[Pete Svarrior]

I just think that all concerned need to figure out where they want this site and/or society to go before they worry too much about how to get there. 

I think they can be done in parallel, to some extent.

[Tom Bishop]

I'm a bit worried that this would carry an impression of us being the other FES. It feels extremely similar to, for example, the Oxford Brookes University. Y'know, that second university in Oxford that everyone is talking about... not. They're not even a bad university, but the name acts as a detractor and provides opportunity for mockery.

But as it stands right now we are already the "other" Oxford. Rather than being an unrelated Oxford startup school I would prefer to be the Oxford Graduate School, the place of higher studies for Oxford University.

We may not have the keys to Oxford University, but we can have the keys to its Graduate School. The path we are on right now is to start an unrelated "Oxford University" and attempt some sort of competition for the name.

I believe we should compete, but it should not around which site is the "real" or "true" Flat Earth Society. That distracts from the movement. A different name separates us from the distraction.

My idea is to create something which compliments the .org site so that we may prosper. For example, I would like to start writing a first chapter to a new annotated edition of Earth Not a Globe. When the chapter is done we can host it on the site and make a post on the .org site to tell them about these things the academy has done, not act as a representative from a competitor and try to sway them to join our competing Flat Earth Society because we are better and Daniel is so bad, etc.

When reaching out to the press, I suspect that there would be more interest in hearing that the Flat Earth Society has created the Flat Earth Academy, the first academic organization to further FET and academic brain trust of Zetetic Science, rather than a story of how some people revolted and created a different Flat Earth Society because of some technical issues.

[Pete Svarrior]

The issue isn't individual members advertizing the society. The issue is the content and the fact that money is being spent on it. We all know what is in the leaflets Tintagel made for the society because she posted them for all to see. We know nothing about these ads that were clandestinely placed for an unknown price somewhere at sometime. It's alarming to have this kind of information come out of the blue, particularly when it's being used to bolster someone's position.

It's not being used to bolster anyone's position - I'd like to ask that you choose your accusations more carefully. All content on Facebook is public, and a link to it is rather prominent on the Society's front page. Also, most regulars would know about these ads, because we showed them off when they were being made on IRC. If you have an issue with the content on Facebook, you're more than welcome to raise specific concerns, after you've actually seen it. Until then, I do not appreciate your comments, as they appear to carry the sole intention of discrediting our efforts.

I also don't understand why you're so concerned about the price. It's my money, which I earned because I have a job. We do not accept donations to, among other reasons, avoid dissent from people complaining about how their money is being spent.

I don't see how the name change decision has contributed to slowing down the Council

You seem not to see many things that are right there in the open. http://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=1132.msg16625#msg16625

The whole point of the Council was to perform certain duties and authorize certain actions on behalf of the society. If you feel that it's already proven itself to be a failed experiment and are prepared to support its abolition, that's fine. Just say that.

I am not saying that at all. Again, much appreciated if you stop putting words in my mouth. All I'm saying is that the ZC should start doing the things they were mandated to do by their electorate, and only then focus on pointless dabble. As it stands, they have no Constitution (which was a direct requirement and condition for their existence), and have not produced any of the communication they promised. We cannot talk about a failed experiment, because there is no experiment to speak of yet.

However, that isn't what the membership here decided the system was going to be. That's going to have to be reconciled if you want to take a new direction.

The membership here decided how the Society is going to be run; not the Facebook page. The Facebook page is being run by myself, Tintagel, Secret User and Junker, and predates the ZC in its origin. I refer you to the list of people in charge of different FES-oriented media, none of which are under the jurisdiction of the ZC*: http://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=804.0

* - n.b. This may change once the ZC has a constitution, and following discussion. However, at the present, that's what things are.

I agree with the general sentiment here. If you'll read my original post that was misrepresented to start the "name debate" in this thread, you'll see that I was explicitly not supporting a change of the name. The only reason I pursued it here was because it was the only idea I mentioned that anyone seemed to want to talk about. I absolutely feel that there are much more important things to be done.

But they're not being done. We're stuck here because of the discussion you (allegedly) started, and TB is not going to let this go even if no one supports him. If it was misrepresented, that's something you should have mentioned earlier, don't you think?

