The New MDS Website

So, if a chapter or a project wanted to run a forum open only to the chapter or project members, would it be possible and if so how would it work? Similarly, could a chapter run its listserv off the website, and have mail going to and coming from only chapter members? Would the chapter archive be open reading?

One of the applications I am especially wondering about is the new SDS News Bulletin. Could the editors group have a forum open only to the editors? and could the editors use the polling functions to vote on the choice of a graphic to go with an article, without everybody in the rest of the organization putting their 2 cents in? I think it is easy to see how it could be set up to have everybody put their 2 cents in, but is the opposite possible?

Obviously this poll is much too limited in range of options. But, the website's polling functions are something we have nowhere else. So, that would seem a plausible priority function for the site.

The design of the site is bound to improve, but it is easy to see how it could become hard to navigate. If we develop a simple home page, with good graphics and not too many links to major features, then each major feature could offer more detailed links and content. For example, the home page might have just one link for alternative news and information sources, and then our main page for such news could contain myriad links (ZNET, Commondreams, IndyMedia, etc.).

Despite the potential for confusing navigation, the ability of members to build resource pages, to run blogs, and to collaborate on research and campaign work is impressive.

It also appears that a discussion begun at a listserv, e.g., New Left Cafe, might be easier to follow and maintain as a long-term forum if transfered to the website once it becomes obvious it will continue for more than short time. The entire thread could then be posted here, and a notice to that effect put up on the listserv.

We ought to install a link for New Left Cafe for new subscribers, at the top of this site's home page. We ought to use NLC as the place to open up discussions on new topics. NLC works well for that now, but it is often difficult to follow a thread backwards through the archive to see what actually started it.

We might interface with the MDS Announcements listserv to announce the start of official voting on anything, when we get to a point of MDS actually using the site for that purpose.

Fragmentation of the membership via too many separated discussion foci is an issue already, and one thing we might want this website to try to do is to link to all the listserv archives and E-Rap, and the SDS Wiki, etc. It would be a lot of work to even just list the topics of the threads, let alone summarize them, but it would be great if there was a place any member could go to search for material on current or past topics. Maybe a collective could be formed to do this sort of librarian function.