SC Mission Statement and sub-groups

I wanted to agree with, discuss and build on pusha's post on the Mission Statement thread

pusha wrote:

Steering Committee
Mission Statement

We Believe In:

Severing the community that created us
A democratic and transparent decision making process by simple majority
Respecting each others points of view and cultures
Disbanding ourselves in 90 days unless asked to continue our work

We Aim To:

Present a draft vision for the site in 20 days
Present a draft web page layout in 12 days
Present a draft 10 point business plan in 20 days
Present a draft plan to cultivate existing data sources in 15 days
Present a new mission statement in 40 days

I agree with: the We Believe In section

Should we now split into groups for the other 5 Aim To goals? I think most of us have some sort of vision / mission statement for the site, but not everyone might want to be involved with actively drafting up a layout, business plan, or draft plan to cultivate existing data (a nice way of saying how do we export our collections and reuse the information).

I'd like to work on the Vision, Draft Web Site Layout, and Mission Statement. What would you like to do?

Vision and the more business side of things work for me

Revised Steering Committee Mission Statement, from the SC chatsession 3: 2008-04-20 thread, primarily revised in the chat and posted on the Steering Committee wiki page by Kergillian, with agreement from the rest of the SC in the chat.

Quote :

Revised Steering Committee
Mission Statement

WE, AS A STEERING COMMITTEE, BELIEVE IN:

1) Being our own community and maintaining our own spirit and ideals as defined by that community
2) Using a democratic and transparent decision-making process through simple majority
* Respecting each others points of view and cultures (removed, as it applies to the whole site, not just SC)
3) Holding regular meetings and discussions to fulfill our mandate
4) Holding a poll every 90 days to decide whether or not a new committee should be elected
* Disbanding ourselves in 90 days unless asked to continue our work (removed in favor of having a poll)

Doesn't 1) also apply to the entire site?

Heh, now that you mention it, yes.

------------------------

Steering Committee sub-groups, from the SC chatsession 3: 2008-04-20 thread, and the current forums where things can be discussed:

1) SC.Vis: vision & general principles (11. Other)
2) SC.Tech: tech stuff (5. Technical: Database, format and structure)
_ 2a) DB programmers - first focus
_ 2b) interface / HTML - close second concern
3) SC.BFL: Business, finance & legal (4. Finance: Income, sponsorship, marketplace)

The ideal break-up of SC members would be: SC.Vis: 5* / SC.Tech: 5 / SC.BFL: 3

* The vision group would have 3 dedicated members, and 1 member from Fin and Tech, to bridge the groups.

Tentative groupings, as of 2008-04-21:
asylum27 - ?
azzurro - Vis
deejsasqui - Vis
dmaxx - BFL
hmvh - ?
Kergillian - ?
lazlo_nibble - ?
little_alien - ?
MR_E - ?
pusha - BFL
quisquilia - Vis/BFL

Tallies:
Vis - 3 (1 crossed w/BFL)
Tech - none
BFL - 3 (1 crossed with Vis)

As dmaxx noted, if we apply [BFL], [TECH], [VIS] tags before topic titles, that'd keep things organized within the current forum structure. The topics are to be discussed by any and all, with Steering Committee folks involved to keep things focused and moving along, setting timelines if needed and possible.

DJ - thanks for picking up my slack.

I will check my notes at home to see if there is anything further to add. But, for the most part it looks like you got it covered.

No problem - thanks to those who have been hashing this all out.

I've updated my Calling all coders! thread to include the [TECH] tag, and I just tried searching for "[tech]" - there it was! Yeah, nothing too impressive, but I'm happy with thread tags that make it easier to search the forums.

Hi,

I missed the chat yesterday unfortunately, though I think it's indeed a good idea to focus on special topics in smaller groups.

Personally, I have no technical skills nor enough knowledge about financing etc. but I think I can be usefull in the vision group.

I like the thread-tags idea. It's really useful when there is a lot of threads to go through.

deejsasqui, thanks for putting it up here. I unfortunately almost have no spare time left, if I find a gap somewhere in the next few days I'll make a newsletter to send to the entire forum.

By the way, I'm going for BFL only. Cheers!

Glad to help!

With filling in guesses for the list of current non-responders, here's what I think could be the break-down (updated April 24, 2008):

asylum27 - BFL / Vis
azzurro - Vis
deejsasqui - Vis
dmaxx - BFL
hmvh - Tech / Vis
Kergillian - Vis
lazlo_nibble - Tech / Vis?
little_alien - Tech?
MR_E - Tech / Vis?
pusha - BFL
quisquilia - Vis/BFL

Rough numbers:
Vis - 8 (2 crossed w/BFL, 3 w/Tech)
Tech - 4 (3 crossed w/Vis)
BFL - 4 (2 crossed with Vis)

I think our hopes for 5 tech people is high, seeing as few in the SC have listed their skills as including technical stuff, and some of those are purely guesses as to what they'd like to do. It could be fewer.

