AZ alumni network?

Posted June 11th, 2007 by Maurreen Skowran

Is anyone interested in maintaining and building on the relationships, ideas and whatnot from here?

I've recently been looking into Ning and a few somewhat similar sites. Ning bills itself as "the only online service where you can create, customize, and share your own Social Network for free in seconds."

Features include:
* Forum
* Members can customize their own pages.
* A profile question section where you write the questions.
* Create blog posts with photos, files, and moods.
* Manage blog posts and moderate comments.
* Choose the option to publish in the future.
* A member "chatterwall" for others to leave chatters.
* Option to add widgets to profile page.
* Member photos and videos.

URLs:
Main page -- http://www.ning.com/
Features list -- http://www.ning.com/about/features.html
FAQs -- http://www.ning.com/help/faq-using-ning.html

Thoughts, anyone? Is anyone still reading this?

-----

Edited to add:

And maybe it could be based on alumni, but become broader, both in people and idea.

Here a few options for names:
* Citizen Technology
* Citizen Net
* Citizen Networking
* Demonet
* Demotech

ok

On August 3rd, 2008 peterwei (not verified) says:

names

On June 18th, 2007 Anna Haynes says:

> Citizen Net

i like Cit-net. Sounds a little like Skynet in its reach, only somewhat more benevolent.

cheap insurance

On June 18th, 2007 Anna Haynes says:

I just registered citnet.us and citnet.info

Don't worry... it'll happen

On June 18th, 2007 David Cohn says:

I'm going to echoe Tish's comments below. For the core team of AZ -- this was a full time job... well, actually. It was more than a full time job. I think most of you guys know that I became a night owl during this project. We pushed until the June 5th deadline (and in truth, we ended up extending it a day or two). Right now the ball is in Wired's court. So we are taking a quick break while they get stuff ready for publication.

BUT -- once the story is published -- we are not just going to let all the people that were involved in AZ sit around with question marks over their head -- that would be a big giant waste.

Action will be taken -- You just have to remember that things take time. And for me, personally. I'm taking a much needed breather while Wired takes charge of the publication cycle.

OK, networking part 2

On June 18th, 2007 Maurreen Skowran says:

How about calling it "Citizen Net" and describing it as about "technology for civic life" or something like that?

AZ alum network

On June 14th, 2007 KG says:

I'm definitely interested. Keep me posted.

reply to Maurreen

On June 12th, 2007 Anna Haynes says:

> Is anyone still reading this?

no. I go to the front page to see what if anything is new, and the forum posts don't show there, and the "tracker" (where they *do* show) has very low visibility on the front page and (i think) no visibility *off* the front page.

i.e. it's a website design issue

Is anyone still tending the project?

On June 12th, 2007 Maurreen Skowran says:

Thanks, Anna.

Partly, I meant the tracker.

But partly, I also meant that Assignment Zero seems abandoned in an almost-done state.

Alumni network a good idea!

On June 18th, 2007 Tish Grier says:

Hi Maurreen,

the alumni network's a good idea! When it's set-up, email me and we can do a post on the Scoop. .

As for the site being "abanadoned"--no, not at all. We are, though, in something of a holding pattern waiting to hear from Wired.com on publication date (we've heard from them about important additional material for the features--I've been drafted to do a bit of fact-checking and tracking down photos.)

The core team--myself, David, Amanda, Angela, and Hillary--worked pretty much 'round the clock, taking time out from other projects and our personal lives, to devote to pulling all of AZ together to meet our June 5 deadline. After June 5, we were still working (still 'round the clock some days) with editors and contributors to pull together the seven feature pieces which were then submitted to Wired.com for review.

For us, AZ was pretty much all-consuming. It's less consuming now, but we're still, on occasion, hearing from Wired. As soon as we hear from Wired on publication date, I'll be sending out email and posting--and that will be from the road, as I'll be at a conference this week.

Mike Ho, who wrote the Citizendium piece, raised the question of whether or not it's appropriate to reveal everything about how the "sausage is made." So, that's another aspect--how much of this "sausage" did people want to see? Does the community really want minutely detailed posts of what we're working on--how we feel about everthing, etc.? Would the community want to hear who's doing (or not doing) what? or would that be kind of gossiping out of turn? How do we maintain professionalism while also being transparent? These are not easy questions to answer.

Network and AZ status

On June 18th, 2007 Maurreen Skowran says:

Thanks for your reply and interest in the alumni network.

Sorry if my remark was too blunt. I've sent Tish some of my rationale for it.

Alumni

On June 17th, 2007 johannes.germany says:

I think the Alumni network is a good idea...maybe the editors can include the idea in their next e-mail.