User:Bendonahower

Free Culture Conference Call December 28th, 2004

In Attendance:

Benjamin Li

Rebekah

Purpose of Conference Call: Internal Strategy Paper

Public Knowledge wants us to do two things:

1) Internal strategy paper. How we're going to get things done - how we're going to further Free Culture as a student movement. Ã¢â‚¬Â¢	How we are going to get things done Ã¢â‚¬Â¢	Map of structure Ã¢â‚¬â€œ concrete sustainable path Ã¢â‚¬Â¢	This can be important not just for PK but to improve our organization Ã¢â‚¬Â¢	Topical information o	How are we going to run? o	How do we want the organization to look and then reverse engineer

2) External policy paper to give to legislators so they know what students want them to do Ã¢â‚¬Â¢	For policymakers

Note: 1.	Keeping in mind that individual chapters make us distinct from other organizations such as EFF, etc. 2.	#1 priority: national organizationÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s first purpose is to increase the quantity and to foster the quality of local groups

Free CultureÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Organizational Components:

o	Communication o	Communicating with local groups o	Organizational structure o	Philosophy o	Digital public policy o	Logistics o	Roles of who is doing what o	Must fill roles o	Goals o	Timeline and related updates o	Improving quality and quantity of local groups

Free Culture Components Explored:

o	Communication o	Communicating with local groups o	Communication weak Ã¯â€šÂ§	Dichotomy between national and local would be a result of it o	Everyone should in contact with each other o	Rapid/response to media o	Decentralized with some methodÃ¢â‚¬Â¦ o	Impersonal resources Ã¯â€šÂ§	Online resources Ã¯â€šÂ§	Wiki for the individual groups to contribute to o	Personal resources Ã¯â€šÂ§	Being able to contact a real human being Ã¯â€šÂ§	Directory of the individual groups Ã¯â€šÂ§	Description of the individual groups Ã¯â€šÂ§	Message board o	Portal targeted for each individual member of Free Culture that aggregates the feeds from local chapter blogs Ã¯â€šÂ§	Planet? Ã¯â€šÂ§	Chapter blogs not individual blogs Ã¯â€šÂ§	We need some more than blogs and email lists o	Organizational structure o	Chairman and the rest of core group over certain jurisdiction o	Nelson Ã¢â‚¬â€œ combination between national and local groups o	Steering or core committee directing the group while committees have certain responsibilities or functions o	Some local autonomy and some national o	We're in a transitional period, where we used to be mostly a single group and now the local chapters are emerging. o	Defining issues, setting up communication structures, facilitate and coordinate their work, but shouldnÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t be command and control Ã¯â€šÂ§	Local to the national to determine direction o	Thoughts from Ben: instead of committees, what about working groups? Ã¯â€šÂ§	http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&oi=defmore&q=define:Working+Group o	Philosophy o	Digital public policy o	Logistics o	Roles of who is doing what o	Must fill roles o	Goals o	Timeline and related updates o	Improving quality and quantity of local groups o	Local groups Ã¢â‚¬â€œ what can we expect from the national and what can national expect from local o	Repository of ideas and information for the local groups o	Differences between local and national chapters and what their assets are o	Linkage between local groups and communication Ã¯â€šÂ§	How structured versus decentralized we need to be Ã¯â€šÂ§	How can we be a clearing house for information when local groups give the national group information Ã¯â€šÂ§

GROUP ORGANIZATION: CASE STUDY, YOUTH GROUP o	Local o	Shared information because they attended state functions o o	State o	National

GROUP ORGANIZATION: CASE STUDY, BOY SCOUTS o	Local o	Local planning of regional events o	Regional o	National o	Providing materials and logistical support

Miscellaneous:

The wiki is not that well organized and there are no real deep links from the main page.

Need to be able to accommodate both long-term, sustained efforts and short-term, quick-reaction events.

We need an Instant-Response Squad. We need squads or teams -- so you Can develop your own expertise. o	Thoughts from Ben: Howard Dean built up a similar such organization, called Dean Rapid/Response Network it has morphed into an R/R network for progressive politics. Here is the link, it might be of some use in forming our own quick response to media, http://rapidresponsenetwork.org/

Unanswered questions:

How do local chapters coordinate and how does the national organization work with them?

How does the national coordinate itself?

Wrap up:

We need a to-do list and an action-by list. We need an organizational structure. We don't need to assign tasks to people; we need to assign something bigger. Like responsibilities.

Another conference call has been scheduled for Wednesday at 3 pm. During the conference call, we will make plans for an AIM chat to create a draft of the internal strategy paper.