That means we'll need more of our technical people to help out in big ways, which I think we can do, if any of the posts in the Tech forum prove examples of skills and interest.

Yes, BFL / Vision works for me. I have some legal knowledge and a little understanding of corporate structure. The establishment and structuring of an entity is really quite a crucial early step.

Quote :

I think our hopes for 5 tech people is high, seeing as few in the SC have listed their skills as including technical stuff, and some of those are purely guesses as to what they'd like to do. It could be fewer.

yes but non SC members are already ploughing ahead in a very strong way on this. We really just need a coordinator to pull it all together. Maybe 2 SC members and 3 or 4 non-Sc members on a Tech sub-group. This is specialised stuff after all and I'd be more comfortable if those with a level of expertise were hands on rather than scarping together a SC team because we have to.

asylum27 wrote:

yes but non SC members are already ploughing ahead in a very strong way on this. We really just need a coordinator to pull it all together. Maybe 2 SC members and 3 or 4 non-Sc members on a Tech sub-group. This is specialised stuff after all and I'd be more comfortable if those with a level of expertise were hands on rather than scarping together a SC team because we have to.

Agreed. 5 was the number from discussion #3, and I think those discussions are building blocks, not hard and fast rules. It'd be great if we had more of the technical people on SC, but not completely necessary for progress.

I mentioned in the chat that I would be best suited for the Vision Squad.

It was also mentioned that it would be useful to have a crossover person between groups. I don't know how much time I have available, but I'd be happy to do my best to join all 3 groups and coordinate between them, if necessary.

As above, I'm good with Tech+VIS.

Next question: Is the official vision statement (Kerg, that was your baby?) available for us all to gloat over? I want that to made available for everyone to see and approve, and then cast in granite.

I'll start with a few other lists tonight to ensure that everyone's wants are, in one way or another, taken care of; it seems that Schneckl is going mad with structuring the db already before we even know what information we actually want to capture!

No, we're not building a prettier clone of discogs, we're going to branch off where it went haywire because we've learnt from that site and will do things differently.

Yeah, I'm back. The vision remains grand. Try to keep up.

PS: No provider in Europe. The law does not favour Nazi peraphernalia or naughty images in the name of album cover art. Denmark would be a solid choice, though.

As I understand it, we have a Steering Committee Mission Statement - something that focuses the SC's actions and such.

I think there's still the need for a solid Vision, as I've sort of rambled on about in the Compiling a Collective Vision thread. azzurro offered to work on gathering the ideas from all corners of our forums into something for our longer-term growth, tied with close-range goals.

At least, that's what I understand our path to be. Correct me if I'm wrong, please =)

As a minor bump / update, We still haven't heard from lazlo_nibble (who's been MIA for a bit), little_alien (busy ATM, I think) and MR_E (finishing up some school work this week, should be more active soon).

IMO better structured split up

Vision:
azzurro
deejsasqui
hmvh (bridge VIS - TECH)
quisquilia (bridge VIS - BFL)
-


Tech:
hmvh (bridge VIS - TECH)
kergillian
little_alien
-


BFL:
asylum27
dmaxx
pusha
quisquilia (bridge VIS - BFL)


unknown:
lazzlo_nibble
MR_E

^^ You need to mark me as bridge VIS - BFL. Thx.

and if Quis is the VIS/BFL bridge, then Asylum will have to drop one of his two selections...

added bridge to quisquilia

Asylum, can you let us know which you prefer?

BFL works for me as I've some expertise in that

done mate.

That leaves two. If neither of the remaining people want VIS then feel free to put me back into VIS. I don't mind either way.

But if they don't respond by tomorrow we need to replace them and move on.

Dammit, that is disappointing -- I NEEDED lazlo_nibble for his label insight (we had some good dialogue about those back at that other place).

OK, we need to get this decided and start setting up SSC meetings - I don't think we can afford to wait any longer. Time is ticking away and our rate of progress is going to come to a standstill unless we get this over and done with.

IMO, we need to replace Laszlo and MR_E with pano and one other person (perhaps our final 'contestant' in the original SC vote?) and get the SSC meetings set. They've had planty of time to respond and we need to keep moving before our 90 days are up - a hell of a lot to do in a short amount of time.

Last I heard, MR_E is finishing his school work and pano is busy with work. But if we are to replace members due to inactivity (lazlo_nibble's the only one who hasn't spoken up at all in the recent past), ultra_ambient would be next on board, as he had 20 votes, and pano4423_004 had 19.

We should wait a day or so to see how MR_E is doing, and see if Lazlo_Nibble rises up. Maybe if nothing is heard by Friday, we can ask ultra_ambient if he still has the time and want to join the SC? And we can ask pano if he has time for some legal input.

I just realized we can check when someone last logged on, and lazlo_nibble's profile lists April 7 as the last time he was on. MR_E's profile lists April 25 as the last date of logging on.

The Subcommittees forum has been unlocked, and everyone from the SC should be able to join.

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Thx, dmaxx.