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I just sent this to Siun, FDL's Press Secretary (I found the email addy on the "contact us" page) ...

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Subject: Discussion of possible extensions of the FDL blog

Hello Siun,

...and thru you to the other FDL Proprietors, Mods and behind-the-scenes techies (I.e., please redistribute this when you can),

I imagine that Jane must be very busy at the Take Back America conference, and that the other players of FDL must also be extra-busy these days.

So, with the greatest respect to you and to your current workload, I invite you and them to check out the Off-Topic part of my

http://www.firedoglake.com/2007/06/18/violations/#comment-767311

wherein I invite folx to a discussion of how FDL is moving towards adding non-blog tools to FDL. Personally, I think that FaceBook, while very well suited to social networking among people of different groups, is not optimal for FDL.

Someone -- name redacted -- suggested in

http://www.quicktopic.com/39/H/j6R8HtFMMKZ/m32

that I email you directly and ask for your participation, in your "copious free time." :) Here 'tiz.

I'd be very grateful for any consideration of these thoughts, either by email or online.

Thanks,

/Dan Kalikow, aka "S.O.S. from MA"

Hi All — This is an exchange I had with someone in FB last week. It sure was difficult to wedge it in there and make it clear whose words were whose. At any rate this FB person (whose name I unfortunately learned) said "OK" when I asked permission to post our exchange in this QT, but requested me to redact their name.

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Hello S.O.S.,

===> (I'll be marking paragraphs of my responses with that ===> symbol, and showing your text in indented italics) Hi FB UID redacted! This FaceBook naming convention will drive me quite nuts! :) and pls pardon the length of this... almost 50% of it is your words anyway...:)

Been watching your posts and I must say personally I am intrigued by your proposals. Clearly some changes need to made in order for the forum to grow.. Unfortunately I am not a techy, at all, so it is difficult for me to follow or feel like my input may be nothing more than a distraction.

===> OBTW, the substantive parts of this note would imho be better placed over in the links I pointed to, which are QuickTopic (QT) links; it's so much easier a tool to use than is FaceBook (FB) because more than just me and you will read what we say... Albeit that QT is still not quite the right tool that we imho need. As far as your "I'm not a techy," nope, no distraction at all, no worries. You're more then welcome; if you have a question about anything, ask and someone in the discussion area will come to your aid.

But it's early on and I wanted to share a couple thoughts about how to get and keep this conversation going re more input. ...

===> I'm really glad to have the opportunity to get your advice! :)

About the announcements of your wonderful page in threads, I think you could address the announcement a bit more clearly as an invitation to discuss.....etc..

===> :) Thanks for that "wonderful." :) That's a really good point you just made. I try to keep the intro text as short as possible so as not to unduly disrupt the ongoing discussion of the base post, but I'll work some on clarifying what I mean. TYVM for the guidance. When "non-techy" users say "What does that mean??", then it's a sure sign that the technical writer has not done their job completely.

Also be sure a new post has been up awhile before introducing an OT. Perhaps acknowledge the author and their posts work in the current thread before getting to the meat of your OT matter.. (which clearly is intended to benefit all of us) I would also restrain from posting about this at all in a live or special guest thread..

===> That's an excellent point about waiting till the discussion "matures" before inserting my OT (clarified) :) comment. I often try to preface my OT with some sort of base-post-relevant comment, to sort of "justify" my presence there before jumping to my own OT stuff. But I'll admit I don't recall doing that recently. To my recollection, I've never done my OT thingie in a LiveBlog or Special Guest thread. I figure that in the firsst case, the server's loaded down enough without my shoveling in ANYthing that's not directly relevant. And that I realize it would be Just Plain Rude to post anything not related to the Special Guest's appearance in FDL. Though I can't recall having done the latter two "impolitenesses," I'll certainly remember your advice going forward.

As you can imagine in an open source area like FDL there is not a lot of hierarchy nor time for everyone to do everything.. like you, we are all volunteers. But one of the few clear rules mods have is not to allow OT in guest or live threads like book salon or Blue America etc. also the likes of Lew's Padilla threads as well

===> Yep. Tnx, as above.

It's tricky, I know.

===> Naah, it's quite simple really; and as long as I say something relevant or complimentary to the base-post writer, and don't post my OT stuff too early, and stay away from the two posting-types that I believe I have avoided thus far, I think I'm good to go. Again — I appreciate your taking the time to explain the "unwritten rules of our social community" more clearly to me!

May I ask a couple of questions?

===> Why, sure!

Have you sent emails/ invitations to view and or join or support your page/ideas, to the big cheese like Jane, CHS, Pach etc., directly? I noticed Jane is on your friends list at face book.. perhaps she is watching or you all have spoken.. I don't know but thought a direct invitation to view your ideas and or garner support for your efforts may help move things along with more participation from firepups who could really help you.. If so.. please disregard, if not. perhaps you should consider doing so.

===> Another good idea that I'll take you up on. No, I haven't had the guts yet to directly address them (I have so much respect and indirect friendship to them, that I hardly wanted to distract them, specially since they work so hard "herding cats") (that's us), the huge and growing community that they've created through their hard work.

===> Howsomever, someone (Pach? I'm not sure) thought that FaceBook (FB) would be a good tool upon which to further build the FDL community, off its normal blog base. I disagree strongly, feeling that FB is fine for what it's designed to do, but that it's quite offbase for what we imho need. For example: Who cares whether person X is "friends with" person Y? Very interesting, helpful, and probably necessary in a social networking scheme, but irrelevant to the FDL community where we are all equal (imho) in being able to comment on anything. That's why I think another user model — a modern web BBS — would be much closer to the mark. I hesitate to address Them On High because SOMEbody in that group has created this FB FDL community, and I am saying that it was the wrong decision, there being working examples out there that are closer to the goal. Furthermore, I've sketched (elsewhere, in the QT) a way for the FDL blog to be integrated with a BBS in the background — in such a way as to change the FDL blog we know and love only minimally.

Perhaps Jane has another face book weekend post in the works and you could post an extended invitation with her endorsement in that thread??

===> Interesting notion. I'd certainly be happy to influence things to that extent. Problem being I am getting snowed under with responses, most positive, and I want to keep that going... Though I certainly admit that getting Jane's imprimatur would be a major step in the right direction! :)

Sorry this is a choppy note, but I'll stop here and hope it 's received with nothing but the best intentions in mind.. hope a mssg this size will squeeze through facebook mail system and find you well..

===> Not choppy at all, in fact very interesting. This means I've received it very well, and with thanks. Interesting about your misgivings about message length. So if this thingie-larger-than-yours doesn't make it thru either, then I'll just email it along outside FB.

===> Would it be OK with you for me to put the text of your message into the ongoing QT discussion area]? If so, would you have me put in your name as FB UID redacted? Alternatively, you could put this stuff in yourself... You can get there by clicking here: [1].

===> You can create a QT account virtually instantly, choosing a screen name the same as your FDL nickname. Your real name or email addr need never appear, if you like. Or if you don't want to bother with a QT user ID, you can just post and write in your nickname for every post. Same thing as a Gabbly account: You can register and thus "claim" your nickname or just pick the same one when you come back.

===> After I post your valuable comments in the discussion area, hopefully others already there will comment. You've said some important things that imho should get wider distribution.

===> The beauty part about the QT discussion is that it can go on past the temporal boundaries of normal FDL postings. [N.B. — I'm still not endorsing QT as the "right" tool for FDL!]

All the best and thanks for your indulgence, FB UID redacted

===> You're quite welcome! Thanks for your comments! Best back atcha! Cheers, "S.O.S. from MA" in FDL, aka "Sos von Ma" in FB :)

Edited by author 06-17-2007 11:20 PM
I appreciate the fdbk, raven in /m29 — that sounds like a pretty useable BBS! :) Same with the BBS you frequent, TJ in /m27.

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oddmommy /m28 -- glad to have you here! :) Ya, I also truly love the FDL community — it's such great food for the soul — and I feel it could be even better (on the software side) than it is now, even augmented by FaceBook (FB). Certainly the community that Jane, Christy, Pach, TRex Siun, Suzanne and the other crew (wish I could remember all their names) *blush* have built here is a wonderful place on the 'net to hang out. I've learned so much from their "base posts" and from the comments of all of us 'FirePups.

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_re_ raven in /m30 and oddmommy /m28, I agree that the mods have to feel like they're "herding cats" each with their own priorities. I wouldn't be at all surprised if they feel "snowed in" with their normal blogging responsibities, and that may result in "hard-and-fast rules" that sometimes feel adversarial but I'm sure are not intended as such. Therefore, I always approach them and the subject of changes to FDL with due respect. It's their creation, so they get to pick! (: Occasionally though, one of the cats – like me – yowls for attention... :)
  
Consider that this particular conversation has extended over several days, which is impossible within the current FDL blog model, and (as far as I can determine) quite difficult within FB.

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M Levi(a.k.a. realworld) in /m25 — thanks for the feedback and the excellent ideas.

1. I sortakinda like the notion of "persistent chats." I've used BBSes that allowed their RT chats' content to be converted into a BBS thread. If we adopted this notion, it would mean a change in the "sociology" of the Gabbly chat for FDL. There, we're pretty freewheeling, topic-drifting by convention, and occasionally (horrors!) quite profane! So if the conversion of our Gabbly chats into permanent threads became the norm, it might detract from the current "Let-'er-RIP!" style that FDL Gabblers have come to know and love. Such a thing could perhaps be created (with effort). Or, we'd have to find a BBS that supported this kind of thing, and in either case add its maintenance to the new workload that moderating a BBS will place on the FDL Mods. So, on balance, I'd have to not support that notion. I'd stay with Gabbly as it is (and hope that it remains on the 'net in more-or-less its present form).
2. Document Libraries: sure, why not? I've used and created BBSes that encourage collections of docs and/or pointers. N.B., when you said "Cooperatively developing long writeups," I thought "Wiki model." Could be fun, as long as we don't expect that the Wiki would be a good place for the type of interactive, time-independent discussion supported by a "true BBS." There are free Wiki services out there that could be used.
3. Social Bookmarking: I don't know nearly enough about this, not having used such a system yet. But your proposal sure sounds like it could add some value to FDL.

So then, M Levi(a.k.a. realworld), thanks for participating, and natch you're more than welcome to comment on my comments here! :)

What I would support by way of extensions to FDL, aside from the BBS that I'm mostly concentrating on here, would be the additional services I brought up over here: [1]. To wit,

1. The 'PupMap, here: [2] (660 'Pups signed up)
2. The FDL "Gabbly Chat" (non-persistent) here: [3] and
3. The 'PupCalendar here: [4]. Full explanations of these three services are available here: [1].
   
   These first three are already up and running, the first two without any further maintenance, and the third, the 'PupCalendar. needs only care and feeding with upcoming events in order to remain of value to FirePups.
   
   Next, from M Levi(a.k.a. realworld)'s valuable comments in /m26,
   ...
4. Document Libraries, and
5. Social Bookmarking, as defined by someone who understands it better than I do. :)

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TJ in /m26 and /m27 — (your comments in quoted indented italics, my responses outdented:)

"I would support having a bulletin board with a topic for each new blog post, as well as ongoing topics and a social area. I regularly use a couple of bulletine boards and have ongoing friendships with the folks."

Absolutely true for me too, TJ. I've been a member of such electronic communities for awhile, long before the Web. I've made good friends with other ppl in those communities, some of whom I still get together with despite being long-gone from the companies where we met. Even more fun were the "BBS Parties" where anyone within driving distance showed up to meet their BBS-Buddies F2F.

"However, it doesn't seem that FDL wants to support this effort now. I wonder if one of the top level people would be willing to post a link to a poll to check the general level of interest."

Well, imho the "powers that be" (PTB) must be interested in supporting some sort of extension to the blog model that has served FDL so well in the past... but at the moment they're encouraging us to use FB for that purpose, which is "kludgy" for the large community created by their hard work and attractive intellects.

Someone (dunno who) in the PTB surveyed the field of "social networking" tools and decided on FaceBook — or simply went for it because of habits-of-use in making connections between people with discloseable names in various affiliate groups. This might well be because FB seems to be a good tool to use when connecting communities... But as I say, imho it doesn't work within communities — communities which are traditionally open, zealously concerned about and resistive of the disclosure of their real identities. We also need tools that have relatively sophisticated formatting and preview capabilities... the list goes on. I can easily understand the utility of FB connections between like-minded people from different blogging communities, people who are not loath to disclose their real identities etc.

Therefore, I, myself, think that FB is the wrong tool to get to where we need to be, though FB is a handy-dandy, "one-stop shopping," single-login area that can be used to approximate what's needed. However, I would suggest that asking FB to do what we need is like shopping for tires in a supermarket. You might get some tasty or even tangentially useful stuff, but you ain't gonna get what will work on your car.

You said you'd be interested in a Poll, TJ. Great idea! Turns out we can do it ourselves! Everyone, please visit and vote in this 'PupPoll. (No login is required; you only get to vote once. Before you can register your vote, you'll have to read and enter some distorted text, via a system called CAPCHA, to "prove you're a human and not a robot.") If you have any comments on your vote, please put them in this discussion.

"Also, Dan, the 13 requirements seem to be making things pretty complex. But I'm posting this in the middle of the Giuliani 12 commandment thread, so my viewpoint may be jaded."

707! Well, all I can say in my own defense is that I'm an ex-academic and I sometimes tend to be too detail-oriented. But I hope that separately stating each of suggested properties of a "good BBS" eases the evaluation process for someone... and I sure hope you finished Giuliani's commandments without barfing too much... I liked that last comment a lot! Thanks, all, for participating!

Edited by author 06-15-2007 05:42 AM
I also hope that this situation is not perceived as critical or adversarial by Jane, Christy et al. It may be that they are so buried trying to provide the valuable service they do that there just isn't the time or interest in changing. FB seemed like fun and no one had top do any work to get it going. As far as dictatorial tactics, working with a huge number of whiny liberals and the occasional wingnut troll would test anyone!

