Flu Wiki Conference Call, Saturday 2006–03–18
Join us for a Flu Wiki Conference Call this Saturday. The purpose of the conference call will be to informally review the latest developments on the Avian flu front, including outbreaks, human incidents, vaccine/drug developments, etc; to share advice; and to just plain get to know your fellow fluwikians. A number of us have already participated in a couple of previous conference calls, and all have found it fun to connect on this more personal level.
To accomodate most of the English speaking regions of the planet, here’s the time on Saturday 2006–03–18 as it relates to various time zones:
To join the conference call, dial 605–772–3300 and enter the access code 735417#. An automated voice prompt will help you enter the call, and will give you further instructions. We have an account on the FreeConferenceCall.com system with room for 96 participants, availability 24×7 (no reservations necessary), and it’s good for 120 days. The company does not charge for the conference call service; however, the number isn’t toll-free, so unless you have an unlimited calling plan (I use Vonage VoIP so it’s free for me), there will be a long distance charge. I figure that by having it on a weekend, most people will have either free or low cost long distance. For those who can’t attend but might want to listen to the conference call, I could record the call and post a link to the audio recording later in the wiki.
AGENDA ?
I don’t want to make this conference call a formal event; however, if we get a large number of people participating, then it might be useful to structure things just a little. For now, let me propose the following tentative list of topics. If the individuals don’t mind, perhaps I might take the liberty to suggest a specific fluwikian (based on my familiarity with their expertise) to make starting comments on the topic
How’s that?
Feel free to post your interest in attending just so we can gauge the number of people who might attend.
cheers!
-keith
Hi Keith and all!
I get a pass with my son tomorrow and will be out and about, but will try and call!
To prove that I am paranoid: will anyone have a list of our phone numbers if we call in to the conference call? I know that I am a whiz at getting personal information on people if all I have is their phone number, and that would kind of put a lot of us at risk who are trying to keep our preps secret and our identities secure.
NEMO,
Hate to say it, but I *just* learned yesterday (I’m at a week long security training class) Caller ID spoofing IS possible…
Now would someone go through the trouble to use their technical knowledge to know where a bunch of extra bologna is? I dunno, maybe, but if I had that knowledge (and early next week I may know how. >;-) ) I think I’d hack a grocery delivery service first.
I wouldn’t worry about it - should be fine - but easy enough to skip. I’m sure there will be a summary posted afterwards.
Try dialling *67 before the number to withold Caller ID. Works for me :-)
Keith, thank you for putting this in place. Will do my best to get back from baseball to join in.
BUMP :)
sorry for the delayed response (out for dinner with the family).
re phone numbers: the only tracking of numbers is the call summary that is automatically emailed to me (because i set up the account). It includes call date, calling numbers, start-time, end-time, and total minutes. No names or other identifying information. Not particularly informative, especially if there are more than 2 phone numbers listed (one will be my number). So worrying that I might cleverly trace the numbers back to people’s names assumes I have more intelligence and free time than I really have, and that I actually care to have such information. Not the case at all. If people trust me to ignore the summary (which i’ve done so far), then it should be a pretty safe interaction.
cheers
Hi all! I am looking forward to talking to everyone who can make it. I will try to come up with a synopsis of the weekly news if you’d like. keith, for the conversion challenged (like me :-), what is the wiki time for the conference call?
hahaha, do any of us really worry about you tracing us down and then what…trying to bust into our homes??? hahaha! With all this chat at the site, the last thing I would do is break into any of your homes…. I know most of you are WELL ARMED!!!! haha!
MaMa,
glad to hear you’ll try to make it. Yes it would be great if you can start the “News Roundup” topic with some tidbits.
I’m not exactly sure how the Wiki tracks time. My current time (on my computer is 9:03), but the last posting (TreasureIslandGal) reads 21:59, or about 2 hrs faster than my current time. What time zone is the Flu wiki in? All I know is that 10:30am CST is the time I’ll look for in my time zone.
TreasureIslandGal,
i don’t think i’ll be venturing outside of my house, so you should be safe. ;-)
I didn’t get a chance to convert the conference call time into equivalents for all time zones, here’s a time zone conversion tool for others to use for their own time zone. Simply enter 10:30am CST for the one time zone, and then select your own time zone for the other, and press the button. Hope that the time works out for those other zones i didn’t consider.
