[COMMUNICATION] Better conferencing? (was: Re: [libreoffice-marketing] Re: [DESIGN] Do we need a separate mailing list for artwork/usability/branding...?)

Hi all!

Besides the mailing list I mentioned initially (will discuss this in
another mail), some people already mentioned different communication
channels. I'd like to add my thoughts based on some years collaboration
- both at work and within OOo.

Am Freitag, den 12.11.2010, 04:25 -0500 schrieb Marc Paré:
> > (Google Wave is also great for brainstorming, in many ways, but
> takes
> > some getting used to, and also demands "posting discipline".)
> >
> > It's useful to have an "IM" medium, too, as a complement for the
> > above. IMHO, communal Skype chats are better than IRC: easier for
> many
> > people to access and use. Plus a great feature of Skype chats is
> that
> > you can *unsay and edit* your posts when you say something
> > stupid/incorrect/regrettable.
>
> I also thought that Skype chats would be a good alternative until I 
> realized that I had forgotten the "mantra" that I was trying to
> perform on the lists where ever needed: "many of our users have only
> dial-up or mobile phone connections. 

Very good point! A mailing list is something which does not only work
for people with "low bandwidth", but also with (temporarily) no Internet
connection at all. Many people I know, do work on emails and such stuff
when away from home (sitting in a train, on the way to their day
jobs, ...). This "work offline" requirement had already been mentioned
by Bernhard.

Another thing to have in mind is, that some people do feel uncomfortable
when using certain communication channels. For example, in Germany
people usually are a bit more cautious when large companies process /
own a lot of data (Facebook, Google ... just to name a few). For them it
is important to "own" the data.

The latter point can also extended a bit. If a company decides to stop
their business ... what happens with the data?

Finally - there needs to be a balance between "ready to serve" solution
and "having control". Based on my experience with several i-Teams and
the UX project, it would have been great to have a "virtual meeting
room". Not only a phone conference, but a virtual whiteboard, audio
streaming, desktop sharing, chat, ... without installation of any kind
of additional software on the Desktop. Open-Source software (of course)
and platform neutral.

Quite a number of wishes, or? Well, there is a project that I've been
watching since some time ... OpenMeetings [1]. Today, I gave the demo a
try (again) and everything worked flawlessly - so might this be
something that drives collaboration? In my opinion: Yes.

You may also want to watch the video / read the blog covering the latest
features - have a look at [2]. Or, check the demo installation at [3]
(Name: test, Password: test).

By the way, the installation instructions [4] recommend "OOo in headless
mode". Shouldn't this be "LibO in headless mode"? :-)

This may improve things for the website team, the marketing team, the
design team, ... What do you think?

Cheers,
Christoph

[1] http://code.google.com/p/openmeetings/
[2] http://opensourcewebconferencing.blogspot.com/
[3] http://www.openmeetings.de/openmeetings/
[4] http://code.google.com/p/openmeetings/wiki/OpenOfficeConverter


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