Michael--
What you say about preserving the old and extending it with the new is
very similar to what I have been reading all through Christopher
Alexander's The Nature of Order: the life giving transformations are the
ones which are structure preserving: that is, they always preserve the
life that was there before and intensify it.
:- Doug.
On Fri, 2009-11-20 at 13:51 -0600, Michael Herman wrote:
> more from birgitt williams' chapter in tales from open space, from her
> list of "key ingredients", in the spirit of finding deeper
> understanding AND nitty-gritty technical moves for getting on with our
> work, on the web and in the world:
>
> ...here is what I believe the key ingredients are to sustaining the
> new and ever renewing after an Open Space event.
>
>
> Language. We found that many assumptions/miscommunications occurred
> because we didn't take the time to teach one another our "language."
> Most notable were differences in language of senior staff who kept
> referring to the global picture, supervisory staff who dealt with
> meeting goals and objectives, and front-line staff who talked about
> what faced them minute by minute. We all still are passionate about
> different things based on our role, but we've tried to teach each
> other our language.
>
>
> why did i not pull the plug on the websites last night? why did i not
> quit the list? it's the same reason that i have not made other major
> changes in the site(s) for a couple of years now. and it has much to
> do with what birgitt says about these differences in global vision and
> minute-to-minute.
>
> it's worth noticing, i think, that when we talk about
> openspaceworld.org on the oslist or elsewhere, almost everyone talks
> about new tools, blogs and nings and wikis. i'm a willing participant
> in those conversations.
>
> AND... there is another conversation that i almost never have with
> anyone... it starts out like this: "...but what will i do with the
> powerpoint presentation that laurel doersam contributed before she
> died? what will i do with joelle's (and peggy's) STORIES newsletters?
> what about peggy's old, original ost website hosted at the meta
> network? and osonos proceedings from ten years ago, not all of which
> are in the form of a simple document. yes, of course, all these
> things can be archived on a server out there forever, but how can they
> be kept accessible?
>
> the longer we go on, the more history we create. i think this history
> says as much about who we are as a community and a practice as any of
> the newest tools. if a leader comes to a site like osw and can see
> that we are looking out for laurel's presentation and peggy's original
> site, i think that on some level that will assure them that we are not
> slash and burn sorts of folks. leaders need to know, and i think we
> need to show the world, that open space is not about destroying
> existing structures and leaders in our devotion to whatever is new and
> emergent.
>
> to continually bring our history forward gets more and more
> technically challenging as time goes on. there are more and more
> files and formats to migrate, or to bury. there is no perfect
> solution. and no perfect technology. nor are my technical skills all
> not that deep.
>
> until some of this stuff was raised in april, i didn't know how,
> technically, to make more space in the openspaceworld.org site. in
> response to inquiries from osi-usa, i did some more studying and
> learned how i could create whole new spaces, technically they'd be
> sub-domains, with addresses like osi-usa.openspaceworld.org ...these
> spaces would have their own ftp access, own passwords, and whatever
> group was using a space like this could own and manage their stuff
> totally for themselves and others.
>
> i gulped. i didn't really want to be in the website business in the
> first place, and this was deeper still.
>
> since osi-usa was the only group i knew of that was actively thinking
> about developing something new, i shared this new option with them. i
> thought we might learn our way into how to manage such an arrangement
> together, then offer it to everyone else. obviously, we haven't
> pursued this option yet, but the offer still stands.
>
> kaliya, i didn't offer this option to you, individually, because i'd
> already tried to follow up with you on these things and i took your
> short or non- replies as an indication that you'd moved on to other
> things. when you have taken your complaints to the list, or to
> osi-usa board members, rather than to me personally, it makes it
> harder for me to get to know you better and learn to trust you as a
> working partner. in april, the conversation started because osi-usa
> emailed me and asked me to comment on what you'd sent to them.
> because they brought the question to me, i made my offer of new
> working space to them. at that time they were the ones talking about
> creating a site for themselves.
>
> if you want to develop these new things, i am glad to provide hosting
> space under the openspaceworld.org umbrella, in one or more
> subdomains. you can have your own space(s), own password(s), ftp
> access. all of the history that is osw can continue on it's merry
> terrible way and your new functions will benefit reap whatever
> benefits might accrue from being part of the highly-ranked main site.
> but more than that, once your stuff is up and running, ways to connect
> our history with our future might be easier for both of us to see.
>
> if harrison is committed to hanging around oslist for the duration, i
> guess my favorite place to rest in all of this is in the design of the
> main home page of osw. the 22 langauges (21 plus farsi coming soon)
> matter to me. the links to other sites like world map and os-online
> and ning, too. that page is where i'd like to continue to be able to
> play. everyting behind that, blog, wikis, resources, videos, laurel's
> presentation, and the like -- as long as i know it's to be well cared
> for, i would gladly give all of that up to the new system. i just
> want to be able to continue to take a leading role in shaping that one
> front page, cuz i get such a charge out of adding another link,
> another big chunk of space opening, like adding links to research and
> ning this week.
>
> please give me a call if you want to explore any of this together.
>
> m
>
>
> --
>
> Michael Herman
> Michael Herman Associates
>
> http://www.michaelherman.com
> http://www.ronanparktrail.com
> http://www.chicagoconservationcorps.org
> http://www.openspaceworld.org
>
> 312-280-7838 (mobile)
> * * ==========================================================
> osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu ------------------------------ To
> subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of
> osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu:
> http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html To learn about
> OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs:
> http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist
*
*
==========================================================
osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu
------------------------------
To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options,
view the archives of osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu:
http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html
To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs:
http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist
