RecentChangesCamp 2011

Notes from session:

Recent Changes Camp 2011

Marc LaPorte, Krystle Chung, Brion Vibber, Cary Bass, Nicole Willson


 * Etherpad notes

Issues This Year

 * Big issue with this year's --
 * unclear who was in charge for a long time.
 * Things worked out in the end, but would have been a lot smoother with a larger group organized earlier.
 * 6-10 people w/ one main responsibility each?


 * Comments from Laura:
 * Partly Laura's fault. Didn't want to take responsibility but wanted to make sure it happened.  Realized midway through planning would not be able to attend.  Follow through with Sherrod for venue became a bit problematic. Then there was planning  political BS that put her off. Other people who said they'd help bailed again or didn't come through when asked.   Anne and Marc Laporte did a lot of the work securing the venue and dealing with the food.
 * Compared to last year's planning, I (Laura) found it less stressful to organize. There weren't conference calls that only one or two people were on the line for.  There weren't situations where we solicited for feedback and no one responded only to have people complain AFTER the decision was made.  The focus was on what are the must haves versus the nice to haves.
 * Most of the planners hung out in #wiki on irc.freenode.net so it was easy to find people to get certain things done. It was also easy to understand the context of who was whom and what they were supposed to do. If the person responsible wasn't there, it was easy enough to ask people who to get in touch with.

Possible Locations

 * San Francisco
 * Cary, Brion local - fair amount of local Wikipedia, WikiHowians. Some other companies to tap.
 * (Need venue... Wikimedia? StatusNet's space here is too small. SocialText again? Poke WikiHow?)
 * Montreal
 * Portland
 * Boston
 * Nicole is local -- may have limited time
 * Lots of Wikipedia folks, some WikiHow folks.
 * big BarCamp community, social media-ers
 * (New York people can also be leveraged)
 * Venues...?   April /May ideal.
 * lots of uni venues will be classrooms -- ok for breakout sessions but not great for the main open space circle

Date
Target Februrary-June
 * avoid squooshing against WikiSym and Wikimania
 * portland february was well liked
 * West Coast WikiCon - Jan 15&16 2011
 * Boston would need April, May - April spring break?

Other events in the area in that period

 * Enterprise 2.0 Conference, Boston, June 20-23, 2011

Budget

 * venue
 * can vary a lot; what's history? $2000-$3000 for last Portland
 * Note: Portland hotel location restricted outside food. Consider this in venue choice.
 * What is important to weigh here is if there are lots of out of town people, having them in one place might be good.
 * Portland venue also cost a lot and was a major worry budget wise. Challenge to find sponsorship to cover it all.

Organization

 * split between things that are local and things that aren't
 * locals can worry about venue, food, etc
 * sponsorships etc could often be better for folks who aren't local

Sponsors
Sponsors/companies to get involved?
 * Boston - Pogo, EditMe
 * Were these responsive? One organizer was told that another person had contacted them and gotten nos.
 * Contact us at EditMe http://twitter.com/msmamet or http://twitter.com/editme if you need help - Matthew from EditMe.

Ideal venue

 * Open space, open at least from 1000 - 1900
 * Good soundproofing
 * Stata
 * Google Cambridge
 * target 100-150 people

Future

 * 2012 -- Portland, San Francisco (West coast) Mexico City?
 * Who will step up to organize? On the ground organizers fundamental to getting this to work.
 * 2013 -- Montréal ?
 * Who will step up to organize? On the ground organizers fundamental to getting this to work.

Schedule

 * Friday night / Saturday / Sunday
 * Friday night 'open house' style -- give the semi-interested people a chance to taste.

April 2011 Boston

 * probably avoid Easter itself, but weekend after might be perfect? April 29 is friday after Easter.
 * spring breaks vary by school

Continuity of resources

 * bank account
 * paypal
 * twit
 * dent
 * facebook account - http://Facebook.com/RecentChangesCamp
 * twit/dent/facebook account: jon has the identi.ca account password, not been updating much. Laura has been managing the Twitter account and is currently doing RTs.  Has passwords for both.  Marc Laporte handled setting up the Facebook event?  Is there an RCC fanpage?


 * Website!!!
 * Problem this year was making it too hard. Keeping it simple makes things less stressful.   Wiki planning wiki drama distracted from organization goals and deterred others from being involved with planning.


