Now we just need someone to handle posting Texas Bicycle Coalition and Be Kind to Cyclists news/events and we'll be all set.  Any takers?

But I'll repeat the plea now:  Can I please get:

* One volunteer to post Bike Austin's news/events
* One volunteer to post Texas Bicycle Coalition's news/events

?

bizikletari will probably be posting YBP stuff, so that's one out of three!

I'm surprised that you need permission from the collective to post YBP stuff to the web forum, but if so, then thanks for inquiring about that.

If the YBP collective agrees, I'll help with that.

Anyway, bizikletari, does this mean you're offering to post YBP stuff here?

So, things will plod along for now.  In the meantime, it would be really great if any of our members would volunteer to post local news & events here.  Could I please get:

* One volunteer to post Bike Austin's news/events
* One volunteer to post YBP's news/events
* One volunteer to post Texas Bicycle Coalition's news/events

Okay whoever figures that out is the next Zuckerberg or Jobs or whatever.

What form would that take?  And how would we get groups to actually use it?

Oh heck...here's an example. I find NextDoor https://nextdoor.com/ to be extremely effective in keeping me plugged in on what's happening with my neighborhood and surrounding neighborhoods, better than the traditional listserv. But it's just one more thing I have to sign up for, monitor, have an app for, etc. It's built kind of like Facebook, but obviously separate. And then you have Facebook to deal with as well. Google calendars work great in that I can do something like simply subscribe to my kids' school calendars...but you can only subscribe to so many calendars before it gets silly and unwieldy.

If there were something that automatically pulled in content from various organizations to one place, with options on how you interact with that content, it would be great. I'm not talking about the old push toward portals with user generated options for content, or just feeds either...but something that the user had to actually go to and engage. It's in my head, but I can't quite describe it, as you can tell by this post!

damicoaustin wrote:

I think this vehicle--the forum--is a bit outdated for the ways a lot of people communicate. Then again, I always thought forums were outstanding for searching for old information. And I wish there was a centralized place that plugged in all the different organizations automatically.

What form would that take?  And how would we get groups to actually use it?

No need to wonder what form it could take, as it's already come and (largely) gone..

Forums largely replaced Usenet because 1) they were a little easier to use for those who were new and 2) they allowed people to control their forums with an iron fist if they chose to, rather than the lack of control that Usenet offered.  But Usenet was awesome in that every interest was covered in one place (just in different groups) and it was decentralized so that things wouldn't just disappear one day because somebody got tired of dealing with it or because their harddrive failed and they forgot to ever take backups.  And when dejanews came along to search all of it at once, going back to the beginning of time ... wonderful!

That said, the lack of control was a problem (and a blessing), as was the high difficulty in creating new groups and near impossibility of removing unused groups.

Usenet is still around, but largely dead -- most discussions happen elsewhere now.  Reddit is probably the closest thing to what it was now, and it's solved many of the problems that Usenet had quite effectively.  And there is a subreddit dedicated to bicycling in Austin though it's not particularly active.

When the discussion came up, I said that someone needed to contact you. But the response I got was, "what difference will it make?" Still, I believe in open communication, and there are always ways to point people in the right direction, like "Looking for ...?" Or simply promoting each other.

Thank you for making that suggestion.  On the "simply promoting each other" bit, I have to laugh.  I link to Bike Austin in the header of every page of this site, but I think it'll be a cold day in hell before they admit that BicycleAustin.info even exists.  (Or other sites/groups, for that matter.  From perusing BikeAustin's site, you wouldn't know that there are any other advocacy groups in town, or even a City Bicycle Program.  The word that comes to mind when browsing their site is "insular".)

What form would that take?  And how would we get groups to actually use it?

I have daydreamed about programming a calendar system that would let users (readers) filter for just rides, just other events, all events, etc. (i.e., offering functionality that the Google Calendar doesn't), and to make it easy for each group/blog to put that calendar on their own site -- the idea being that that kind of rich usefulness was available, more groups might actually participate.  But I'd have to build it first to see if they'd come, and if they didn't, that would have been a big waste of time.

What's been great for Austin bicycling, also creates a problem....e.g. many groups and interests all with their own ways to communicate them. Back when I was active in advocacy, I would pepper every vehicle I could to get the word out on events/releases and such. But covering all that ground was time consuming, so I can understand why many organizations don't cover all the bases by posting with what you created.

I think this vehicle--the forum--is a bit outdated for the ways a lot of people communicate. Then again, I always thought forums were outstanding for searching for old information. And I wish there was a centralized place that plugged in all the different organizations automatically.

So in a nutshell, the forum still has value, but much less an impact than it used to. So I'll understand whatever direction you go.

On the Bike Austin deal, just a note that you pegged it perfectly with your other post noting: "Yeah, it might have been nice had I heard from anyone in Bike Austin before they chose that name.  But no, I didn't.  Then again, I'm not sure it would have helped anyway:  They wanted the name Bike Austin, and I would have been loathe to change the Bicycle Austin name I've used for many years."

When the discussion came up, I said that someone needed to contact you. But the response I got was, "what difference will it make?" Still, I believe in open communication, and there are always ways to point people in the right direction, like "Looking for ...?" Or simply promoting each other.