Moving Forward.

@ashleighfield @ben13 @bobwhitehead @callumcant @daniellindley @darcyluke @dorter @emilyfarmer @hannahlemming @helena @jolyonjones @johnenglish @mumitm @natashaturner @nick4 @rachelobrien @robert2 @rufussilverleaf @seanfarmelo @karamoses @kellyrogers

This is good, I won't be around on the 12th (or 13th) of July though - It makes sense to me to do some sort of a doodle poll so we can ensure more people are free. I would be pretty upset to be missing yet another Slaney Street conference.

Also not entirely sure about the guaranteed spaces for various bodies on the board, I think it would detract from the independent nature of slaney st and (perhaps) at times lower the engagement of the editorial board - at least on the Co-op WM board engagement is pretty low at the best of times. Employing people and funding grants sound like a great move though :D

The date is flexible obviously. Lets see if people approve of the idea before we start a doodle poll for it.

Good idea. I'll make it a priority, whatever the date turns out to be.

I think this is all a good idea. I can't offer much of my time organising it, as I'm fairly overwhelmed by the women's edition atm, but yeah - sounds good. All the ideas mentioned can be debated at the conference.

I think this is great. I think it's worth mentioning that we also want to be building links and providing a medium for the community in Birmingham which is neither represented nor encouraged to put its voice forwards. The statement seems like it's solely aimed at encouraging political groups to participate when, in addition, I think there should also be space for non political community stuff.

Also, in terms of offering positions Would this be something the board of slaney street would do itself, like some form of appointment? Would that mean SS would lose out on advertising revenue? The more I think about the idea, the more useful think it could be as it brings in expertise and experience and as you say, solid links with existing political movements.

I'm happy to go along with most things so long as I can get to handing out some newspapers.

In terms of getting approval from everyone, is there a way of letting everyone know this discussion is happening so we can decide on a course of action?

@seanfarmelo @kellyrogers @robert2 @ben13 with the four of you plus me that is the five members that we need to call this meeting. Our constitution says we can now deliver this to the Editoral Board to request it arranges a time and put this on directly on the website. My only concern in @dorter has said she wanted to make some points but that was 8 days ago and I don't think we can wait much longer.

as you for other point would adding this paragraph in suffice?

"We should also be keen to develop our cultural review and coverage of sports. We have established relationships with theatres and venues across Birmingham who are happy to provide us with free tickets to their shows. We need to build on this to establish a respectable local reviews team to support the arts and local sports teams in Birmingham."

Is there any way to get in touch to let them know directly? Perhaps a call would be best if possible. If not then maybe wait another day or so for an extra bit of time and then we can get to it.

I think if you're mentioning culture, then supporting local music etc as well, but I was referring more to local community projects and organisations IE allowing people in Birmingham to communicate with ourselves without the media filtering it to commercial ends. I only say this because having looked on the about page, it's not clear if this is an overtly political paper which facilitates information towards that end, or if this a different means for allowing participation in our culture on top of that.

I've just come back from a number of events, one of them from a self organised group in London resisting the forced relocation of council tenants away from their homes for a corporate selloff, which is struggling to get their message out there. It's important to me that people are able to articulate these struggles, so I feel making it clear in the above statement to allow some space for this kind of news might encourage a range of different people to come forwards to strengthen the base of our articles.

Hey - so i had been thinking of a different approach, really, as i have outlined below. it is what i had hoped we would talk about at the meeting that had been tentatively scheduled for after Pride. I know that @lindsey had some ideas for structures, too, so perhaps she could add to it, but i think it is a big mistake to do another callout for greater participation before we have a stable structure in place. Here are my thoughts in greater detail, both below and attached. I also know that @jolyonjones had some ideas about moving forward, so i am tagging him to make sure he's followed this thread.

Hey. So my ideas around needing some sort of structure meeting are a little different than what Ed proposed. Whilst i think it is great to open it up and certainly we need to get new people involved, what i think is most important at the moment is that we develop a cohesive and manageable structure from which to go forward. This should not only help Slaney Street become more sustainable and consistent, but it will help new people find ways to plug in. To do this, rather than expanding, i think we need to step back a bit and slow down. Solid and sustainable projects don't just spring forth from good intentions and strong will or desire, but from creating a sturdy foundation. This needs time and thought and commitment. Once we are doing really well at a basic level, we can try to expand but, like any project, we need to make sure that our aspirations don't exceed our capacity or we will lose it all.

I also fear that some of the absences of people might be out of frustration or out of feeling unable to plug in. By having a clear and coherent structure, everyone interested can know how best to get involved and know what is expected of them/each other

I propose that, first and foremost, we focus on the following issues, and see where our own gaps are and try to recruit new members to the editorial board on an interim basis, to fit in with how those of us who remain can work together, and to fill the gaps that need filling.

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1. Introductions/ideas/etc and outside examples To me, this is one of the key areas that i think has been missing. I think we all need to get to know each other a little bit better and share our own ideas or what is important to each of us.. We could do a go-around and write on a flipchart os something the ideas that come up, like a brainstorm, and then maybe that will help shape us a bit more.

