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

[Rufus Pollock]

Dear Rayna,

As per my response just now to Pierre I've delayed a bit in responding to
because I wanted to give some space for the online community discussions
plus the tagline discussion. At the same time, I did want to follow-up with
as many folks as possible here - so herewith a belated response!

On 15 April 2014 15:26, Rayna <rayna.st at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hey there,
>
> I haven't been very talkative on this list but the discussion is an
> important one and I feel like I have things to share. Not sure I'll be able
> to join the community call, am sick and kinda voiceless, so here are some
> thoughts.
>

First off a big thanks for sharing - I know it takes time and energy but
its super-important and useful. Would welcome chance to chat if you have
more thoughts you'd like to share!

[snip]

Apologies if this sounds blunt but I do not identify with the tagline. My
> aim within OKFN is not this one. The tagline reflects *a* vision, but is
> not a comprehensive vision. And again the whole thing was done without any
> interaction whatsoever with the community. If it is true that OKFN has
> grown organically, it is also true that this needs structure -- but not
> shoehorning. Why centering on data? Data is a means, not an aim. Data is a
> particular "dress-up", not a goal *per se*. How will science or access to
> research or GLAM or hardware or climate fit in this 'data' tagline? Should
> we all try to twist our angles to fit a data-driven vision if we want to
> continue working on these topics within OKFN? Should I go into explaining
> that for some places in the world, such a direction will be redhibitory
> because it'll be seen as an intrusion to national security? (Whether you
> find this ridiculous or not is not the point; the point is that such a
> brand will make an already Herculean task impossible to fulfill.
>

Point very much taken. I should emphasize, as I wrote to Peter, that I'm
worried a bit too much has got read in the tagline - it isn't a subtle
signal of some change in identity. Also, the tagline is now open for
suggestions and ideas on how we could better capture our vision / essence
in a succinct, compelling and understandable way would be *very* welcome :-)


> Over the past few months, I've had quite a few discussions with staff and
> community members regarding diversity. The observation is that, despite its
> non-tech-centricity, if I may say so, OKFN is still quite uniform when it
> boils down to diversity (gender, nationality, social status, pick yours).
> The new brand will probably make this worse as it is much more
> tech-centered. I have been in many other communities before -- and much
> more tech-centered, too -- yet what pleased me with OKFN was precisely this
> capacity to speak nerdy without requiring that everyone able to respond is
> necessarily able to write software. Let me explain further:
>

:-)


> Before we get into a n-th round of how much external communication experts
> have provided great advise, I want just to emphasize that the whole fuss
> around this is because a) *external* people do not provide proper feedback
> about the community; b) communication is not about what you say but about
> what people hear. My a) speaks for itself and just complements my own
> frustration of being an active member of the community and of not being
> consulted on such an important topic given that people outside of the
> community assume I represent OKFN up to a certain extent. I guess others
> from the community have/will relate(d) to such a frustration.
>
> My b) might need some more elaboration. We can play with the words, make
> modular statements and taglines and decide to cut-paste stuff to fit
> whatever purpose. This is not a tagline, it's tinkering. Tinkering is
> awesome by the way. Yet, if I need cut-paste-arranging-tinkering, then a
> tagline is useless. Complementarily, what people hear is not necessarily
> what you want to convey. When you speak to people outside of the 'usual
> data suspects', you see that opening up information or knowledge is NOT
> about data. They need to have some information accessible because stuff.
> The formalism of "knowledge" or "data" comes at a much later stage. The
> rebranding process IMHO should have been much more focused on outreach and
> usability than on data in order to include the overwhelming majority of
> humans whose brains are not rewired in data-centric way.
>

Very good points and well-taken. Do you have any thoughts on what this
should concretely mean for the language or terminology we could use here to
reflect these points?


> Thus, sticking to data will not just alienate many from the community but
> will also put others off. Nowhere in the rebranding we spoke about people,
> about outreach. The rebranding is done to speak to a very particular type
> of people, a result in striking contrast with the org's mission, to open
> knowledge to the widest possible number of humans. People need information.
> If experts narrow these needs to mean some flavour of data, then fine. Yet,
> you can have all the data in the world, if you don't get people to use and
> comprehend it, then it's useless. Data, just as code, is speech. You need
> to make use of them for the change to happen. If you open up data but
> nobody cares about using it for real social and political transformation,
> than we have failed to achieve freedom. (Amen :) )
>

We all agree that "data in itself isn't useful" :-) (cf
http://blog.okfn.org/2011/09/15/open-data-a-means-to-an-end-not-an-end-in-itself/
)

Let me reiterate my point above that I worry the tagline has suggested some
change in identity or purpose. That is not the case. The challenge we have
with the tagline is to have something simple and meaningful - and
meaningful beyond the immediate "core" of people who are very knowledgeable
and very engaged :-)


> In conclusion: May we have 'knowledge' and 'people' back, pretty please? :)
>

Absolutely - they never went away :-) More seriously how do we best convey
this? Do you have thoughts or improvements for the tagline (see suggestions
on the wiki) and/or the "vision" statement on the front page?

Rufus
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