Re: Perfectly Kim...

[tEd ® KiLLiAn <tedkillian@charter.net>]

That IS perfectly Kim.

I am still in shock.

On Jun 20, 2010, at 11:56 AM, Jim Goodin wrote:

> Charles I just saw this after the fact.  That's wonderful and  
> amazing and his legacy speaks on as it did in that note.  I will  
> post this on theImprovFriday blog that I just posted a note about  
> his death on.  Thanks for posting this...
>
> On Sun, Jun 20, 2010 at 1:05 PM, Charles Zwicky <cazwicky@earthlink.net 
> > wrote:
> Dear Violet, and everyone else...
>
> We have all gained much from knowing Kim through Loopers-Delight..  
> I've been here since the mid 1990s and have experienced some great  
> conversations.
>
> Here is an example of how great Kim was, his ideas about forming  
> community are wonderful.  I was moved by his words  in this post  
> (see below) from 2006 so I saved it...
>
> Chuck Zwicky
>
> At 08:06 AM 4/24/2006, Matthew.Quinn@sunlife.com wrote:
>
> Just wondering- is there any reason why there is no LD Message Board?
>
> Yes, there is a reason. It has nothing to do with personal  
> preferences. Neither mine, nor yours, nor anybody else's. It also  
> has nothing to do with technology.
>
> It has everything to do with community. How communities form, how  
> people interact with each other, how communities sustain or fade out.
>
> I started using online networked environments in the 80's. I was  
> fascinated by the possibilities they offered to allow new  
> communities to form, and the possibilities for new methods of  
> communication.
>
> Over many years of using these environments, I observed that the  
> interface and method for the communication had a huge effect on how  
> people interacted, and the type of communities they did or did not  
> form. Bulletin boards, group chat, instant messaging, mailing lists,  
> video conferencing, newsgroups, etc., all turn out differently. Even  
> subtle things can have a significant impact. With mailing lists, for  
> example, factors like bounce/digest, moderation, posting rules, even  
> whether the "reply-to" field is set to the list address or the  
> poster's address, all affect the way people communicate in different  
> ways. Some formats turn out ugly, and result if a lot of flaming, or  
> trolls, or whatever. But some turn out wonderfully, when applied the  
> right way.
>
> So, the reason for choosing one interface or another should really  
> depend on the application and the type of communication desired. Is  
> the goal more of a friendly community, where people are a little  
> chatty and get to know each other over a long time? Is it just for  
> posting announcements or ads? Technical question and answers with a  
> minimum of nonsense? Customer support? A good place to chat people  
> up and try to get a date? A different format will work better in  
> each case. Choosing the wrong format usually results in failure.
>
> When I wanted to start a community around looping, my goal was to  
> form a community. I hoped people would spend extended time there,  
> and get to know one another. I wanted people to share information  
> and collaborate on projects together. I wanted people to spend time  
> to teach one another about looping. I wanted people to have serious,  
> thoughtful, and respectful discussions. I wanted it to last. I  
> wanted a community of interested people to build the whole idea of  
> looping into something much bigger than it was.
>
> I had long observed that mailing lists work very well in forming  
> strong communities, and that is what I wanted to do.
>
> So the fundamental format I chose for this nascent looping community  
> is the mailing list. I set up LD as a bounce list, with the reply-to  
> set to the list address. There is no moderation, but you can't post  
> unless you are a subscriber. There are no explicit rules about what  
> can be posted. There is a web archive that saves all discussion, and  
> makes it freely available to the world. (there is also a digest,  
> which I wasn't too thrilled to create and still think was a somewhat  
> bad idea.)
>
> All of these choices were made with a lot of thought. Mailing lists  
> have continuity. People mostly don't drop in and disappear, they  
> usually stick around for a while. Email lists appeal to people's  
> natural inertia. If people do nothing, the messages still go to  
> them. So people get to know one another. Email encourages more  
> thoughtful discussion. Bounce lists are more active. Lack of  
> moderation encourages more individual sense of ownership and  
> responsibility for the community. Reply-to set to the list makes  
> things a little more chatty and fun. None of these choices were  
> accidents, or made without purpose. I thought about each one and  
> made the choice in order to form the kind of community I envisioned.
>
> And so in 1996 I started Looper's Delight, and a whole bunch of  
> interested people showed up and started communicating in a new way,  
> and we all built this remarkable community. Looper's Delight is  
> almost 10 years old. We've made good friends, we've had numerous  
> great festivals, we've recorded many amazing albums, we shared a lot  
> of knowledge, we shared a lot of music, we've gone to see one  
> another perform, we guided manufacturers to make products for us, we  
> created a huge archive of knowledge, sometimes we've argued and  
> disagreed, mostly we've supported each other in all manner of ways,  
> and most important, we've developed looping far beyond what any of  
> us ever thought it could be.
>
> I'm really proud of all that. And I'm really convinced, now more  
> than ever, that the choices I made in forming this community were  
> correct. In my world, there is no better proof than success.
>
> So no, I'm not at all interested in converting LD into a message  
> board. I think that idea is destructive to our community. I also  
> think it is hurtful to the group when people try to create some  
> separate forum. It always feels like an attempt to split our  
> community up. That's why the reactions from so many people in the  
> community to these ideas are usually so hostile. People like the  
> community we have here. The don't want to see it broken up or damaged.
>
> And by the way, the idea that message boards are somehow more  
> "modern" is laughably wrong. As someone else noted, even in the 80's  
> bulletin board systems following that approach were very  
> sophisticated. Email was relatively primitive at that time, and was  
> little better than a command line or unix shell interface. There is  
> not really anything new about message boards today other than  
> slicker graphics and php code. Most of them seem to be actually  
> worse in user interface than the average BBS you could have joined  
> 15-20 years ago.
>
> kim
>
>
> ______________________________________________________________________
> Kim Flint                     | Looper's Delight
> kflint@loopers-delight.com    | http://www.loopers-delight.com
>
>
> -- 
>
> ...
> http://www.zmix.net
>
> http://www.esession.com/ChuckZwicky
>
> http://albumcredits.com/zmix
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> From Brooklyn To Glindran, a new World/Free Jazz recording by Jim  
> Goodin & Peter Thörn.  Proceeds
> from the sale of this CD will benefit JDRF International.   
> jimgoodinpeterthorn.bandcamp.com.
>
> www.jimgoodinmusic.com
> www.chinapaintingmusic.com
> woodandwiremusic.wordpress.com