Reorganizing the Internet and Free/Libre/Opensource Solutions Working Groups

The Internet and Free/Libre/Opensource Solutions Working Groups are compelled to reorganize themselves to adapt to the changing needs of the occupy movement and the changing organizational structures of the NYCGA. The intention of this reorganization is to improve our ability to collaborate with stakeholders, streamline our operations and engage in a more complete spectrum of operational and movement building activities.

The following is a set of recommendations for how to restructure:

1. Change the name of the Internet Working Group to Technology Operations Group and use the current description of the techops groups in the wiki for the NYCGA.net website. Continue the general, weekly meeting Tuesdays and Sundays at 6pm at 60 Wall St.
2. Change the internet.nycga.net to techops.nycga.net and outline a 'community management' strategy that would leverage this site as a primary point for engagement, recruitment, best practice documentations and resource raising.
3. Create project pages on the wiki for all the active projects of the TechOps Group. These projects include:
   1. NYCGA.net
   2. Occupy.net: News, Wiki, CRM
   3. PermaBank.net
   4. OccupyWallStreet.net
   5. FGA
4. Add the following information about each project:
   1. Name
   2. Description
   3. Technologies Used (SocialSourceCommons Widget)
   4. Needs
   5. Source
   6. Meeting Time, Location, Documentation
   7. Connect
      1. IRC and/or Listerve
      2. Coordinator Email
      3. Source
      4. Project Management Link
5. Change internet@nycga.net to tech@nycga.net. Change name on account to Technology Operations.
6. Change the Free/Libre/Opensource Solutions Group to the Free/Libre/Opensource Movement Group. Here is a proposed description of the reorganized group: "The FLO Movement Group advocates the development, deployment and documentation of FLO tools and techniques people can use to create value for themselves and their communities. We participate in awareness raising, policy advocacy and strategic communication initiatives in support the FLO and #Occupy movements."
   1. Establish a weekly meeting time.

Modifications to this proposal are welcome and the addition of a section concerning the execution of said proposal is essential for this process to move forward.

Addendum

Beyond the relationship between the parts and the whole, we need to define much better how projects get taken up by the group, owned by them, or divorced from them.

There have been in various groups and occupations splits because processes for new large-scale initiatives were not made explicit and discussions were sidetracked by bureaucracy or power dynamics.

The Solution Proposal Advice page is an honest start, but could be less off-putting and more representative of how we are working. It is easy to get the impression from this document that you can send a proposal to Tech Ops and we'll have an army of people to implement it (or not) based on undefined criteria.

Depending on how we phrase things, people could see Tech Ops as one or many of the following:

• a government ministry
• a start-up incubator
• a service provider to GA proposals
• a web design firm
• a web host
• an mobile apps

Our position to date has been that we do not guide GA decisions, but in a lot of ways we are taking initiatives that feed upwards and help redefine social change in our digital era. The maps project is a good example of this. Tom's blog post about its emergence is inspiring.

Next steps

1. We redraft our Solution Proposal Advice document on this wiki so it is more like:

• let's do great things!
• this is how we are doing things right now!
• this is how you can do great things with us!
• this is how we play with others!

2. We think about revising our draft charter sometime soon.