There are currently about 100 groups on the NYCGA web site and we get more requests for added groups every day. We, at Tech Operations (formerly known as Internet), are very concerned with this situation and after many conversations with other groups in the movement, we know that the negative implications of this are vast and serious. These concerns include the following:
- Unclear and inaccessible groups: Many working groups listed on the NYCGA.net website lack clarity about their function and/or provide no information about what they do or how one can participate in their work. Many have no (or inaccurate) contact information listed and many do not even have a real administrator beyond the site admin who created the group initially.
- Non-functioning groups: Many working groups are either non-functioning or not actually groups yet they maintain the same status as active and participating working groups.
- Non-local groups: This site was designed to serve the occupation on the ground at Liberty Plaza and Wall Street. It was not designed to be a central hub for any group involved in the global movement. The groups represented on the site, therefore, should be working actively, on the ground with the OWS occupation. For many of the current groups, this is not the case.
- Redundant groups: Many groups are redundant in part due to a lack of communcation and transparency; there is no simple way to find out if a project idea has people working on it; collaboration between groups and projects is very difficult; difficult for groups who want to coordinate projects OWS-wide to get the word out.
- Decreased Productivity: In almost 100% of instanced, the existing groups are overworked and understaffed. Groups need help. We have serious problems that need to be solved (housing, food, transportation, medical, financial, and so much more) and every time we make another fractured, specific, group, we dilute the resources available to the existing groups that are working so hard to solve these problems in a focused way. Instead of starting new groups, which only divide us and split our focus, we should be working on strengthening the groups we have so they can do the important work that needs to be done.
- Barrier to entry: Inaccessibility for newbies to OWS is extremely high due to the lack of clarity what the OWS activities are. In tandem is a general need of more people involved in OWS Groups & Projects.
- Over-crowding of the site: With so many groups, it becomes so much harder to find the group you’re looking for, or identify the appropriate forum to have a conversation in. We need to maintain an environment that is digestible to new visitors. If we do not, the site won’t be able to effectively serve anyone in the community and we would not be living up to our charter or our obligation to the movement.
- Financial complications: With the current standing policy of $100 at-a-time allotment for groups, the Finance Working Group needs a more clear definition and creation process for groups. If just anyone can become a group, then anyone can begin asking for money out of our general fund with no accountability.
As you can see, the situation is complex. The spokes council was supposed to help clarify which groups were Operations Groups, Movement Groups, and Caucuses, but that process has not been moving forward as quickly as many of us had hoped. We in Tech are taking some immediate action and seeking some more long-term solutions to be brought before the GA in collaboration with the Communications Cluster (Tech Ops, Media, Outreach, PR, and Info/ComHub) .
Immediate: We have come to consensus as a group that we are past the point of being able to support new groups until our body as a whole reaches consensus on a good way to manage and ratify groups. We have thus put group creation on hold pending further action by the GA and Spokes council. This is a policy that has been partially in place for weeks now, but that was not clear to all group-creators on the site, so some new groups have continued to slip though. As of today, those exception will no longer occur.
To assist with navigation of the current set of groups, Tech Ops is also considering adding categories to the Group Directory Page based on some existing models and definitions:
- Operations
- Caucus
- Movement
- Working
- Affinity / Ally
We are not a decision-making or policy-making body and would like to step back from any implication of being gate-keepers to tech resources in any way. We are therefore not in a position to autonomously determine the requirements to become a group, and we do not want to continue to add to the problems by adding unlimited groups with no-questions-asked. We need the GA to step in and fix this broken system. To this end, we are pursing the following more long-term solutions:
Long-Term: The Communication Cluster is working on coming to consensus on a proposal that will attempt to clarify the group creation and upkeep process. Please read and edit the proposal here: notes.occupy.net/p/group_update_proposal (Remember, you can create your own note pad at notes.occupy.net)
This proposal will be brought to GA on Saturday. Public comment on this pre-draft version ends on Thursday at 1pm so we have time to compile them into a proposal which can go to the facilitation team to be posted online before the 24-hour Future Proposal window. If you would like to participate in the Communication Cluster meeting please join us at 2pm Thursday at 60 Wall St.
We hope that, if passed by GA, this proposal will help Tech Ops manage the website better by allowing us to remove defunct groups and giving new groups clear instructions on how to become a group on this web site.
Let us know how you feel about all this in the comments. Thank you.
