Yes, a further outcome of the meeting
> is that we have decided to create a new entity - www.flossmanuals.org-this is the home of the umbrella organisaton for FLOSS Manuals. The board
> is appointed to oversee this AND (at present) the English FM. In time
> however we foresee (and it will be milestoned) creating a new foundation for
> FLOSS Manuals English. We believe that the English FM should not be the
> 'default' home of FM but each language community should be equal.
>
> Each FM language community will be its own legal entity (as is true for the
> French FM) and the umbrella org will assist each language community with
> resources such as fundraising expertise, PR, tech support etc.
>
> So FLOSSManuals.org is effectively where you will find people like Laurent
> and Camille, (increasingly) me and the board.
>
> We have this site in place already in scratch form (www.flossmanuals.org)
> - it is running CiviCRM (thanks to Michael McAndrew) and we aim to work this
> site into shape over the next weeks.
>
> Next- We are going to start running a series of FM conferences known as
> Sprint Conferences. We have a reputation for delivering a lot of content
> despite small resources (especially with Book Sprints) and the Sprint Confs
> will push this further. Sprint Confs will build upon the model in place for
> the Google Summer of Code Doc Summit happening next week (co-organised and
> facilitated by FM, GSoC and Aspiration). At this event we will run 4
> parallel Book Sprints (KDE, OpenStreetMaps, Sahana, and OpenMRS). With
> future Sprint Confs we aim to explode this model and push our doc output to
> another level - the first to happen perhaps as early as March.
>
> The Sprint Confs are not just a random thing we wanted to do but fulfil two
> other purposes (we hope) - fundraising and a strategic move to further push
> FLOSS Manuals into the role of 'enabler' and 'context provider'. Fundraising
> is reasonably self explanatory but the last two items may sound esoteric.
>
> In essence they mean we need to focus on helping people make docs about
> free software. That means 'enabling' that process where ever possible, and
> providing the contexts for this to happen. We should never be a team of
> professional doc creators or some such doing 'our own thing' - if we did get
> a load of cash from fundraising it should be put to helping people create
> docs and getting the most out of the docs. Those people might include you or
> me and our doc needs/wants, a disparate group rallying around a manual 'in'
> FM, or a group working on docs within established free software project etc.
> Sprint Conferences fit into this role perfectly, as do Book Sprints, the
> current website, this list etc...we aim to help people make free
> documentation about free software and provide the spaces to do it, not to
> employ teams of fulltimers to do it for you...
>
> Essentially we realise that FM has achieved a lot already and our past (and
> present) could e categorised something like:
> * content building
> * platform building
> * community building
>
> We now think we have come a long way in each of these. Building content and
> community is always going be close to the heart of FM but we should should
> only be in the business of making tools for as long as it takes to make the
> ones we need. We have done a good job with Booki and it might almost be time
> to find a partner org to help us with managing its development. Now its time
> to move into this new phase of 'context provision'. If this still seems
> unclear to you just hold on to the rails, it will become clearer in time as
> we start actioning some of this and refining this objective.
>
> ok...so. At the meeting we also outlined a budget, it is detailed in the
> minutes. Essentially we are spending money to lift FM to a new level (not
> just to keep going as we are now). We don't have a lot of money so we are
> spending it wisely but needless to say the next 6 months for FM is very
> critical.
>
> For this reason we have also put the board in place and we are starting a
> new admin list for managing some of these activities. Anyone can join the
> admin list but if you join it you are expected to *do something* for FM.
> Something more than you currently do. Same with the board, they are there to
> push FM along and so if you have the time and energy to volunteer to make
> things happen then join here:
> http://lists.flossmanuals.org/**listinfo.cgi/admin-**flossmanuals.org<http://lists.flossmanuals.org/listinfo.cgi/admin-flossmanuals.org>
>
> Currently on that list are all those that attended this very special FM
> meet up. Each has made a commitment to get stuck in. All those attending
> also have FM email addresses (janet at flossmanuals.net,
> sacha at flossmanuals.net etc)...so if you want one of those then come to the
> next meeting....
>
> Ok, believe or not that is a *brief* summary. I will leave it to the board
> members and those present to highlight anything they think is important that
> I might have missed or under emphasised.
>
> I can only say that I am astounded at the quality of people we had at this
> meeting - it further highlights what an amazing community we have. The
> discussions were amazing and we (FM) came out of it very strengthened I
> believe. Not only in terms of the (fantastic) board and new part-time staff
> but the meeting is the start of a very strong vision for FMs future and a
> very strong commitment from those that were there to help achieve it...we
> hope you will also pitch in as much as you can...
>
> :)
>
> adam
>
>
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>
> --
>
> --
> Adam Hyde
> Founder, FLOSS Manuals
> Project Manager, Booki
> Book Sprint Facilitator
> mobile :+ 49 177 4935122
> identi.ca : @eset
> booki.flossmanuals.net : @adam
>
> http://www.flossmanuals.net
> http://www.booki.cc
> http://www.booksprints.net
>
> ______________________________**_________________
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>
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