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| Author |
Message |
| 25 new of 143 responses total. |
mta
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response 8 of 143:
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Aug 21 11:54 UTC 1998 |
This is a great idea, John! I've been curious about the Ann Arbor Space
Society for years -- even talked Jean Barnard out of a couple of old
newsletters earlier this summer. I'd love to participate in this
conference!
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jsw
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response 9 of 143:
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Aug 21 15:00 UTC 1998 |
Response has been good from our current members and some from around
the world. I am ready to go. The next step is to EMail the request to
the conference administrator. Hope it is put on-line soon.
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janc
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response 10 of 143:
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Aug 23 02:15 UTC 1998 |
This seems sufficiently uncontroversial that we could go ahead with it.
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jsw
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response 11 of 143:
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Aug 25 11:40 UTC 1998 |
Jan, I have forwarded the necessary conference setup information to the
conference administrator. If you here anything additional is needed
please call or EMail me.
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jsw
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response 12 of 143:
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Aug 26 18:09 UTC 1998 |
BTW Jan what issue would be sufficiently controversial to _not_ be
consicered on a free speech web site?
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janc
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response 13 of 143:
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Aug 26 19:39 UTC 1998 |
If there was controversy, then we would allow more time for discussion.
Current policy allows for up to a week. The only way it wouldn't be
created after a week would be if nobody still felt it should be created.
Of course, if you tried hard enough you could probably come up with
something sufficiently controversial to trigger a change in the policy.
But it's never come up yet.
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valerie
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response 14 of 143:
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Aug 26 19:49 UTC 1998 |
This response has been erased.
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davel
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response 15 of 143:
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Aug 26 19:52 UTC 1998 |
If you go back into some of the conference request items in old coops - which
are all there, I think - you'll see some cases where people raised questions
("why do we need this when we've got that already?") or suggestions which
changed the focus of the proposed conference or caused the proposal to be
dropped by the person proposing it (because some existing conference seemed
reasonable for the function involved, say). That kind of discussion just takes
more time, that's all. The policy has always been that you get it if you
still want it.
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davel
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response 16 of 143:
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Aug 26 19:55 UTC 1998 |
Valerie slipped in & said the same thing better.
The picture you should have is not "too controversial to be considered" but
rather "after discussion it seemed obvious that the proposed conference would
die from lack of interest" or "after discussion it was decided to pursue this
in the xyz conference".
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gracel
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response 17 of 143:
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Aug 27 16:58 UTC 1998 |
So, "too controversial to be decided immediately, let's wait for consensus".
But not in this case.
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valerie
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response 18 of 143:
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Aug 28 12:54 UTC 1998 |
This response has been erased.
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jsw
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response 19 of 143:
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Sep 1 10:20 UTC 1998 |
I have been looking for the 'space' conference name to appear in the
'Public Issues' section of the conference list but have not seen it
yet. Do I have to setup this up through config somehow?
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remmers
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response 20 of 143:
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Sep 1 15:13 UTC 1998 |
Nope, that's cfadm's job. I was waiting for you to supply a one-line
description of the conference to put there, but in reviewing your
original mail I see that you already did that, and I missed it. I'll
go put it in. Sorry about the mixup.
Other than that, I believe the Space cf. is all set up. In
particular, I notice that you've posted a first item. Good luck
with the conference.
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remmers
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response 21 of 143:
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Sep 1 15:22 UTC 1998 |
Okay, the Space conference is now listed in the public conference
index.
^R
(With a dialup or telnet connection, you can see the conference
index by typing "help conferences" at a Picospan prompt. Via the
web, its at the URL
http://www.cyberspace.org/cgi-bin/pw/bt/pistachio/conflist
With the web version, you can go to the conference by clicking on
its name.
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davel
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response 22 of 143:
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Sep 2 01:20 UTC 1998 |
What's the ^R in aid of, John?
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remmers
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response 23 of 143:
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Sep 2 11:49 UTC 1998 |
Beats me. I posted the response in Backtalk, and it looked fine
before I posted it.
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keesan
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response 24 of 143:
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Sep 22 21:07 UTC 1998 |
The Slavic Languages Division of a national translators' organization is
looking for a way to conference. We have about 300 members, maybe half of
whom are originally or still from Eastern Europe or the former Soviet Union.