Three followup Q's if I might:

   1. In the ChevyTalk BBS, is there the concept of "email subscription" either to a particular topic, to topics that YOU post yourself, or to the entire BBS? So that when a reply is posted or a new Topic is begun, you get an email to notify you to check the BBS?

Yes, you do subscribe and you can also become a "supporting member" that gives you some extra bennies.


   2. Is there an RSS feed? Not to worry about this Q if you're not into RSS feeds yet...

No

   3. Can you register and use a "handle" that keeps your real name and email addy confidential?


Yes, you control what is visible.

Tnx :)

well, I don't understand ANY of the techno-talk here....but I signed on because I like the fdl community, but don't always like some of its more, uh, dictatorial tactics.

http://www.johnbridge.com/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=1

a forum I frequent regularly

I would support having a bulletin board with a topic for each new blog post, as well as ongoing topics and a social area. I regularly use a couple of bulletine boards and have ongoing friendships with the folks.

However, it doesn't seem that FDL wants to support this effort now. I wonder if one of the top level people would be willing to post a link to a poll to check the general level of interest.

Also, Dan, the 13 requirements seem to be making things pretty complex. But I'm posting this in the middle of the Giuliani 12 commandment thread, so my viewpoint may be jaded.

I'm late in joining this discussion so my comments may have already been hashed over by others. It looks interesting., I think the guidelines from S.O.S. make a lot of sense. Some other models that might be useful in addition to a BBS are: Chat, Persistent Chat, Document Library, and social bookmarking.

Chats:

We already have a basic chat model with Gably but it would be good if these chats could become long term objects that had the ability to evolve over their life. It is sort of a cross between a real-time chat and a thread.

Doc Libraries:

A document library could be simply a set of useful indices's to other material or could be used to a) Storing long writups b) Cooperatively developing long writeups.

Social Bookmarking: A cross between Google Bookmarks and Diggs. This could be implemented as part of an index and link oriented doc library too, where the references (links) could contain metadata like ratings, commentaries, links to related materials, etc.

Edited by author 06-14-2007 05:34 PM
Tnx for the info raven. Sure sounds like this BBS is helpful to you! I'm glad of that.

Three followup Q's if I might:

1. In the ChevyTalk BBS, is there the concept of "email subscription" either to a particular topic, to topics that YOU post yourself, or to the entire BBS? So that when a reply is posted or a new Topic is begun, you get an email to notify you to check the BBS?
2. Is there an RSS feed? Not to worry about this Q if you're not into RSS feeds yet...
3. Can you register and use a "handle" that keeps your real name and email addy confidential?

Tnx :)

Yes, I can see new posts each time I log in. It has a number in a little box on each topic to let you know. I have a 66 Truck and this site has been incredibly helpful as I have rebuilt it almost from the ground up. I have never waited more than a couple of hours for an answer and have even had people send me parts for free. The mods do a nice job of keeping folks on topic and moving stuff to chit chat when needed.

Oho. Nice. With ads, no less! Loox like a pretty standard multi-topic BBS. At the bottom of the front page it says FusionBB™ Version 2.0.1 ©2003-2006 InteractivePHP, Inc so it's one of many contemporary licenseable BBSes built on the PHP language.

Since I've never owned a Chevy (VW, Volvo & 2 Mustangs did it for me), I didn't register. So tell me pls, does ChevyTalk have anything like Next Unseen-by-me or New Posts/Replies since I was here last?

In other words, how do you get directed to new stuff? Tnx for keeping the discussion going! :)

Edited by author 06-14-2007 10:31 AM
PS

this is the site I am used to using most often

http://www.chevytalk.org/fusionbb/index.php

I did not take it as a negative comment. You obvioulsy know way more about this than most of us and I was interested to see if I had you right. I'm working toward understanding and this has helped. Thanks

Hi raven -- I assume you're talking about my /m17 ^*. You are quite right, it was silly that the NEW thread was, at that early time in its life, still in its birth stage, when ppl normally play the trivial "ZED, I'm first!!" game. So when you made the jump into the new thread, there wasn't much THEN to talk about. So, I think you might have been wondering, "Why should I have left the old thread simply to walk into this ZED-playgroup?" :)

(FWIW, I too think that the ZED game is a waste of time -- and that ppl play it to advertise that they were Johnny-on-the-spot first to see the notation that "a new thread is upstairs," or else just happened to jump into the 'Lake as the new post is put up.)

And if that's what you were thinking, imho you were right -- because we work within the normal conventions of the any standard blog.

Wouldn't it be convenient to be able to finish a conversation despite the fact that a new blog post had been put up for commenting? That's the thought-experiment that I was alluding to when I said "... this sort of comment is symptomatic of forcing what "wants to be" a BBS-style posting into a blog-style model." ... I meant nothing pejorative about your posting in FDL. I was merely observing that you were working, as we all do, within the available tools for conversing.

