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| Author |
Message |
| 25 new of 299 responses total. |
mynxcat
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response 61 of 299:
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Aug 26 20:43 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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polygon
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response 62 of 299:
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Aug 26 21:28 UTC 2002 |
Speaker phones and phone calls are cheap. I don't think cost is an issue.
I used to be a member of the Arbornet (M-Net) board. One of the things we
noticed was that online interaction among the board members had all the
pitfalls of, well, online interaction. Face-to-face meetings brought out
the best in people, and disputes which seemed intractable online were
worked out easily in person. Thus, I would be opposed to using "party" or
similar text mode for board meetings. I suppose that voice conferencing
is better, even if not quite as good as face-to-face.
Grex's community is far more geographically dispersed than ever before,
and it makes sense that its leadership (at least the board) reflect that.
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other
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response 63 of 299:
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Aug 26 21:54 UTC 2002 |
If you wish me to keep repeating myself, reread my previous posts and
pretend I reentered them.
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jp2
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response 64 of 299:
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Aug 26 22:49 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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other
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response 65 of 299:
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Aug 27 00:26 UTC 2002 |
What of the things I said are you claiming is wrong? And if it is wrong,
what then is right?
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mary
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response 66 of 299:
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Aug 27 00:28 UTC 2002 |
Could a conference call thingie work for multiple board members
participating at the same time? Would these same remote board
members be able to carry out the duties of president, secretary and
treasurer? And how expensive would it be to have a multiple remote
site conference call for 2 hours?
The concept is interesting but I'd really like to see the details
of how it would come together, be fair to all, and affordable.
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jp2
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response 67 of 299:
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Aug 27 00:44 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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jp2
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response 68 of 299:
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Aug 27 00:48 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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mary
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response 69 of 299:
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Aug 27 00:51 UTC 2002 |
So the connection should be good enough for the secretary to take
accurate minutes. I've never been part of a conference call but
it must be better than what you'd get out of a standard speaker
phone and certainly a cell phone.
The President makes arrangements for reserving the room we
meet in, signing documents, and following up with contacts both
local and remote. The president also draws up the agenda, posts
it online, and keeps the meetings as on topic as possible.
After watching how difficult this last bit is I really wonder
if someone on the end of a telephone line could handle that one.
The treasurer's job would be difficult unless they could make it
to town for the mail and banking.
But I so like the idea of opening up the board to more candidates
that I'd love to have someone show me this could all work, well.
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jp2
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response 70 of 299:
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Aug 27 00:52 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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mary
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response 71 of 299:
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Aug 27 00:55 UTC 2002 |
Propose it be changed.
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jp2
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response 72 of 299:
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Aug 27 01:02 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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jp2
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response 73 of 299:
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Aug 27 01:03 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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md
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response 74 of 299:
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Aug 27 02:22 UTC 2002 |
Nobody's "afraid" of electing you, Jamie. Bravery isn't the quality
that comes to mind when I try to imagine what it would take to make
anyone vote for you. The reason nobody voted for you is that you're,
you know, *you*.
I don't think it's fear of change, either, or any kind of fear. They
don't know how, is all. Nobody here's ever done a teleconference, I
guess, at least ever *managed* one, so they don't know how. That is
perfectly obvious from all the comments I've read. There is fear here,
but it seems to be coming from you. Why is that?
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mdw
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response 75 of 299:
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Aug 27 03:19 UTC 2002 |
The members who are voting for members of the board are (we hope) voting
for the people who will best serve the needs of grex. This is not a
popularity contest, and it shouldn't be a matter of anyone's ego. It
doesn't hurt to be well known, but this is only because there's no other
way other people who know who would be best suited for the job. It's
definitely not sufficient to be well known, although I don't think
anyone has any objective measure of what is required past that. I can't
speak for anyone else, but when I vote for a board member, I'm certainly
looking for people who are capable of working well with others,
non-confrontational, effective at solving problems, and who are familiar
with grex and sympathetic with its aims and culture. I believe other
people must have something of the same theory, judging by past election
results.
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rcurl
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response 76 of 299:
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Aug 27 04:52 UTC 2002 |
Re #35: The Michigan Nonprofit Corporation Act is all of 89 pages (in
the copy I have), and it is also on the web. You can read that after
dinner. I will admit, however, that the plot is lousy, not to mention
the characters.
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other
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response 77 of 299:
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Aug 27 05:08 UTC 2002 |
re #76: Please provide a link to the MNCA.
