group progress report

There's been a flurry of activity the last 24 hours, so here's a progress report.

Group Message. I sent a message to the "Students for Changing the Post-Minifeed World" group asking members to quit and instead join the "Lose the Label" group. Why? Four reasons. 1) We ditch the old name (Facebook doesn't allow name changes to groups) that was long and unappealing and actually kind of a joke and 2) we separate the active members from the inactive ones and 3) the new group can show up on peoples' Newsfeed and gain fresh exposure for the project and 4) if we're lucky, get found by some programmers who can help out with the website.

Website volunteers. It's gone pretty well so far, with Sunil, James, and Grant offering to pitch in (check this thread). Jake D has been busy this semester, so he's out, and Michael our website coordinator is busy through the next week and a half, but after he's clear he can start arranging more details. The consensus is that CivicSpace is our best option for constructing the site, since it's all premade coding and has all the features we need. (I vaguely understand what I just wrote but I'm really glad that Sunil, James and Grant are around to actually make something of it... I get lost very easily and don't know much beyond superficial details, so if it ever sounds like I'm BS'ing... yeah, I probably am.)

Group Membership. The SfCtPMW membership went from 710 before last night's message to 640 now and the LtL numbers have shot up from 10 to around 50. This is pretty solid, and a big enough core to restart with, although it indicates that a lot of people didn't read the message... a problem inherent with Facebook communication and an indication of how inactive the group's been lately, which is entirely my fault. By the way, as long as I'm on the subject, sorry about being MIA for the last two months. I could make excuses about being busy, but the fact is that I've neglected the project, which is bullshit since I started it in the first place and people were looking to me for guidance. Everyone had (has) such great ideas and causes for the group to take up, and I just hope it's not too late to revive and get active. If only we can finish the website!

The Blog. This is the third blog post in the last three days and I'm going to try to keep up with this pace for as long as I can. Delia said she'd be able to pitch in after the 11th and Lauren's been busy, so it looks like it's just me for another week. If anyone reads this and would like to post here, please contact me.