Consider what we now use. Think of each blog-post as a single "tube" (: thank you Sen. Stevens :) within which we converse. That tube is perforce used to discuss the blog posting, but occasionally there are various off-topic interjections that we are supposed to note by saying "Pardon the OT..." and sometimes a whole OT conversation, or more than one, that occur within a single tube. That's because at any one time, only one current tube exists.

When a new blog-post is put up, a new "tube" is created, and the "crowd" in the old one empties out except for stuff that is "EPU'd." To defend against their thoughts not having been exposed to, and read by, the moved-on crowd, some people re-post their thoughts in the "new tube," and we are supposed to note that fact by saying "EPU'd from previous topic..." This is imho a symptom of our using the wrong communications tool to handle ongoing conversations across "tube boundaries."

A good contemporary BBS allows multiple tubes to exist at the same time. Anything "OT" can find a home outside of the tube dedicated to comments about any particular posting, and (because of the NEXT UNSEEN capability of a good BBS,) the "crowd" can be depended on to read it, albeit asynchronously and separately from the blog-comment tube.

These are complex concepts, but it's my view that anyone who has used a good contemporary web BBS and a good contemporary web-log already recognizes the difference. I'm one of those ppl. I think that if FDL and a BBS are hybridized along the lines I sketched, the sum can be better than its parts. I further think that the main FDL blog we know and love would be changed only slightly in the process.

Dat's wot I meant. Hope this clarification, which I should have put in my /m17, is what you were curious about.

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^* QT has a nifty convention that you can write SLASH M # SEPARATOR and it will hyperize that into a link to the indicated previous message #. It will pop up a window with that message # in it. This trick isn't really necessary in this case, since mine immediately follows yours, but it's kinda handy when the message being commented on is way before the reply. NB: Still not endorsing the use of QT for FDL's discussion area! :)

Can you explain a bit more about your comment on my comment. We were engaged in a pretty good conversation when repated "fresh thread" messages appeared. When I went there everyone was doing "I'm first"! Seemd silly to me.

Edited by author 06-13-2007 10:45 PM
To buttress the points I've been making, I give you this post from the FDL blog:

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raven @ 6

We are supposed to rush over from the other thread so we can play duck duck goose?

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I put it to you that this sort of comment is symptomatic of forcing what "wants to be" a BBS-style posting into a blog-style model. "The math doesn't work," as a certain Preznit would say. :)

Please remember, I am most emphatically not advocating the use of QT as the FDL BBS engine. Totally the wrong user model here.

Edited by author 06-13-2007 02:38 PM
A BBS (for such is imho what we need) will not succeed in FDL's context unless it is implemented using some or all of these guidelines:

1. It should be frontpaged on FDL — that is, a pointer to it should appear there. On the way in, there might be a brief description of how the BBS and FDL blog interact...
   
2. Once people arrive at the BBS, they should be encouraged to register and then to login using their usual anonymous FDL "handle" or "nickname." (Many modern browsers (e.g., FireFox) offer the facility to remember usernames and passwords, such that whenever you return you are already logged in as yourself.)
   All the BBSes I have ever seen offer registration with a known, true, never-shown email address; this is for verification that there's a real person who is registering, rather than a 'bot, and as a place where email-type subscriptions can be delivered, should the user choose that optiion.
   
   
3. People should be free to start up any topic they want, except in one particular section: Topics tied to particular FDL blog-posts. In that section, there should be one Topic per base Blog Post.
    
   
   There should be another section for upcoming events. It should be the responsibility for someone (the Mods or their delegated person(s) to take that info, which can be contributed by anyone, and transfer it into the FDL Calendar (q.v. elsewhere).
   
   There might be another section called "Miscellany" and another for "Casual chatter"... implementation decisions.
   
4. During the on-FDL-blog "life" of a Topic, the only venue for discussing it should be, as is usual and expected, the FDL comments on the post. As soon as the post is superseded by another, comments in the blog on that post should be closed, and all further comment should be placed in the BBS Topic associated with that Topic. This is reflective of the reasons people like to post in a "live FDL post's" comment string: They know that the "currently online crowd of FDL community members" will see and maybe pay attention to what they write. However, when a new post comes along, the crowd moves along too, leaving a few sorry stragglers to continue the abandoned conversation, then finally realizing that something new is under discussion, and move on themselves.
   
   This is the reason we appreciate the "new topic upstairs" convention. If comments are closed, possibly with a pointer to continued conversation in the corresponding BBS Topic, the existence of a new Topic would be unmistakable, and the "new thread upstairs" convention would be obviated.
   
   Consider what will happen to our "EPU" and "OT" conventions.
   
