Before lunch we are commenting and discussing any of what we’ve shared this morning.

We’ve now broken for lunch, we will be starting up again at 1:30 pm (CST).
Continue reading Comments →

What is the spark and story that will draw people to this site. What will draw other people like us and those that will need to be around us. Who’s story is important?

This discussion included some thoughts on the roles of publishers and the resistance to the publishing enterprise. We are saying that human knowledge is not, finally, a commodity.

To what degree will this be a site that facilitates a conversation in addition to static content?

Can we signal in the story that we have a community that values this flow and sharing? We will have to start with something. We have some concrete communities that need this, can we pull together the content and embody it in this new space. The effort is already underway.

We intend to create a community in which there is mutual respect, but we won’t eliminate all fears and tensions from the site or the community. We can be a place where all voices can speak up and be heard. We have to understand that we are talking about power, this wide open space may be threatening to some, all may make contributions.

Could we combine the resource we are creating with a series of workshops that help folks (especially in communities like the Latino community) combine the heart with these materials and what we can do with it. This echos the notion of apprenticeship and the accompaniment that model implies.
Continue reading Brainstorming: Story →

To facilitate more successful searching and browsing we should think about how material on the site would be collated. What kind of categories would we use for finding materials? How can this make us more inviting? Mary noticed in pulling together a handout for this meeting that there were actually theological issues embedded in the choices various other publications have made for labeling.
Continue reading Brainstorming: Labels and categories →

Thinking about the kinds of media and material we might share. Some questions came up during the brainstorming below. We acknowledge that we are talking about a digital site on the web which already excludes all sorts of users who do not have access to the collections. Perhaps, though, getting the material on the web will still help facilitate distribution.

Think about levels of access. Think about bridges between these technologies (mp3 to radio). Think about supporting meaning making. Think about presenting an alternative media representation with a more global view (note IndyMedia).

Think about how distributing our bits of connections to the divine (songs, pictures, stories) across borders can loose the content from its roots and context. Do we need to develop and code of ethics of sorts to help recover and maintain these contexts? (note Consuming Religion)
Continue reading Brainstorming: What kinds of material →

Open source can mean a lot of things. The movement we think of as “open source” began in the software world and helped generate the net as we know it today. In theory, many eyes with access to the internals of the product will improve the quality of the product. Does the current model of dissemination for our work serve us well? Can this effort open up access to dissemination in the way that wikipedia has opened up access to building an encyclopedia? This can bring both risks and rewards. There are aspects of this sharing that are beginning to happen within protected spaces in our community.
Continue reading What is this open source stuff anyway? →

We would like to come up with a good enough description to put forward a request for proposals (RFP). We need enough rich description of what that would be so that we can put that together. We would like to spread the energy and ideas from this table, networks that would be interested in contributing to this site and also those that would be interested in reviewing material. We would very much like this to be a global, border-crossing endeavor. What (besides visas!) would make this kind of effort hospitable to global participation. The more people we have from global contexts, the more like this hospitality will be present.

Priamary Goal: We want a vivid description of what this project will be. In preparation for an RFP.

Secondary Goal: Begin the community-building process.
Continue reading Goals for today →

Mary opened the meeting with a prayer. Apologized for not being able to get all our partners to the meeting. Everyone welcome to comment on the blog. Mary notes that she and Fabio (Fabio Botelho Josgrilberg who has helped conceive this idea with Mary but could not be here today) acknowledge that there are large digital divide issues that won’t be addressed today. This is a first step meeting, communicate with each other, play, the agenda is not ironclad. There is a lot of room for input.

Participants in today’s meeting introduced themselves to one another.

Welcome to the first planning meeting for the Open Source Religious Resources Website. Mary Hess has called this meeting together and I’ve launched this blog this morning in case participants elsewhere who couldn’t make it want to join in the conversation. Mary’s resources for this first meeting are at http://www.religioused.org/. Right now people are gather, eating some continental breakfast, and chatting.