THe group publishes a quarterly newsletter of about 15 pages, discussing such
topics as why it is now Ukraine instead of the Ukraine, ecotourism in national
parks in the former USSR, the life of a translator in Ukraine, dictionary
reviews,, electronic dictionaries and other computer related topics (how to
type Bulgarian using WP5.1). THere is also a question and answer column for
problem words and phrases. I have asked the administrator if grex would be
a suitable location for a Slavic translators' conference. If so, I would
request first that users donate to grex, and that they try to make the
discussions, or at least many of them, of interest to non translators. Many
of the translators are recent arrivals from former communist countries and
would be able to answer questions about life there, politics, economics,
cooking, housing, whatever. Translation can be a lonely business and I expect
there would be quite a lot of general chit-chat. Some of our members are
still living in eastern Europe (but would write in only in English).
I do not expect a flood of users, possibly ten or twenty new grex members at
the very most and some other occasional users.
THe translators' association is non profit and educational. would
there be any problem in setting up a conference on grex intended primarily
for the use of another nonprofit organization? (And if this worked, how about
a conference for an amateur fruit growers' group?)
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lilmo
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response 25 of 143:
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Sep 22 22:35 UTC 1998 |
Sounds great !!! Invite them immediately !!! (IMHO)
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cmcgee
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response 26 of 143:
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Sep 22 23:05 UTC 1998 |
as usual, I suggest that we try a few topics in agora first. The translator's
association sounds pretty viable, assuming all the readers of the newsletter
would also have telnet or web access to grex. I wonder if the amateur fruit
growers' group has the same everyday use of the web. Even in Ann Arbor, some
seemingly "natural" groups of potential grexers never show up. For a prime
example, look at the People's Food Coop conference. Food coop has a web page,
some very computer savy activists, and absolutely no activity in a conference
that was promoted in its newsletter, its web site, and in person. They were
simply not interested in being involved in a computer coop based on their food
coop interests. Which is not to say that there aren't a lot of Food Coop
members on line in Grex. Just that they don't use the Food Coop conference.
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lilmo
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response 27 of 143:
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Sep 23 01:39 UTC 1998 |
If it isn't used, why is it still around?
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davel
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response 28 of 143:
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Sep 23 11:53 UTC 1998 |
Because we never get rid of conferences, basically.
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keesan
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response 29 of 143:
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Sep 23 17:45 UTC 1998 |
I just wanted to make sure that there would not be any legal or other
objections to letting another organization have a conference on grex, which
might concentrate heavily on matters not of very general interest. I have
not yet heard from the administrator of the translators' association, but will
let her know that so far it looks possible..
Jim is trying to get hold of the person teaching computers at the
Chelsea-Dexter area senior center, to see if the students, many of whom have
no computers at home, would like some from Kiwanis (or from Tim Ryan). Also
to see if they would be interested in joining grex, and maybe have a seniors
conference. (I did not check if there was such a thing). One of the students
and her husband found it interesting when I showed them how to join the
kitchen and the diy conferences, and also look at websites on medical problems
and rototillers. They make wine. We could use more older members for more
of a balance. May know more in a week or three.
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mta
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response 30 of 143:
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Sep 23 22:31 UTC 1998 |
Colleen, I'm not so sure that making people "try out" in Agora first is such
a good idea when we'r talking about an organization. After all, a lot of what
they want to discuss would be, as Sindi says, of no interest to the average
Grexer. That doesn't mean they won't use the conferenc eif it's started.
(Of course, if it's started, there's also no guarantee that they'll use it
-- but I don't think unused conferences cause any problems...)
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cmcgee
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response 31 of 143:
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Sep 23 23:02 UTC 1998 |
Yeah, you're right Misti. An organization is, theoretically, a mass of people
who have expressed interest in communication about a topic.
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keesan
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response 32 of 143:
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Sep 24 14:10 UTC 1998 |
I could start this off as an item in Language. The organization is already
communicating via a quarterly newsletter which publishes anything and
everything people submit, but many people feel too shy to submit to a printed
newsletter. Also it does not help a lot to get an answer to a question on
a document you are translating in the newsletter six months after the document
has been translated. The national organization could also use a bulletin
board for short questions on translating, but I am afraid the volume of
questions might be too large for grex to handle (6000 or so members as opposed
to about 300 in teh Slavic languages only). Let's try out Slavic first.
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