[okfn-discuss] new brand, new website: coming up next week

[Samuel Goëta]

Hi everyone,

I was less connected for the last few days and I am quite
astonished<https://twitter.com/samgoeta/status/456409840726704129>by
the new identity. I share most concerns already expressed so I will be
short, it's difficult to follow.

I would like to share a less-addressed concern about the new okfn.org.
Could we just agree first on the identity and then launch a new website?
Also the new okfn.org does not mean much if we don't know the whole OKF
strategy which is I believe currently drafted.

To me, the new okfn.org (besides already what was already expressed on
identity):
- does not explain *what Open Knowledge actually is*! Stating the
summarized open definition on the homepage would be a good thing.
- *emphasizes* too much on *services* offered by OKF Central
- does not present any of our *projects* (what we do is part of what we
are): CKAN, School of Data, Public Domain Review, Open Spending, Open
Definition, Open Data Index, Textus… I could not find them on the new
website!
- is actually quite good in the last section to *explain the benefits* of
open knowledge
- misses *action calls* besides just signing up to the newsletter

Can we discuss about the website issue at the next community call?

Thanks

Best

Sam

On Tue, Apr 15, 2014 at 9:49 PM, Aaron Wolf <wolftune at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> On Tue, Apr 15, 2014 at 6:30 PM, Rob Myers <rob at robmyers.org> wrote:
>
>> "sharing" is
>> rapidly becoming a synonym for renting
>>
>
> I don't know this to be true at all. Just because some people are abusing
> the term doesn't mean that much. Most of your critique is just negative
> discounting of my proposal. I don't really care whether *my* proposal is
> used, but "change the world" is as vacuous and overused as anything out
> there, and the effect of "Data" on changing the world could be as negative
> as it is positive depending upon what the data is and who controls it. It
> is imperative that it be clear *what direction* we are proposing that the
> change go.
>
> "See How Data Can Change The World" is *too* focused, that's the point all
> along. Less focused is the goal here. We want the focus to be about
> empowering the world's citizens, not about Big Data controlling us, we want
> the focus to be broader, not about venerating Data as the primary or only
> focus of Openness.
>
> Big Data is a reality today whether we like it or not. The OKF needn't
> exist just to promote data itself. The point has to be about promoting
> specifically Open data over restricted data controlled by governments and
> corporations. The point of "Open Knowledge" overall is for that same
> Openness to be applied to many things. The Openness and empowerment of
> people is the goal, whether we apply the values of openness to data or to
> art or to educational resources etc.
>
> If the OKF is to be strictly a data-focused organization, it should become
> the Open Data Foundation, and people who don't care about data as much can
> just be tangential supporters. There is a big decision here about focus,
> and it appears that when questioned nobody is suggesting that it really
> become the Open Data Foundation, although that honestly could be a
> reasonable direction for various reasons. But it either should embrace that
> or work to be inclusive of other areas. Either you focus or you don't.
> Don't pretend to be inclusive but actually neglect areas outside of a
> certain focus.
>
> I see no problem with including the word "free" in things that refer to
> Open. I'm not insisting on it either, but I completely reject the idea that
> inclusion of other terms is inherently problematic.
>
> --
> Aaron Wolf
> wolftune.com
>
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