EDIT: I just went through every post you made on this site, and the only time you mention the rename or lack thereof prior to my objection is to push your own name. I'm not sure how that's an explicit declaration of lack of support, and a clarification on that would be useful.

[Tom Bishop]

I'll let it go if there is a lack of support on the matter.

[Pete Svarrior]

I apologise, Tom. That comment on my part was uncalled for.

[markjo]

I'm a bit worried that this would carry an impression of us being the other FES. It feels extremely similar to, for example, the Oxford Brookes University. Y'know, that second university in Oxford that everyone is talking about... not. They're not even a bad university, but the name acts as a detractor and provides opportunity for mockery.

But as it stands right now we are already the "other" Oxford. Rather than being an unrelated Oxford startup school I would prefer to be the Oxford Graduate School, the place of higher studies for Oxford University.

Honestly, I'd like to see that too, but I doubt that will ever happen.  Unless and until FE'ers can start supporting their FE "models" with math that matches real world observations, then your "Graduate School" will be no better than FES grade school.

[Tom Bishop]

I'm a bit worried that this would carry an impression of us being the other FES. It feels extremely similar to, for example, the Oxford Brookes University. Y'know, that second university in Oxford that everyone is talking about... not. They're not even a bad university, but the name acts as a detractor and provides opportunity for mockery.

But as it stands right now we are already the "other" Oxford. Rather than being an unrelated Oxford startup school I would prefer to be the Oxford Graduate School, the place of higher studies for Oxford University.

Honestly, I'd like to see that too, but I doubt that will ever happen.  Unless and until FE'ers can start supporting their FE "models" with math that matches real world observations, then your "Graduate School" will be no better than FES grade school.

Why do you keep saying this? If you've been paying attention for the last seven years, the community often does to provide some sort of math for its models. I've seen math used to compute Special Relativity for acceleration problems, I've seen math used to compute how hot the a small and near sun would be to warm the earth, and I've seen math in Earth Not a Globe to compute convexity. Math has been provided for calculating the thickness of the earth under a "gravity" model, as well as math to predict the recurrence of a lunar eclipse.

Efforts need to be made to search through the old threads and categorize this in the Wiki, but it cannot be said that no math is ever performed.

[markjo]

Tom, to say FE'ers "often" try to provide supporting math is, at best, an exaggeration and, at worst, an outright lie.  From what I've seen over the past 7 years, FE'ers tend to be deathly afraid of math.  As I recall, in most of those cases that you mention, the math was done by RE'ers to show the improbability of the various models being discussed.  I've even provided math showing the inconsistent results of trying determine the height of the sun by triangulation.   

What I'm talking about is FE'ers providing maths showing that FET does work, not RE'ers providing maths showing that FET doesn't work.  There is a difference.

[Saddam Hussein]

Can we keep whining about how FET sucks in discussions that are actually about FET, please?

[markjo]

The point that I was trying to make is that it might be worthwhile to actually improve FET before worrying about advertising a society that supposedly supports FET.

[Saddam Hussein]

You have made that point many times now.  It is noted.

[Pete Svarrior]

I've seen the facebook page. Among the content to be found there, what was being used for the ads you were paying for?

Most of the posts were "boosted", meaning their reach is artificially increased to friends of those who already liked the page, or other people who might be interested in them based on Facebook's algorithmic magic. Also, there were a few standard fb ads that simply display the page and its description on people's news feeds, in an effort to get them to like it.

Oh, come on. Don't be like that. We're on the same side here.

It really doesn't sound like it right now, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt.

Hey, I don't think anyone here objects to you or anyone else spending their own money promoting the society. I just think that the society should know about it in advance. Is it really weird to think that an organization should have some foreknowledge of media expenditures on its behalf?

I dunno, it strikes me as obvious that since I run the Facebook page, I'd be making media statements, and I still don't think the financial part of it is any of anyone's business, other than my own.

I'd say the people doing this deserve a certain recognition from the society too.

Even if the person deserving recognition expressly doesn't want said recognition?

Yeah, you kind of cropped out my point there[...]

Point taken and conceded.

When you said that "we can't wait for the council to make decisions", I took that to mean that you wanted the membership to take matters into their own hands. Based on such an interpretation, it's easy to infer that the Council would then be obsolete. If that is indeed wrong, an explanation of what you meant by that is clearly needed and would be appreciated.

