OSLIST Digest - 17 Apr 1997 to 20 Apr 1997

[Gary Kimble & Metta Zetty]

Dear Birgitt,

Thanks for sharing your story of this wonderful OS success.
On a Monday morning, this is good, inspiring news!

Metta
_______________________________________________________________________________

>Date:    Sun, 20 Apr 1997 15:04:54 -0400
>From:    Birgitt Bolton <birgitt at worldchat.com>
>Subject: Re: open space event continued on-line
>
>Hi Lisa! It is exciting as this story of Open Space on the web unfolds.
>
>Just thought you might like to know of a small attempt at ongoing on-line
>Open Space. On April 12th, Larry Peterson, Diane Blair and myself did three
>simultaneous Open Spaces in three ballrooms at a large hotel. Topic was
>partnerships between business and the school system. A very hot topic here.
>We did the Open Space against a lot of odds. First there were keynote
>speakers and so on for the group of over 400, then there was a four hour
>only period for Open Space in which folks left the big group and met in
>three smaller groups. Only time for two discussion time slots. Larry and I
>certainly went into it worried about a mini-open space with a group of
>folks who didn't know each other, with a hot issue in which there were
>people stationed in each room to stop the process (possible hecklers),
>sandwiched in between other agenda. The idea (Diane Blair is the champion
>of the cyberspace piece) was that we would get the topics up, some
>discussion, the reports would be posted on the web site, and discussions
>would continue there. After four weeks, the discussion time would end with
>a multi-vote.
>
>The Open Space was an amazing success. Even against the odds. The
>"hecklers" left because they couldn't find a platform. The topics were
>exactly what needed to happen with deep honesty including the CEO of a
>large corporation putting up "Do the corporations really have another
>agenda". I was amazed at getting this so quickly. Folks felt that they had
>their first real chance to get to know each other, listen to each other
>(even in this short time frame). Wow!
>
>So it is continuing on-line. I have no idea how it will go but I think it
>has lots of potential. We are learning from it. I think better technology
>would have worked better (in fact I think Diane called you but had no
>budget to do what really should have been done here)--but it is still a
>start. (We had strongly urged her to access the wisdom at Metanet.) I think
>there is room for an ongoing discussion between you and her. She  sees some
>of the potential, but you could help her dream bigger.
>
>The site is for the Learning Partnership and found at http://www.tlp.on.ca