Shawn Carrié
See, I feel that this is a perfect example of a redundant group. Why form a totally new working group to address transparency? That’s the opposite of transparency, because it doesn’t address any issues in other groups where more transparency is needed. We can meet and sit around and discuss how to deal with it, but this is only going to be effective if it addresses the problem where it lives.
If you feel there’s an issue with transparency with Legal, join the Legal WG and say I’d like to help you guys be more transparent! If you want to help Finance with its transparency, join Finance! Work together, not separately!
odd ah
Monica McLaughlin said>>I have activated the “Accounting & Transparency” working group, a group which never had an active administrator. I am very involved in the transparency issue and would like to become administrator of this group.<<With all due respect- I think the admin of this group should be someone who has actually spent face time, lots of face time working and connecting within the ‘real time’ ows…..Odd
NWwaterboy
Interesting idea, but would be concerned that it would grow into an even more restrictive power base. While a good idea in theory, I am not sure this would be a good idea in practice. Accountability and transparency are very subjective terms.
Lopi
In my opinion it was a big mistake to allow a new group to form to regulate the working groups. It is not a good idea to have an Accountability and Transparency working group. The premise of the notion that we need a working group to police other working groups activities is based on an old paradigm that we need to be regulated by outside forces. We have the power to join groups if we think they need help being transparent. We don’t need a cop working group to go around and tell people they are being audited.
Also, I have observed this individual, who created this group, posting slanderous, divisive, accusatory, suspicious, insulting, insinuating posts for the last couple months.
The health of the movement is at stake here. It is being over run by trolls, bullies, infiltrators, agitators, undercover cops and the mentally ill.
This working group just gives a voice to divisional tactics which may be coming from the government.
How about someone form a working group to create back ground checks for people who are trying to tear us apart?
Darrell Prince
no, you would want a seperate auditing group to ensure transparency. One, transparency is not limited to financial by any stretch of the imagination. Two, having outsiders audit and review practices gives a different perspective and allows groups which move to think similarly and in sync ( a very good thing to a point, and a very bad thing out past that point, especially without trasperancy and review)
s.t.
there is a valid reason why there exist independent auditing & review bodies outside of individual departments that require auditing & review. ever see Serpico?
Monica McLaughlin
The Transparency WG must be separate from other WGs. If it were not, then you would have a group policing itself.
Dallas
This is the most basic aspect of making #OWS current structure work, and yet I find myself having to repeat it all the time online and on the ground @ Liberty Plaza. +1 @shawn.
Walter Adler
This isnt about demands. This is that the genral public wants us to have a platform, something immediate. Its not as if we are deamnding thinking demands will be answered with action. We are simply advancing a process that many many peole in this city are calling for. Localized NYCGA demands.
It doesnt matter what they are. But right now we dont have any. Not even one.
Katie
From what I know, there are no groups abusing the weekly stipend. There are a few requirements that a group must fulfill to get that funding as well. They must be on the website, have a regular meeting time and place, be open for people to join, and more than one member. People seem to have been honest and self-regulatory.
Sam Redman
Hi Lopi,
Monica McLaughlin is a well-known activist (in some ways like you). My guess is that you might actually become fast friends if you got to know her. You both are about the same age and have a similar dedication to the principles of OWS. My guess is that a good personal conversation might end up with you two working together once you find your common ground. Lopi, I was very impressed with your work in Haiti and on your other projects, so I know that you are a person with considerable depth of character. So, I know that you would be able to see the altruistic qualities in Monica with just a tiny effort on your part.
Here is a NYtimes article describing Monica’s work concerning fighting an unscrupulous landlord:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/30/nyregion/upper-east-side-tenants-fight-to-keep-buildings-as-landmarks.html?pagewanted=all
Like the article says (and she has posted this info several times in her posts) she is a New York attorney. Just Google her name. She is quite open with her personal information and even publishes her office/apartment address online. Yes, she is a fighter, but maybe not as evil as you imagine.
Monica McLaughlin
Thank you, Sam. The fight to save the apartment building continues. The owners, the Stahl Organization, are most certainly in the 1%. And the NY Landmarks Preservation Commission — who decides — is run by Robert Tierney, a close friend of and appointed by Bloomberg. Tierney, like Cathy Black, has no prior experience in this field.
Monica McLaughlin
There should not be a single Admin to the WG. You should become and Admin, add ah. And find others who believe in transparency to apply also. I am not sure who you ask.. Right now the admin is a lady named Patricia L. Maybe you ask her.