Mom11 and Niman, I do hope both of you can participate in the conf call. You both have so much to offer. I know Mom11 is tracking the vaccine development situation closely, and of course we all know Niman has much to say about the changes happening or potentially happening in the viral genome.
Hi Keith!
I have a pass with my son tomorrow, but am still going to try and call. Hopefully my “chicks” won’t be chirping in the background too loudly! Vaccine developement is moving rapidly ahead, in many arenas. There is some hope and we need to just support our scientists, write the FDA in support of their latest proposals,and encourage our govt. to make this issue a top priority.
Mom11: good to hear. We won’t mind the “chicks”, as long as their of the human kind ;-)
Hi Keith!
Well, they don’t have feathers!
OK, here’s a tentative head count so far…
“Will attend” or “will try to attend” have been confirmed from at least:
How about other confirmations? Many Cats? TreasureIslandGal? Nemo? Quartzman, Petergunn, NS1? Anyone else?
Me here.
Count me in :)
Perhaps a topic to add might be prep ideas, basic and/or advanced, even though there is so much info. already here???
will try- add the pharmacists point of view
mother of five,
glad you’re going to attend. Right you are. I think a verbal summary can cover so much more than typing text and reading text can provide. On the other hand, the typed text becomes a nice permanent record that people can use as reference material later.
If we have time for a “Preparations” topic, would you be willing to say a few things to start the topic off? If so, great. If not, we could leave that topic for next week’s conference call.
Thanks for the link keith, talk to you all tomorrow!
looking forward to talking with you “O-“ .
new tally of likely participants:
I think we’ve got some momentum on this!
I’ll gladly listen in! Oh, and I have a great way to block caller ID - I use an AT&T calling card from Sam’s Club. It doesn’t show my number. Instead, it shows a number in NE, GA, or some other state. No one ever knows who I am when I call.
I’ll be there, listening in intently. :) maybe my partner will even wake up early enough to hear it!
listeners are good. But I’m sure we’ll get everyone relaxed enough to speak up. Ve hav vays of making you talk!
Thank you, Keith, for asking, I would be pleased to do so. Although, it looks like the list includes members that are probably into some pretty advanced preps. I’ll have to seriously think about where to begin :) I do have another question, I live in Indiana, which doesn’t participate in Daylight Savings Time changes. Currently, we are on Eastern Time. When does that mean I should call? (Ever since moving here, the time zone thing has become confusing for me since IN is so odd about it) It’s like my internal clock gets messed up just like during international travel….
mother of five,
i lived in Indiana once, in Bloomington. I still remember that it had an oddball time zone thing. Consulting the time zone tool, it looks like the conf call time in Indiana will be:
10:30:00 a.m. Saturday March 18, 2006 in US/Central converts to 11:30:00 a.m. Saturday March 18, 2006 in US/East-Indiana
Hope that helps!
I plan to call.
Looking foward to it and absoluteley don’t care who’s looking “on”.
Looking forward to it and absoluteley don’t care who’s looking “on”.
the list keeps growing…
we now have confirmations from:
Any others out there?
Thank you so much, Keith. Just this year the state legislature voted on the time change thingy. I believe we will be an hour off from Chicago now, always. However that works??
I don’t know what anyone else is doing posting at this hour, but I have several extra girls doing a sleepover thing with my five girls and my husband is hibernating upstairs in our room—his manly cave—when there’s too much progesterone and giggling going on. That always leaves me to stay up to make sure they don’t burn the house down or run the phone bill up too high! Hopefully, I can be awake for this call tomorrow :)
Will try to make it, though it’s a teensy bit early for us night owls on the west coast!
Looks like quite a few are interested. That’s great.
Do we have a clearer topic range? Or just talk about anything? Do people want to propose important topics that will benefit from conference call as opposed to forum posting?
I’m currently down the tunnel on early pandemic signs but that’s just me. I’m open to talk and listen to everything that is interesting to you guys.
I’ve only just started using Skype. Can someone tell me whether I can do this with SkypeOut?
I’ll be in school until 12 Noon EST; will try to leave early and charge up my cell phone! It’ll be interesting to hear the voices behind the posts….
Hi would love to attend but cant can we have a roundup summary of the conversations and post it into a new thread called Conference Summmary so that others like myself can get the lowdown thanks so much ! wish I could join you
Do we know how long the call is? No more than an hour, etc…?