   If a BBS is implemented according to this sketch, nothing would ever be OT — there is always an appropriate other topic where formerly OT comments can be placed, and the "Unseen Topics" function will ensure that the crowd of other FDL'ers will come across your "formerly OT" musings. Thus the crowd can read, asynchronously to the current Base Post, whatever "formerly OT" thing you want to say.
   
   The "EPU" would similarly be less necessary, since the BBS's Unseen Topics command will ensure that the crowd will read it as they read through the comments given during the on-Blog life of the base post, and thereafter in the BBS Topic associated with that blog Topic.
   
5. It is an implementation decision on whether (a) the BBS Topic should contain the full text of the FDL "base post" or just a pointer back into FDL. (I lean to having only a pointer back into FDL, with only the main Topic Heading surviving. (e.g, "Yet Another Dynamic DOJ Duo"or " Standard WaPo BS").
   
6. It is an implementation decision on whether all comments made directly into the FDL comments on that "base post" be transformed into BBS "replies" to that "base post." So, for a very busy Topic that had perhaps 326 replies before being superseded by another, the BBS Topic corresponding to that base post would already have 326 replies before being opened for commentary. I, for one, would like this option. And lest you think that this would produce a welter of commentary for people to read, this would not occur with a good BBS's "Unseen Topics" functionality and reverse-chronological ordering of replies.
   
7. All the above mechanisms will bind the FDL blog closely and productively to its "sister BBS," making them symbiotic and "sum greater than the parts." If hit-rate is important because ad revenue is tied to it on the BBS, fine-and-dandy. The BBS should be implemented with space for advertisers too; and then, since the "FDL blog/sister BBS" pairing will become more attractive, users will use it more and ad revenues will increase concomitantly.
   
8. It may well be that the proprietors of FDL (whom I don't know personally, I just respect them a whole lot!!) are uncomfortable with the notion of "opening up" FDL to BBS-style commentary. To them, I say: The FDL community you have created with your efforts and intelligence has grown too large for the simple blog model. Imho if you meld the existing blog more-or-less untouched with a symbiotic BBS, I confidently predict that FDL will experience a second level of growth as your online functionality expands to more fully serve the needs of its community. The FaceBook, with its FDL group, is/was a valiant attempt, but it's imho not the right tool to blend with FDL.

OK folks, whaddayathink? Over to you.

Edited by author 06-13-2007 02:13 PM
Pach just sent this out:

Upcoming Events
To the members of Firedoglake
 
Pachacutec Firedoglake
Today at 10:08am
Reply
Just a heads up:

1) Tomorrow June 14 at 1:30 PM EST, Scooter Libby will have his bond hearing, and tomorrow by the end of the day, Judge Walton is expected to rule on whether or not Libby will be free pending the completion of his appeal. Walton has said he is inclined to lock Scooter up, but briefs have been filed now by both sides on the questions in play. I'll be covering this at Firedoglake live from the courthouse.

2) If you are near or can get yourself to the Take Back America Conference in Washington, DC next week, give it a shot.

Jane has a post about it here http://www.firedoglake.com/2007/06/11/to-answer-your-question/

On the basis of this helpful info, some observations:

1. This important message will not get to all the members of the FDL community; there are some who haven't signed up yet, and there are others who will never do so because of the lack of anonymity. Plus them who who haven't heard of it (because of its lack of frontpaging) or who don't want to use FB because they don't like it for some other reason.
2. I've taken the info about Libby's bond hearing and added it to the FDL.shared.info calendar. You can see that info in there, without having to log into Google, or even having a Google account, here: [1].
   
   
   FYI, the (non-hyperized!) labels you see at the beginning of calendar events — [1] [2] [3] — these notations arose from a conversation with selise, who suggested it would be "nice-to-have" a mechanism by which one could filter for only those items having to do with a particular subset of the FDL Calendar. Google's Calendar doesn't offer such at the moment, so I've taken a stab at prioritizing event importance, with [1] meaning "all FDLers will want to check this out," [2] "of middling importance," and [3] meaning "we should list this but only the most devoted FDLer will be following this." Beggars can't be choosers, sez I... :) Natch, any other categorization scheme is possible, implementer's choice.
   
   There is a full intro to how FDL might use this form of calendaring, over here: [2] .
   
   Thus you can see that fully functional calendaring is available and already implemented, should FDL choose to support it (1) by keeping its database current, and (2) by encouraging FDLers to use it.
3. I put it to you that Jane's helpful intro that Pach mentioned above will never be found by latecomers who missed that blog-posting. Some way is needed of keeping a record of info that lasts beyond the normal 2- or 3-hour life of a blogpost.

More later...

FaceBook offers functions like "Friending." Why should I care who I am friends with, within FDL? I can see where this function is very useful in the normal User Context of FB, but it is totally extraneous to the open "FDL community." Another reason for my feeling that FB is the wrong tool for what FDL needs. YMMV and if so, please comment!

