Caliban: We could also be clear about whether these are primarily regional or primarily language forums. Probably the former.
No forums should exist with fewer than ~7 posts except during a trial period.
I think it should be both. There are large regions where many languages are spoken (e.g. Middle East) and dominant languages spoken in many regions (English). The proposed list attempts to incorporate both these factors, in order to give people from every part of the world or language a representation. Therefore, I believe the new regional forums should be included, even if they appear empty for some time, just for the sake of inclusiveness. I believe, in the proposed forums list, there will be only 2 such relatively unoccupied sub-forums: Forum Portugues and Africa. For the rest we have ready posts in the general “regional section”. Still I think the latter two forums should be included. According to Mind’s data, Portugal is one of the top visiting countries and Portuguese is one of the world’s most wide-spread languages. And the need to include Africa seems to be obvious. I believe, for these two forums, we can for now just post the “Chapter announcement” and perhaps some links.
Eternaltraveler: We should be consolidating regional forums, not making more. Does every tribe get a forum because they don't want to be lumped in with others in their geographic region?
The proposed list also attempts to emphasize cooperation within particular regions: e.g. “Middle East” instead of just “Israel”. In this regard, “USA and Canada” would make sense as well. And also “UK and Ireland” instead of just UK (Ireland is one of the top visiting countries).
Brokenportal: The second part looks good, with the short description, and the town, name, etc... Have each one in its topic in english, and have each one translated. I would go line by line, other language, english, other, english, etc... Remember to link each spot that says "suggested agendas" up to the suggested agendas topic, and add in any other opportunities there may be to link.
OK. The plan is then to post one or several such revised chapter announcements in each new (and old) regional forums first in English. And then try to have them translated into other languages. I can translate it into Russian and Hebrew, and then perhaps ask some ImmInst members who speak other languages to make more translations and post them in the chapters topics. And we will link to
http://www.imminst.o...das-t36584.html and elsewhere. But at the same time we will also need to list some agendas there as a primer.
Brokenportal: As for the first part you have there, that looks alright. Ive been thinking about how all this info fits best, what do you think about proposing to include that in the form of an open letter in the http://imminst.org/about section, and then link to the about section at imminst.org/chapters?
I think it would be great. But still, in addition to the link, I would post the announcement in full in the specific Chapters topics, so people can have the entire info. Or, alternatively, just post the second part, preceded by a link to the first part, to make it shorter. Either way could work.
Brokenportal: Ok now, as to the word 'chapters'. I was thinking how imminst.org/regions might work in here instead of /chapters. But I dont think that either would cover for the other, and that if we went that way we should probably consider creating both. However at this time I suggest we stick with chapters, and think about possibly creating /regions later. Chapters may be all we need, because although some people may not know what it means, in advertisements for it people could write to go to whatever they want to call it, say, in spanish, "Find your local region or group discussion about unlimited lifespans at imminst.org/chapters" Even though its at /chapters, the description would include the word that the people that speak that language are more familiar with. Do you think that will work well enough?
Caliban: There should be name consistency -- maybe just leave the region names, take out the 'forum' and 'group'
I agree. Just “chapters” would be enough. And this will also relate to what Caliban said about the term consistency. I believe, from the chapter announcement, people will understand that all these terms refer to the same thing: regional organizations, whether we call them chapters, groups, forums, etc. As the forums will be the first venue for interaction, some mention of them should perhaps be left in the announcement. But I agree that “Regional Groups/Chapters” sounds a bit awkward. How about just “Regional Chapters”, and then, as you say, this can still be understood and translated into other languages as people see fit.
Brokenportal: All this though will still leave the /about and the /chapters page untranslated, because we can only really fit one translation on those pages. However, I think we can remedy this by making "Translate the about and the chapters page in pinned topics in your regional section," one of the first and most prominent agenda items that we suggest.
Yes, this could be the solution. The request to translate can be pinned, listed in the agenda, and can also conclude the chapter announcements that are posted in the specific regional forums.
Brokenportal: This makes a good case for making them primarily language forums like Caliban says. I think Ilia has already classified them for the most part in this way. We'll have to wait and see what he says. This also adds to the case for keeping the US and Canada lumped together.
Perhaps we can revise the regions in this way, and then only list and link chapters for english speaking areas at /chapters for now. That would make it easier.
I think the “chapters” page can be in English only, but should link to all the regional forums. The breakdown into specific countries on that chapters page is still to be finalized. It shouldn’t be too long, but should still be representative. On the chapters page we could just list the 14 (or 16) forums. Or we could list the 14/16 forums, each followed by a few larger/top visiting countries.
Edited by ilia, 11 March 2010 - 10:24 AM.
