VH Town Hall Meeting

Revision as of 19:31, 1 November 2013

The VH Townhall is a public meeting that will be lead by a staff member on Sunday, November 3rd at 4 p.m Pacific / 7 p.m. Eastern Time in the Fourth Wall. This week's meeting will be a catch-up and show-off-heavy meetup! We'll be introducing the new private feedback system, introducing and starting the logo contest, although our primary interest is in hearing from YOU - the community - and getting your thoughts on how things are going!

We hope you can join us once again! We will do our best to make sure every topic listed here gets ample discussion time, but once more cannot guarantee unlisted topics their fair place. Brings drinks, grab snacks or food beforehand, and be ready to read and think and write! Also, feel free to put your name on the list of folks guaranteed a spot to talk, below!

Rules

To keep discussion civil and organized, the following rules will be in place:

• Please fall silent when the bailiff asks for silence. Conversation is the name of the game, but there will be intermittent calls for silence between discussion-periods, both to allow folks to gather their thoughts, catch a breath, grab a drink, or simply move on to the next topic. Nobody wants to be the one with a five-line paragraph they're rushing out a minute after silence is called! If you really need to respond to someone, though, do it privately if possible.
• Stay on topic. We want to cover as many issues as possible in this meeting, and the best way to do this is to stay focused and not get sidetracked on other topics.
• Treat others with respect. It is okay to have a disagreement with someone, but please remain civil if it happens. There is no need for hostility.
• Be patient. Although we will try to keep things moving as briskly as possible, this is likely to be a long, drawn-out and thought-provoking meeting. Although we hope it will be a positive experience for everyone, it is still a serious event, and we will be taking everything raised, seriously - which means giving even folks who don't type or talk at 100+ words-per-minute the chance to voice their concerns. There will be ample time to step away and grab a drink or take a walk while others are presenting, or at declared breaks, so don't be afraid you'll miss something by stepping away for a minute.
• Follow the moderator's instructions. There will be 'open discussion' periods, during which the floor will be opened up for free-flowing conversation, and anyone who wishes to can pitch in a comment, but when the topic's been discussed a bit, or if the conversation begins to get too heated, order will be called and participants are expected to calm and quiet down and either re-approach the topic after a short break, or move on to the next one, depending.

In general, we'll be trying to keep things orderly while still giving everyone who wants to, the chance to contribute. It may not work perfectly, but we'll do the best we can.

Past meeting notes have either been commented out or removed - we may develop a methodology for preserving them in the future, but at the moment they are likely to simply confuse.

Discussion Topics

If you would like to submit a topic, click the top-right button marked Edit, there will be a quick wiki-editing guide on how to format it if you don't know how. Alternatively, you can send your topic to Kaoru or any other staffer, and they will edit this page to add your topic to the list. As a note - due to time constraints, we are afraid that we can only guarantee time for up to 6 topics, at this meeting. We are aiming for around 3 hours max, although may overshoot this slightly.

Topics not on the wiki page will not be discussed at the next meeting unless there is spare time.

1. Mods - Presentation of the Feedback system!
2. Mods - Inauguration of the VH Logo Design Contest!
3. Name - Your name and topic here!

Alternate Times/Dates

We are always looking to better serve the community, and we understand the times and dates of these meetings may not fit together with everyone's schedule. We will do our best to accommodate you, both by providing minutes in the Townhall Archive and by announcing meeting dates and times well in advance, but if you feel you will never be able to make the meetings at the times they have been commonly scheduled, please, contact a moderator or leave comments in the Talk Page about dates and times that might work better for you - if enough people are asking that a meeting be held on a given day or time, we'll try to have one then, either in lieu of or in addition to any other scheduled meeting for that 'period' of time.