[1] wherein MarkH notes the difficulty of maintaining FDL's comment etiquette... :)

[1] wherein dakine01 continues the "topic drift," discussing conventions on FDL rather than (I would have thought more appropriate in this "string,") conventions in FB.

[1] wherein demi aka dmoore describes how s/he learned the social rules involved with posting on FDL and joining its community of commenters.(this begins a "thread diversion" wherein later commenters follow this lead, beginning to discuss that rather than the social conventions in FaceBook...)

[1] wherein Elliott thanks selise and S.O.S. from MA

[1] wherein selise says, in response to Eliot @50, "i’m only doing senate and house committee hearings… :( but, S.O.S. from MA is working on a calendar to mark important dates for us firepups."

---

Quoth Dan: "In fact, the calendar is done and ready-to-go, and I've fully explained it here: [2]. All that's needed is someone (or a group of someones) to take over the responsibility of entering event data and maintaining the FDL.shared.info account within Google Calendar. Then, any FirePup who wants to can view the calendar simply by clicking here [3], – no matter whether they are logged into Google or not."

[1] Raven's followup to the previous "string-within-a-string" — where raven, speaking about FB's requirement for full real names, says "I bailed when I read that."

Edited by author 06-12-2007 08:51 PM
[1] will take you to selise's followup to my original posting— it will appear in this same window, so use your browser's BACK button to return here.

In this followup posting, selise follows up dmac's observation that FaceBook (FB) requires people to register with their correct names, and observes "don’t know how we’re going to get around that one."

I found a way to register in FB without using my real name — I found that Sos von Ma was accepted. Apparently FB is happy to welcome German nobility into its ranx. :)

I've seen other creative ways of adding FDL "handles" to the full name that is required at registration —

OK, back to my normal logged-in account.

Wondering how to display these messages in the other time-order? Click on the little triangle to the right of "Messages" in the lighter-blue bar.

Of course, nuttin to prevent anyone from signing anyone else's name to a post — (anyone who isn't logged in can do this) — but then, they don't get the little gray star signifying that they're actually logged in under that name.

Hi — I posted this under my new "QT identity" — but you can see, from the little gray star next to my FDL moniker, that I was logged in under that ID when I posted this.

Edited by author 06-20-2007 11:06 AM
Here are some of my first impressions about FB. If I'm wrong about these points, please correct me, and welcome to it.

1. Imho what is needed is not all the "excess baggage" of the FB user model, but something far simpler. It's nice to have a "one-stop-shopping," single-login application wherein a single web app can "do it all," but imho that is impossible with present web offerings. To cover the ground, more than one web-app is, I believe, now required -- which is why I proposed my "Soc. Networking (optional)" website at [1]. Now I believe it's time to add to that, a BBS (defined below).
   
2. Yes, it's great to have uploadable pictures, but (recall the original purpose of the FB) it enforces a hard-and-fast requirement that one's real name be given before you can enter or post. (Would you want to date someone who didn't even give their own real-life name? (Me, I'm Brad Pitt.) (Didn't think so)) :) In our context, this goes against the strong privacy convictions that many FDLers guard so closely (vide raven's comment in /m6 below).
   
   I refer you to the 'PupMap [2] (now with 663 pins in it!) that is based on Frappr, another freebie web-app, that allows us to sign in using whatever "handle" we want, to upload photos, to create albums of pictures (IIRC) — all with the extra bennie of creating a map of where we all are. It also has a built-in message service that allows inter-user communications (in FB's terms, "messages") without the necessity of revealing your true name. Frappr shields your Real Email Addr behind your chosen "handle."
   
   Any FDL communications tool that has any hope of success must, imho, preserve the anonymity of its users, thus allowing people to use their FDL "handles" without needing to fake them into their FB names (says me, who managed to fool FB into thinking my name is "Sos von MA" (even "Sos from MA" wasn't accepted!)) :)
   
3. All of FB's cool conventions like "poke" and their simple discussion areas are fun, but imho either too weak for, extraneous to, or irrelevant for what we imho need most of all: a multi-threaded discussion area for FDL.
   
4. Recall the original "user model" of FB: It's a social networking system that allows people of various interests and preferences to network among, and connect with, one another based on common interests. Again I say, this is all very cool when choosing cute dates or affiliating with others in an interest group, but these functions are not imho what FDL needs.

I hasten to add, as I did in /m1 below, that in making these observations about alternatives to FB for FDL I am emphatically NOT recommending that the powers-that-be choose QuickTopic (QT) to accomplish these ends. That would be dead wrong.

Nor do we need a blog (we've got one already and we need something else in addition!) and we don't need a Wiki (again, not the right user model. Right for collaboratively creating dictionaries and encyclopedias, but not what we need here).