What I'm saying is that we should drop the rename discussion, either permanently or for the time being, as in my view it is delaying very important and long overdue tasks of the ZC. I say that with no authority and with no claim to authority, it is simply my opinion.

I honestly didn't realize that the facebook page operated independently of the society. I mean, it bears its name and presumably represents it, but the people running it put out anything they want? It even has a council of its own? At this point, would it be all that inaccurate to characterize it as a third FES? It certainly seems to be getting a lot more done than this place.

It's not operated independently of the society, it's operated by its members. That's a very common occurrence in non-profit organisations (or at least each and every one of those I am or have been involved in is doing that - perhaps my sample is heavily skewed, but I'm under the impression it's not). A group of members decide to help out, and they help out. There's no reason for it to be overly formalised, and there's no reason to interrogate me or anyone else about it. If you, or anyone else, is interested in joining, I'm very happy to let almost anyone in.

I've covered this already. The name discussion has nothing to do with the Council's recent inactivity and you know it.

No, I don't know it. The way I see it, several members of the ZC were inactive around Christmas time, which explains their inactivity to some extent. After that, a statement was made that the press release is being put on hold until the name debate is settled. Perhaps that's not the real reason (I think it is), but it certainly is the official reason. In either way, getting that reason out of the way sounds like at least a partial solution.

I can't help but get the impression that you're channeling your frustration at the Council towards me. I don't hold any kind of influence here, so I'm really not worth it.

No, my frustration towards you comes from the fact that I feel attacked (by you and you alone) for trying to help the society out. I deeply regret even mentioning the ads.

Okay. The post is actually quoted in the OP of this thread. I mention the possibility of a name change as a means of differentiation, but I ultimately express reservations toward the idea. I conclude by saying that "it will have to be entirely the efforts of the members here to set this place apart". I don't see that as being much different from your own position.

It is different from my position. My position is that any and all efforts to rename the society would be harmful to it. The only exception to that I can think of is the "official name that we'd never use anyway" proposal. After all, the other FES is technically the International Flat Earth Research Society, or something along these lines. If that's the kind of thing you want to do (which involves no change at all in our logo, site, or media), that's fine, especially since it in no way halts the press release and other activities.

[Blanko]

Reported for quote walls.

[Tintagel]

I'm going to go ahead and withdraw my support of the name change as well, at least for the time being. 

PP makes good points.  We may need to address it in the future, but if it's holding up the ZC's progress on the media release and otherwise disrupting the momentum we have, then I'm in favor of tabling the idea.

[Tau]

Alright. If that's a general agreement I'll draft the press release tomorrow.

[Tintagel]

As I see some discussion taking place in the ZC board about the release, and I can't post there, I wanted to give you some links to help you get started.  Press releases are super easy to write once you learn the format.  There are also some templates here to make it even easier.

http://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/press-release-template-ht
http://www.publicityinsider.com/release.asp
http://www.smallbusinesspr.com/pr-learning-center/diagrams-templates/

[Tau]

As I see some discussion taking place in the ZC board about the release, and I can't post there, I wanted to give you some links to help you get started.  Press releases are super easy to write once you learn the format.  There are also some templates here to make it even easier.

http://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/press-release-template-ht
http://www.publicityinsider.com/release.asp
http://www.smallbusinesspr.com/pr-learning-center/diagrams-templates/

Awesome, thanks.

[Pete Svarrior]

I'm just going to drop this discussion now. If you hate me trying to help the society so much, go ahead and ask me directly, via PM, to stop. This applies to anyone interested, especially potentially concerned council members. If you (Oscar) are just going to keep coming back to try and make me feel shit about it, well, you're getting ignored. Simples.

I should also clarify that the council has no authority over anything for the time being. I mean, I've already clarified it for you once, but here you go again. Until they develop the constitution, they're just a working group. They are more than welcome to specify rules on how social media are run whenever they get round to writing it, subject to members' approval.

[Tau]

My opinion, at least, is that any member of the society in good standing can do whatever they want for the society with its permission. The council will have responsibilities to do certain things, but insisting that everything is our job seems needlessly bureaucratic to me.

[Tau]

I can see the benefit in that. My only concern, as I said, is bureaucracy. I don't want to make it needlessly difficult for people to actually do things for the society, and this strikes me as a step in that direction. What do other people think?