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mynxcat
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response 78 of 299:
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Aug 27 09:55 UTC 2002 |
This response has been erased.
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mary
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response 79 of 299:
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Aug 27 10:50 UTC 2002 |
You guys are looking for controversy where non exists. Questions are
being raised that need to be answered. How much would it cost to buy the
needed equipment? What would a 2 hour conference call cost? Would we
need to rent meeting space to make a connection?
Or don't worry about the questions and instead just walk around
stamping your feet and complaining how the game is fixed.
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md
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response 80 of 299:
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Aug 27 11:27 UTC 2002 |
78: I've never seen Jamie espouse a radical idea about Grex. E.g., the
censored log issue was a very old bandwagon when he decided to jump on
it. I guess what turned voters off is not his obnoxiousness but his
combination of stupidity and self-confidence. He's like a loveable
sitcom character, fun to watch but certainly not electable to
anything. *I* think he's so much fun that I would've voted for him
myself, but a) I'm not a paying member and b) there are limits to fun,
like not inflicting someone like Jamie on the Grex BoD. It's not a
John Hughes movie.
79: You know, in the volunteer organizations I've been involved with
there's always been the lawyer, the CPA, the experienced business
person, the detail-oriented organizer, the computer genius, the guy
with the pickup who's always happy to cart stuff places, the guy with
the big house where everyone can meet, the guy who brings the food, and
so on. (I use "guy" in the approved gender-neutral sense, of course.)
Are you saying that there is no one on the Grex board who can answer
your questions or who even knows where to get the answers?
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gull
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response 81 of 299:
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Aug 27 13:32 UTC 2002 |
Re #57: I thought it had been established that an amendment wasn't
needed for a non-local member to be on the board?
Re #59: Ever used one of those for a meeting? I haven't used the
particular model they sell, but my experience is any cheap speakerphone
isn't worth the trouble. In my office I have a $300 Toshiba desktop
phone with a speakerphone function, and just the ambient noise from the
computers in here renders it useless. The slightest noise mutes the
speaker.
Re #79: Exactly. I think the costs should be worked out ahead of time,
because it could be an issue in whether people want to vote for a
non-local board member. If I knew it was going to cost Grex an extra $x
per month if I elected someone, I might have second thoughts about
voting for them. I also think the onus is on the people who are
suggesting this to work out realistically what the costs would be, and
not to just hand-wave and say they're trivial.
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jep
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response 82 of 299:
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Aug 27 13:35 UTC 2002 |
We have a once per week meeting at work, and we currently have two
people who work remotely. They dial in, and are able to participate in
the weekly meeting via conference call without significant problems.
One of them acts as secretary and e-mails the rest of us the weekly
minutes.
Grex has had, from time to time, problems with finding a place to meet
at all. Maybe it would be easier to have meetings be done via
conference call for all participants.
I agree with Larry that Arbornet's meetings were usually much more
productive than the on-line discussions. However, Grex doesn't work
the same way Arbornet did in those days. The Board here is not in the
role of making decisions for Grex or of leading; it almost always
implements the consensus reached on-line. If there's no consensus, it
doesn't act at all. Have there been any controversial issues which
were resolved at a Board meeting? For Grex, on-line decision making
would work just fine -- and does.
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gull
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response 83 of 299:
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Aug 27 13:46 UTC 2002 |
Re #82: A conference call works if you can do the meeting in round-robin
fashion, with everyone taking their specific turn. That tends to really
drag things out, though, in my experience. The problem is without the
usual cues to indicate who wants to talk, you end up with chaos unless
you organize things in that fashion.
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jep
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response 84 of 299:
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Aug 27 13:55 UTC 2002 |
re #83: Yes, I agree that that approach would probably work better than
any other.
re #81: I think going through the decision process of a vote is a good
idea, since this would be a major change from the current method of
running Grex.
If we're going to allow remote Board members, we should do so in a way
that there is no issue of the cost for someone's candidacy. I don't
want to see people having to make statements like, "It's worth the
extra $25 per month for me to be on the Board because..." If we're
going to accept remote Board members, I think that cost should be
budgeted in advance of the next election, or have some other pre-stated
method of handling it. (Such as stating in advance that the remote
Board member has to pay his own expenses for participating in the
meetings.)
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jep
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response 85 of 299:
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Aug 27 13:56 UTC 2002 |
How about linking this item to coop?
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