Here's what we imho need,not necessarily in priority order:

1. We need a "bulletin-board system" (BBS) (aka "Forum" or "Message Board") (yes, one of those old-fashioned but right-for-the-purpose thingies) prominently linked to the front page of FDL-as-it-now-stands. Yes, blogs are quite prevalent these days, but they stem from the BBSes of the past, which still have their place and fill a real need.
   
2. This BBS should have the facility for advertising space such that hits on it can add to FDL's revenues...
   
3. Proof of this assertion that we need a BBS: See the "string-within-a-string" that I excerpted from a blog entry's comment strings awhile back. This shows the need for a place, not tied to a blog post, where various subjects can be broached and discussed over a period of time greater than a single blog entry, and independent of the many-times-per-day series of blog-posts-with-comment-strings.
   
4. How many times have you had to say "Pardon the OT" or "EPU'ed from previous string?" These common conventions and events are "nature's way of telling us" of the need for a different user model than simple blogposts-and-comments-thereon.
   
5. I don't think that Google Groups or Yahoo Groups will meet this bill of particulars, but as a user of Google Groups, I could be wrong... But it's my vague impression that at least Google Groups is based on NNTP rather than the more modern transports, so there are some internal conventions and privacy issues to be considered. More than that, I dunno.
   
6. FDL users are accustomed to a PREVIEW mode and buttons that automagically do basic formatting, like B I U CODE QUOTE LINK CLOSE TAGS we have in FDL's blog, so at least this level of markup functionality really must be supported. There are many BBSes out there that offer PREVIEW and the automagic use of "BBCode" which does, really, all that's needed for BBSes -- it doesn't need full HTML functionality — in fact, the _latter is a definite hazard to the proper functioning of a BBS. See what I mean? :)
   
7. It should support emoticons.
   
8. It should have email notification and/or delivery of new post content, and an RSS feed. Thus, it should support some means of email or RSS subscription, either to the BBS as a whole or to particular topics or areas of topics.
   
   Compare and contrast these "requirements" to the "discussion areas" offered by FB. Uh-uh, no way. We need more; we're USED TO more.
   
9. It should support editing of posts made by us (when we are logged in) in the past. Either indefinitely or (as in FDL) for a fixed time. This may be limited by Moderator convention.
   
10. It should support Moderators in their day-to-day tasks — blocking IP addrs, holding all or some messages prior to letting them appear, etc...
    
11. It's a matter of policy whether anyone anywhere in cyberspace can post, or whether it's required to establish a "handle," sign in with a (hidden) email address, which must be validated by human response to demonstrate that it's a live, non-faked human emailbox.
    
12. The BBS should support the notion of "private messaging" between registered users, like Frappr does, in such a way as to shield real names and email addresses from other participants. There's no reason to use Frappr's capabilities for anything other than mapping, and most BBS SW packages I've seen do offer "private messaging" services. When you arrive and log in, the BBS SW tells you whether you have new mail; good systems send email to your "real email account" telling you that new BBS mesaages have arrived. You then enter the BBS and pick up your private messages.
    
13. This item is really the sine qua non for any successful BBS: It should have some logical equivalent to a "Next Unseen" function. In order to use it, one has to be logged into the BBS (it's not accessible to randoms). When you re-connect to the BBS as "yourself" (i.e., you log back in), the BBS can list all new messages (or some equivalent) that you haven't seen since you last entered (or left) the BBS. Without this facility, imho it really can't even be termed a BBS.

For a good example of imho a successful multi-threaded BBS with a thriving and active user community, I refer you to Randi Rhodes's (AAR Talker) main site at [3] with a link to her Message Board at [4]. This system, Invision Power Board v2.1.6 © 2007 IPS, Inc., Licensed to: Air America Radio meets or exceeds most, if not all, of the criteria I listed above. (There are several other BBS "engines" out there, to be sure!) Imho FDL should implement one of them, as long as it meets or exceeds the criterion list above.

For a particular example, the Randi Rhodes Message Board's implementation of Next Unseen appears there as New Posts, a service that is only available to logged-in users (people with a "registered handle"), which is good. Importantly, this BBS allows folks to set up accounts with any handle they want.

Click here to see my original FDL posting raising some of these issues — it will appear in another window. (Yeah, that's my real moniker — I could easily create a workable "QuickTopic" (QT) account under my "normal FDL name," thus totally concealing my true "real life" name.) You can see I was logged in as "Dan Kalikow" when I posted this, by the fact that a little gray star appears next to my name, to the left.

Please note: By starting this discussion here, this is by no means an endorsement of using QT for an FDL BBS (bulletin-board system). There are several others that are far more appropriate for this purpose. I've used most of 'em over the years. And no, the Wiki is just as inappropriate an engine for a BBS than is a blog — if not more so.

Watch, I'll do the next post while signed in as S.O.S from MA.