Can someone summarize the conf. call for those who won’t attend? Thanks.
Can’t make it. Sorry, but I will be neck deep in another commitment. Someone please be sure to take and post the minutes.
I’m looking forward to participating in the call today.
Best regards to all.
I’ll try to make it, but I’m on Elder Care and Child duty this morning. So who knows . . .
bumping up, in hopes of getting more people.
ok, here’s the latest list of planned attendees…
it’s shaping up to a be an nicely sized event.
OK, I;ve got to run out for some errands so probably won’t be back in time. Sorry. Catch up later.
DemFromCT,
just the standard 1 hour (or less if we run out of topics!)
for those unable to attend, we’ll try to capture the meeting content and will post here. But it won’t be as much fun as actually participating !
I will try and participate. Thanks for putting this together!
anon_22,
SkypeOut will work just like a regular phone — just connect to the conference call phone number indicated above. As for “clearer topic range”, what did you have in mind beyond the 8 items stated in the original post?
I just tried the call-in procedure and it was extremely easy! See you all in an hour!
see ya!
Looks like a South Dakota area code. I’ll be on.
I’m not much of a talker. Is it ok to call and just listen in?
Yes!
Hope that yes was for me! I’ll be there.
Yes, that yes was for you!
starting the conference call in about 5 minutes. Here’s the list of those who plan to attend:
Here’s a reminder about our approximate list of topics (in case people want this in front of them during the call):
I can give a summary of H5N1 genetic changes
I came in at the end during Henry’s summary. Thank you all for the gathering.
Thank you all for a very informative meeting. I look forward to the next call.
Thanks, Keith et al. Nice to place a voice to ‘old’ friends. I note the account is good for 120 days-can informal groups of say three or four use the access code during that time, say to discuss local planning issues? Thanks again-would like to see this quarterly at least.
That was fun. I just hope I didn’t go too much over my monthly allotment of long distance minutes. (I didn’t introduce myself, btw, but that was me asking Mom11 about funding for vaccine research, and also with the bit about evaluating sources of information).
I came in after it had started also - Mom11 was talking. I got to stay until the end - thank you all - very informative. Thank you Dr. N. for explaining things in a way that was easy to understand. Dem - it was great to hear your voice. Amazing group here.
SO sorry I missed it! Will look forward to the next one. Is someone going to put together a summary of information that come out of the call? Thanks in advance.
Thanks everyone for all the information and all the time and energy you put into this site, I can not tell you how much I enjoy it and it calms me knowing I can get my info here. Thank-you Dr.N I have heard you on the radio before and it was great to hear you again.
I’ve created a new topic Summary of Flu Wiki Conf Call for Sat 20060318 for those that want to continue discussion about the call
mentioned and relevant links:
WyomingBill,
yes its a reservationless conf call system, so ad hoc / impromptu discussions are welcome. The trick is getting enough people together so you’re not talking to yourself.
Great experience, especially for those of us who always seem to be on the run yet want to know the latest.
Lovely to ‘meet’ so many of the great folks who make fluwikie the great gathering place to learn about this threat! Thanks, again, to each and every one of you. You’ve taught our whole family a great deal and helped make prep dollars go farther.
DemFromCT,
thanks for the site update and pointers. Congratulations on the Science and Nature citations of Flu Wiki. You and your colleagues have done an oustanding job on Flu Wiki. It has built a very impressive online community, and continues to make that community vibrant.
I think the conference call provides a nice complement to Flu Wiki. It may not have the permanence, depth of detail, multi-dimensional viewpoint, or asynchronous convenience of the wiki, but it does bring that live human voice dimension that helps solidify the community. The ability of groups of people to understand the challenges and to identify and share solutions is dependent on how cohesive the group feels. Hopefully the conf call helps with the latter.
And apologies to all those who called in but didn’t get a chance to speak (and wanted to). With that many people on the phone, I never even had a chance to point out, e.g., that any reports of major conflicts between niman and Flu Wiki have been greatly exaggerated. ;-)
As I said on the call, don’t believe everything you read on Flu Wki . Let it be a starting point, not an endpoint.
Here are some excellent references on that point:
Hello, I am a new participant and would like to add some pratical tips on getting ready.