So, I am here today at OpenCMS. Boris opens a session that he is leading on GeoMapping. He says flat out…”you know I really don’t like this format where we are at the front of the room and you are out there but we all have ideas to contribute”. It is very frustrating for me to hear this because I advocated that the organizers of this conference including Boris use Open Space as the format as soon as I learned about the conference at the end of November (when it was announced). Both myself and Eugene offered to do the facilitation…a month out they had no sessions outlined and would have to do a tone of work to lay out the program.
Now we all sit in rooms 1/2 here, 1/2 doing e-mail – and there would be SO MUCH good stuff happening if the organizers had chosen the Open Space path. As it is things are so-so. Hopefully next time process can be more open and allow for in the moment.
Archives for February 2006
XML GRRL to meet Identity Woman at OpenCMS Summit
Blogs are fun….I just learned that I will be on a panel with XMLGrrl author of Pushing String on Thursday at the OpenCMS Summit. I have been reading her blog for a long time.
I just got here this afternoon already I am longing for open space process (believe me we tried to convince them to use it). I lived through one terribly facilitated session. As a few of us who were in that session settled into the next one I mentioned that I was considering putting in a proposal for this years OSCON to do a session on meeting/group facilitation skills. Several folks were very supportive of the idea so I am am going to do it.
'what is your name' – when I order coffee it is "Lu"
I went into a coffee shop here in Portland and ordered a raspberry latte. They asked me what my name was – really what they want to know is what ‘identifier’ they can call out to let me know my coffee is ready. If you have an easy name like Kate or John or Kathy – you just use that. I have ‘Kaliya’ and really don’t want to explain how to say it or spell it just to get my coffee. So I use my default “Lu”. This was the nick name I picked up while playing water polo at CAL (UC Berkeley) and believe it or not it was a derivative of Kaliya…
Kaliya
Kalua
(I had this suite with a giant orchid like flower on it (the whole front)
Lula
LuLu follow shortly
Lu
Queer Identities and discrimination online
So there is a big hubub going on around World of Warcraft
[the new “golf” in case you haven’t heard yet – I can’t wait until we have WoW day pre DIDW instead of real golf…what do you think Vince ;)].
around discrimination towards the queer community. Dana Boyd’s latest post was brought my attention to this issue and in an update highlighted why this relates to identity in particular.
As has been noted over and over again, queerness is an identity not just a set of sexual practices. By silencing people’s identities and not allowing people to have bigot-free spaces, Blizzard is upholding a level of discrimination that far outweighs the _potential_ sexual harassment that might occur if people’s sexualities were known.
More about the situation from Dana…
I’ve already heard on numerous occasions that there is intense homophobia within the chatrooms on WoW and this had already made me quite uncomfortable. But Blizzard’s response is just disgusting. How can they call a queer-friendly guild sexual harassment given that this is an attempt by the queer community to create space? Furthermore, there’s so much sexism in the chats (aside from the creatures) that no one from Blizzard can actually argue that they are preventing sexual harassment. I can’t help but wonder about the state of other forms of discrimination and prejudice within the system (particularly since “race” is critical to the narrative of WoW). That said, i don’t care enough to find out – i can’t justify spending personal money on a company with these values.
Identity and privacy …. falling google stock price
From Slashdot.
While the company says it isn’t worried about the stock price correction, there are other issues at hand.” From the article: “Google is under mounting pressure from many traditional industries: telecommunications companies do not like its plan for free internet phone calls, book publishers and newspapers have filed a lawsuit to try to prevent it from digitising library materials, governments are worried about its satellite-imaging service Google Earth and privacy advocates have a growing list of concerns about everything from its e-mail service to its desktop search function, both of which may make it easier for hackers or government agencies to gather information about individuals without their consent.”
