All posts in the topic RIF is Back in Business (Short link)

From: Tim Erickson Date: 2007 Feb 23 02:06 UTC Short link

If you get this message, then I'm pretty sure that the forum is back
up and running again.

Sorry that the upgrade took longer than expected. In addition to
serving as Temporary Forum Manager for this forum, I provide some
level of technical support for all E-Democracy.Org forums and have
been very busy with the upgrade.

I did take time yesterday to drop by city hall and introduce myself
to the new City Manager, Bill Malinen, who has only been on the job
for a short time. I told him a little bit about the forum and our
hopes that it will become a bustling center of interaction among
folks interested in the future of Roseville.

I know that he and others I spoke with are reading the forum. Some
folks expressed a little concern over the lack of activity in the
forum. I assured them, that this group is still getting warmed up.

BUT, it is important that everyone in the forum help make the forum
successful. This forum only really becomes a useful community, once
we've reached a critical mass of traffic. We're not there yet.

Please, do your part to post a question, comment, or insight about
life in Roseville. More topics brings more participants. How about
posting something today (and helping us test the upgraded software)?

   RIF = <email obscured>

NOTE: We're still debugging the upgrade, so please be patient if you
experience difficulties with the software - and PLEASE - do report
anything that isn't working or isn't working like you think it should.

Thanks,

Tim Erickson
Temporary Forum Manager
    

From: roger hess jr Date: 2007 Feb 23 13:57 UTC Short link

so, will the taxpayers of roseville be receiving a refund for the days that
this forum was not working properly? according to my calculations, this forum
costs the taxpayers of roseville $16.4383561643/day. quite a lot for a service
which the residents of roseville could operate themselves at no cost to the
city, as the citizens of other minnesota cities do. i don't remember which day
it was, but i recall reading in the st.paul paper recently that a city, i
believe it was st. francis, has a citizen-run forum that is very busy and does
not cost the taxpayers a dime.
    

From: Tim Erickson Date: 2007 Feb 23 14:34 UTC Short link

On Feb 23, 2007, at 8:01 AM, roger hess jr wrote:
> why is the date and time of posting on this forum shown in
> universal time, rather than central time? not everyone is fully
> versed in universal time, in fact, most people believe the world
> still runs on GMT. actually very few people even know what UTC is.
> so, to avoid confusion, the postings on this forum should show date
> and time in central time.

Thanks for mentioning this.

You will note, in my message yesterday, that I noted not everything
on the site is fully functional. One of the items that has not yet
been resolved, is the time and date stamp on messages.

This may take a while to fix, but it is our intention to fix this so
that participants in the Central Time Zone of the United States, can
view messages in local time.

If you take the time to look around the site, you will find other
things that are not fully functional. We are encouraging participants
to notify us about any problems or concerns that they find, because
we've not spotted them all.

However, we think that bugs in the system MIGHT be better handled
thru personal communication and need not be posted to the entire
forum as if they were significant "local issues."

We went ahead and completed the upgrade, prior to resolving all these
issues, because we felt like the basic functionality of the site was
what was most critical. We are hopeful that participants will be
patient with us as we work out the details.

In regards to the "cost per day" of the forum. The city of Roseville
contracted with E-Democracy.Org to help organize and launch a citizen
lead E-Democracy project in the city of Roseville. It was a one time
expenditure and does not reflect the annual cost of maintaining a
forum, as much as it reflect the costs of organizing and training
local volunteers to manage such a forum.

The city of Roseville is not committed to any ongoing costs of
maintaining the forum - and if all goes well, future costs of the
forum will be absorbed by local volunteers and voluntary contributions.

The forum itself belongs to the community.

Thanks to those of you who have already volunteered to help build
this forum for the future and to help maintain it. If you have not
yet volunteered, but are interested in helping, please contact me at
any time.

I invite Roger or anyone else to contact me directly, if they would
like to meet for coffee and learn more about the history of this
project, the financial details, and the plans for the future.

Best wishes,

Tim Erickson
Temporary Forum Manager
Roseville Issues Forum
651-246-5045