wwp@yahoogroups.com:
Re: Next event 32 days remaining MORE
Don Bain 2009-Aug-21 21:05:00
Sorry about any confusion or inconvenience regarding announcement of
the next theme. It will be announced shortly.
In the early days of the WWP Landis and I chose each theme jointly,
with a certain amount of debate and compromise necessary. Then we
found it more efficient to take it in turn. Most of the suggestions
have come from participants, either in e-mail to the list or entered
into the database. Markus took his turn with "Elevation", beginning a
rotation through the five members of the WWP Foundation board of
directors - Bostjan chose Diversity and Keith proposed Time (Caroling
and Yuval wrote the essay for Color). Now it is Pat's turn, and he
will make the announcement and post an essay.
In the past we hesitated to post themes too far in advance for two
reasons. First, we feared the "buzz" might fade before the event came
around if it started too early; and second, some participants might
choose to skip an event if one that was more to their liking was
coming up next. I don't think either is of much concern now, so we may
decide to post a whole year of themes and their dates.
There is also a possibility of year-long themes and special out-of-
synch special events. The Best of... yearly events will continue,
possibly along with a December theme.
Part of the delay this time has simply been the difficulty of
communication - "the team" live in four different countries and have
many conflicts with work and travel. We have made three huge changes
to the WWP in the last year: giving up the university as sponsor and
setting up the non-profit organization; migrating from the university
server to our own; and providing dual QuickTime/Flash support (the
latter two done almost entirely by Markus). We tend to turn our
attention and energies elsewhere between events.
The database on the Yahoo site is not a list of themes that will be
used, just a repository of suggestions. If any of you have a great
idea for a theme, put it up for discussion on this mailing list and
also record it in the database so we don't forget it.
We try to choose themes that can be done by both newbies and pros,
indoors or outdoors, whatever the local conditions (such as weather),
interpreted literally or imaginatively, and that translate reasonably
well to various languages. Not an easy thing to decide.
(on behalf of the WWP team)
Don
On Aug 21, 2009, at 12:44 PM, Ken Stuart wrote:
> Hi,
>
> Yes, the list of suggested themes is available on the web, but there's
> nothing indicating which, if any, of those will be the next one, nor
> anything indicating those that might even be under consideration.
>
> Having a the chosen themes decided well in advance of a given event
> would be tremendously useful for planning.
>
> Who chooses the theme isn't clear. I'm not advocating that the process
> change (except that it be done sooner and posted), but the group's
> Yahoo! web site also has a built-in polling mechanism, so if those
> responsible for choosing a theme are having some difficulties perhaps
> they could propose a handful and the group membership could vote on
> them via that tool, with the top choice being the next theme, and
> others following in order for the next couple of events.
>