 * use same url every year, e.g. 2011.recentchangescamp.org


 * Brandon owns the domain. Needs follow up.
 * see if we can get things set up under that domain -- owned by Brandon Sanders in Portland, is he still active? [Mark D checking]
 * If we can get the domain name - mod_rewrite can push everything from rococo2010.org to new name, gracefully --ShakataGaNai 18:54, 26 June 2010 (PDT)

Organization
need a person/committee responsible for each: 42244775
 * [ LOCAL ONLY] local organization - food, venue Nicole
 * [ exportable] sponsors - need to contact and follow up Marc
 * budgeting Cary
 * Donations from individuals
 * [ exportable] web site Jon? [some cary, brion as well]
 * Jon is currently hosting the website. Hosting change in middle of planning because of complaints about the response time of original host.  Issues with moving over handing over people's passwords to an unknown party.  Rather than send the whole DB to that party, Jon just stepped in and did the MediaWiki export.  No database porting security issues.
 * [ exportable] finding a facilitator - even if informal, needs to not be distracted by everything else
 * Question from non-participant: Was the English language facilitator distracted? Or is this referring to Anne?  If Anne, Laura apologizes for her part in creating stress.
 * if getting someone pro, be clear on $$ issues
 * Query from non-attendant: Does this relate to the English speaking facilitator? Understanding from some organizers was that WMF (through Eugene Kim) had agreed to sponsor the English speaking facilitator.  Once that was understood and dates were passed along, we left it at that and assumed since WMF had taken care of that, the issue would be handled by them.
 * can for instance do sponsorship -- or informal pay them in chocolate :)
 * [ mostly exportable] marketing the event / outreach & bringing people in - Krystle
 * poke at various companies, communities -- make sure the word gets out
 * Facebook, Twitter, Identi.ca, Craigslist [check w/ Jon on continuing; brion can poke these as well]
 * Laura has passwords for both Twitter and identi.ca. She doesn't think a fan page on Facebook was set up.  Rather, an event page was created by Marc Laporte?  Either way, nothing there that requires continuity as an event tends to be a one off thing.  Craigslists has the same thing.
 * Bots were created to invite local Wikipedians to RCC. This was done by Marc Laporte? Or derp or Jon?
 * Wasn't me. I could do it (AWB + ShakataBot) in the future if need be.  --ShakataGaNai 10:37, 27 June 2010 (PDT)
 * Not much outreach done on Wikia wikis or with Wikia in general.
 * Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2401201685 Ted Ernst Mark Dilley Anne Goldenberg Evan Prodromou Marc Laporte Hex Martin  (creator) Last updated in 2007.  Not a fan page.  No continuity issue with creating one.  Just an issue of doing it.


 * logo


 * Reuse past logos? Cary did this year's logo.  Portland took a long time to finalize the logo.  2010 was easier because Cary made it in like 10 minutes.  Much less stress for planners in that tracking down artists, voting and reaching consensus not required.

Other Bostonians:
 * SJ
 * Mako Hill

Follow up

 * Domain name [Brion/Jon -- check w/ the current owner; will want to tweak the old web sites too]
 * happy to host it and past years. --ShakataGaNai 14:33, 26 June 2010 (PDT)
 * Contact other Bostonians, share info with Nicole

Note for future: Always be able to announce the next event's location at each event!
 * Can't do that unless you have some one who is committed to making it happen. Portland 2009 said Portland again but no one stepped up to organize.  Good in theory but unless you get some one dedicated on the ground, problematic as organizers have been known to disappear for a variety of reasons.  Happened with Portland and Pete, Steven.  Happened with Montreal with Laura (getting a PhD and could not afford the the $1,600 ticket from Australia) and Sherrod.
 * That is why we need to build redundancy and outsource more of the organization. Local people should handle local stuff (venue, food, hotel, transportation), but have nothing to do for Sponsors, Website, Budget, Marketing and Facilitation.

Committee for 2011

 * Local: Nicole Willson, Benjamin Mako Hill and SJ Klein
 * Budget: Cary Bass(in the middle of grad school, so limited) and ?
 * Sponsors: Marc Laporte, Jack Herrick
 * Website (tech/back-end): Jon & Brion Vibber - MarkDilley will help get keys from Brandon
 * Marketing (including website content): Krystle Chung, MarkDilley, Dave Crosby, Laura Hale
 * Facilitation & schedule: Anne Goldenberg - TedErnst? JohnAbbe?

Each committee will make a wiki page with their respective planning.

Attendees

 * Marc Laporte
 * Krystle Chung
 * Brion Vibber
 * Cary Bass
 * Nicole Willson

Co-located events

 * http://tikiwiki.org/TikiFestBoston7
 * Please organize others! :-)