Accompanying this, we might look to other effective examples of community media and learn from them. There are 2 great sources in Canada that i can think of, and i would be happy to arrange some sort of skype-date or email introductions with people there. One is called The Media Coop , with branches in various canadian cities, and, until recently, did put out a Canadian paper copy, which has just become an on-line PDF edition.http://www.mediacoop.ca/

Another, very different project, is The Two-Row Times, http://www.tworowtimes.com/about/ . It is not a co-op per se but has an editorial structure. Nonetheless, it might be worht talking to the general manager, Tom, who established it and built it up from a small settler-project in a community that neighbours an indigenous reservation, into a paper that seemt to reach communities across canada.

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1. Realistic commitments. It's really hard when we don't know what to expect from each other, or how to reach each other, when questions come up. I for one imagined that I would put in a few hours a week but this proved to be far too little, and rather than being a reliable presence, i feel like i have popped in when i could, but then been burnt out or overwhelmed and disappeared. I fear that a few of us are in and out like that, and some seem to have disappeared altogether. To that end i propose we do the following:

A. Each state what sort of time commitment we can realistically make, including what days or times we might be available. If other there are absences or resignations, i propose that we attempt to fill those spaces asap. So if everyone could respond in the next week (i will make a separate discussion for this), we can gauge who we actually have, and then solicit participation from other people to fill those roles until the next AGM.

B. Let's talk about communication and meetings. Would regular in person meetings help (in the past, this has been an issue as people's geography and schedules are not very aligned), or a regular gmail hangout session once a week or once a fortnight? I think there might need to be some way to bring people together regularly.

Once we have a realistic idea of what we can manage can try to plan out the next few months and make a schedule for when we publish online, etc., New people can plug into that. It is much easier to integrate new people into an existing framework than to continuously try to reinvent it. For example, if there remain 6 active EB members, and all of them can meet every Wednesday at 6pm in the centre, new people cn be recruited with this in mind.

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1. Structure I would propose that we map out a number of roles, and see who can fill them and when. From this i think we might re-think the whole structure. Is a 12-person editorial board that does everything the best structure? Perhaps there needs to be a smaller core of people who manage the day-to-day, and branch out into different committees. Maybe a few people who don't really want to be on the editorial board as a whole still would be really into doing design work, or fund-raising.

Here is a proposal for what that might look like, understanding that depending on our capacity that might change

B. Email account - checking and responding: - at last once a day - people can make up a schedule, unless 2-3 people can just commit to checking it and responding every day.

C. Blog comments - as above

D. Editorial support:
There are a number of ways that this could play out. Essentially, we need people to solicit and chase down articles; approve, proof-read, edit (some of our pieces really would benefit from more intensive editing) and publish them. I would propose that, for news and commentary articles, we aim for a MWF production, and that we include sport and reviews when they come in, this would mean that people could learn to when to expect things from us. We can also start to solicit pieces on deadline. Finally, we can ensure that someone is always able to post the pieces at the optimal time

i). Solicitations – people either designated to sections (say news, sports, comment, reviews, etc.) or to issues (i.e. migration, Birmingham CC, Benefits gender, etc.) to help identify and solicit pieces (or write them/organizse interviews themselves), and follow-up. A good model, i think, was Linsday's attempts with reviews section, that was working well. Part of this would be creating a callout to people and a database or email list of names of people willing to write on various topic. For example, i know i could ask Jolyon to write on issues pertatining to children's services, or the BCC in general; Sean to write about co-ops,etc., it would be great to have a few people that we could look to for different areas that we want covered, and one or two member of the editorial board to be the point-person for each of these.

ii). Editorial support. A team of people to proofread and even provide more involved editorial suggestions would be great. If they offere their general availability onto Loomio, we could have a schedule to know who was available to help with any article coming in. Perhaps one person could be available each day, if we are still trying to post things quickly. Otherwise, different people available for different topics, or skill-sets (like, i could say i could provide proof-reading Tues evenings, and general editorial support on Sundays.)

iii). Posting: Having an online posting schedule, where 2 people sign up to be able to approve and post pieces every day we want to post (say, Tues and Thurs; or M W F). Having 2 people responsible for each time will allow for unforseen absences and also any support one person might need if having any issues. We could also have a couple of people oncall if reviews or BREAKING news comes that we want posted immediately, or just say that whomever approves those pieces is responsible for getting them posted.

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1. Meeting our mandate So, this is bigger. But also, i think, manageable if we step back and regroup a bit, and hopefully the above structure will allow us to do so. (outside of this proposal , i want to respond to the concerns brought up in the oppositional piece i wrote last time)

A. Make regular callouts with our mandate (similar, i think, to the one i made in April), to various groups and communities. This was what i had written. i think it could be tweaked but still might remain effective.

B. Identify issues that are important to be talking about. Perhaps we can look back at the mandate and brainstorm pieces that might better fit the gaps we have from a local perspective and then try to find people to start writing those pieces (which i do think is happening somewhat)

C. Identify communities whom we would like to have contributing more. Do some very focussed and targeted out reach towards them. One way to do this might be to ask to do round-tables or interview people about their respective work. Then, even if the authors are not particularly diverse, at least the voices being represented are.

D. Plan for the October conference to invite people from such communities. Hopefully by then we will have been regularly producing pieces that reflect our mandate and we might seem more relevant and accessible to broader communities.

E. Mentor writing – perhaps there are people who would be interested in writing, but need some support or guidance – because writing for publication can be hard.

sorry the one bit that i forgot to mention was that i think we should also produce a style guide. It doesn't have to be fancy, but at the very least, have a few pointers for how to write and what to include to help ensure that the pieces we get also meet our mandate.