<html><div>At 11:04 AM 6/15/99 -0700, you wrote:</div>
<div>>Reading Birgitt's report reminds me to report on the Open Space
for 400</div>
<div>>that I facilitated a couple months ago. It was the annual
conference of an</div>
<div>>association of conference center professionals, and the Open
Space was the</div>
<div>>second day of the four day event. The location was Squaw
Valley,</div>
<div>>California.</div>
<div>></div>
<div>>Four hundred were seated in three concentric circles in the
largest</div>
<div>>ballroom on the property. It felt amazingly intimate. After a
rousing</div>
<div>>musical introduction by Sourdough Slim, a banjo picking master
in cowboy</div>
<div>>clothes, I walked to the center and opened the space.</div>
<div>></div>
<div>>I try to not take personally the fact that the weather was
absolutely</div>
<div>>gorgeous, after an evening of fresh snow, and that two thirds of
those</div>
<div>>present decided to use the Law of Two Skis! Those who remained
indoors</div>
<div>>engaged in thirty different sessions and returned with
enthusiastic</div>
<div>>appreciation for the process and the content before boarding
buses to Reno</div>
<div>>for more recreation.</div>
<div>></div>
<div>>The closing circle that day was conducted in darkness because we
only had</div>
<div>>30 minutes, and decided to use an audience-voting system
(handheld devices)</div>
<div>>which projected the results immediately onto a projection
screen. It did</div>
<div>>not feel so intimate, but the feedback was clear to all.</div>
<div>********************************</div>
<div>Sounds wonderful Jeff -- but I think there is probably also a lesson
here about "appropriate technology" Over the years I have
been approached by the purveyors of any number of electronic
widgets and gidgets. In most cases I found they simply got in the way,
and performed tasks that could be more easily, and usefully performed by
the participants themselves. My experieince has been -- technology is
wonderful, but it is essential to remember what is the horse and what is
the carriage.</div>
<br>
Harrison
<br>
<div align="center">
Harrison Owen <br>
7808 River Falls Drive <br>
Potomac, MD 20854 USA <br>
301-469-9269 (phone) <br>
301-983-9314 (fax) <br>
email owen@tmn.com<br>
Website
<a href="http://www.tmn.com/~owen" eudora="autourl">http://www.tmn.com/~owen</a><br>
Open Space Institute website<br>
<a href="http://www.tmn.com/openspace" eudora="autourl">http://www.tmn.com/openspace</a></html>