From Flu Wiki 2

Forum: A Question for the Moderators

21 June 2006

Crazy American Lady in the Village – at 08:09

A couple of the threads have gone off topic which is frowned upon.

BUT, the way I see it….sometimes, support is needed by a member that is not necessarily “on topic” and the “regulars” have come to rely on the Flu Wiki as a lifeline. For me, it’s the fact that I find most people here are both Selfless and Intelligent and I value their oppinion.

SO…..do you think we could have an off topic forum? Just a little one, so that we can have a good ol moan about the state of the world in general?

Anyone second this?

lauraB – at 08:41

CALV - I think ideally it would be great to have an off-topic thread. But when the site is really busy, every thread slows us down. If thshtf the wiki would get overwhelemed. The mods are in planning mode, and maybe soon we could have this. But I think right now they are trying to keep the site focused to provide useful information.

Mods - am I right? Where do things stand with future plans btw? It makes me nervous thinking this thing could crash if tshtf!

anon_22 – at 08:46

You are both right.

We are going to be moving servers, exact timing depending on the long-suffering pogge’s ability to not have a life.

:-)

The platform that we have in mind will have a lot more features, included nested comments and tags, I think. Which means off topic bits can go to sub-threads, and important information buried in some randomly named thread can be tagged so you can find it.

Hillbilly Bill – at 08:53

For those who wish to have so-called off topic conversations, why don’t you put your email addresses in your profile and communicate all you want to that way? Bronco Bill, Eccles and I have had lengthy conversations about topics that didn’t really belong in the forum. If the men can do it surely the women can also.

DemFromCTat 08:59

The above is all true. Keep in mind however, that a Forum that strays off the rules will not function (see especially rule 12). We have such diverse points of view that discussions about N Korea, Iraq and domestic issues such as immigration that are not flu-centric would be disasters in terms of community cooperation about flu prepping.

Support for Forum members, btw, is quite different than “a good ol moan about the state of the world in general”. Tell me your political orientation and I can direct you to some excellent web sites for that!

Crazy American Lady in the Village – at 09:21

DemFromCt

No, I was not thinking political at all, I was actually thinking every day issues that forum members may need support on which are outside of the scope of fluwikie.

I feel very uncomfortable going off topic but at the same time, sometimes you have information that may be of help.

I’m reluctant to make my email public only because of the amount of junk mail I receive already.

DemFromCTat 09:34

That’s a real concern. Few people will delve in your profile to find it manually. List it as “calitv at whatever dot com” and robot scanning won’t discern it as email.

We do not sell, divulge, or solicit email lists, btw. Flu Wiki is strictly non-commercial.

I feel very uncomfortable going off topic but at the same time, sometimes you have information that may be of help.

We have a light hand, not a heavy one, for that. Use your judgement.

CA Mike – at 09:52

Dem: “We have a light hand, not a heavy one, for that. Use your judgement.”

Yes, you do and I thank you for it.

Now for an off topic question. How do I imbed Italics or Bold text in a message?

DemFromCTat 09:55

italics are '' at either end

''italics'' will look like italics.

bold is ''' so that '''bold''' looks like bold.

DemFromCTat 09:56

each of those is a single ‘

CA Mike – at 10:43

Dem, thanks much.

I’m-workin’-on-it – at 11:03

lauraB,

I have a feeling that the mods are so on top of things that if the shtf, they’ll most likely shut almost every thread down, on topic or off, so you won’t have to worry about anything crashing — at least that’s my guess! :-)

gardner – at 11:11

I’m-workin’-on-it. You’re right, though they might not have to. If TSHTF, is anyone really going to be interested in Coping with Ridicule or anything else? — Actually, the Forum might be pretty quiet at first, since we’ll all be out deploying our Top-Up List plans. :-) I think the Forum by itself will get pretty serious pretty quickly.

DemFromCTat 11:15

gardner – at 11:11

You’re right - see Turkey and Indonesia clusters. during those events, the Forum was very focused. It’s at other times we get a little ‘diffusive’.

Hillbilly Bill – at 11:15

During a pandemic, if the internet stays up, and the majority of those who post are SIP, the threads could really increase a quite a bit as we encounter problems and situations we didn’t plan for and seek answers and advice. I can envision a thread titled “Fixing my Generator with Bailing wire and Duct tape”.

Melanie – at 11:19

Of course, what you couldn’t see during Turkey and Indonesia was that the mods were having their own meltdowns off-list.

DemFromCTat 11:20

Hillbilly Bill – at 11:15

Over time, that’s so. Immediately, there’d be gardner’s scenario.

BTW, this ‘ask the mod’ thingie could stay a permanently open thread if there’s interest.

DemFromCTat 11:21

LOL. Some of the mods, Melanie, and not much of a meltdown. ;-)

Melanie – at 11:24

Dem had no meltdown. Yours truly was a wreck.

DemFromCTat 11:28

Melanie – at 11:24

Didn’t stop you from high functioning. Not much of a meltdown.

Melanie – at 11:29

Funtioning? I was on the phone with you and the reveres the whole damn day.

DemFromCTat 11:30

You could dial successfully. ;−0

Melanie – at 11:36

Back to I’m-workin’s question:

When hard news breaks out, the forum gets pretty focused and keeping the news threads to tolerable length is the job.

BroncoBillat 13:20

Hillbilly Bill – at 11:15 --- I can envision a thread titled “Fixing my Generator with Bailing wire and Duct tape”.

We could just make it short and sweet, and call it “The MacGyver Thread”.

DemFromCT – at 11:20 --- BTW, this ‘ask the mod’ thingie could stay a permanently open thread if there’s interest.

I think that’s a great idea…and we could bump it from time to time so’s newbies, or anyone really, that have questions could ask without starting a new thread. :-) Based on what I’ve seen, I envision Parts 2, 3, 4, etc. just continuing this first one…

Could we put a link (anchor??) at the top of the Last 50 Changes page, pointing to this one thread (it would have to be updated as new Parts are opened), with a note to newbies to visit here with questions? Most any of us who have been here a while could answer some of the simpler questions, and the Mods could have the tough ones…

I’m-workin’-on-it – at 13:28

ROIFLMFHO or whatever that thingie is…..Melanie being able to dial a number correctly as a measurement of degree of meltdown/wreck…..hmmmmm I’d say you both were doing fairly well under the circumstances! It probably will get veeeeeeery quiet around here for awhile when really bad news breaks. But a thread like “Fixing my Generator with Bailing wire and Duct tape” might just come in very handy right about then! :-)

DemFromCTat 13:37

BroncoBill – at 13:20

Newbies certainly don’t use Last 50 Changes page ;-)

I’m-workin’-on-it – at 13:28

Everyone has standards. Depending on circumstances,ours can be - flexible.

Hillbilly Bill – at 13:42

re: Fixing my Generator with Bailing wire and Duct tape

I can see it now, Eccles assembles exactly the same items that the desperate fluwikian family has on hand. As he ponders the problem he mutters to himself:

“I need to keep this simple, they are cold and only have candlelight to work by…”

BroncoBillat 13:45

Newbies certainly don’t use Last 50 Changes page

Now see there? That was a toughie-type question, and it’s a good thing you’re here! :-)

DemFromCTat 18:08

Open to anyone who has questions.

2beans – at 18:33

Or …. you could just call it the Eccles/Rube Goldberg Help Desk!

22 June 2006

Heather – at 01:08

bump

Hurricane Alley RN – at 01:26

bump

Hurricane Alley RN – at 02:05

bump2

Hurricane Alley RN – at 02:51

bump3

Crazy American Lady in the Village – at 04:55

Thanks Moderators……

I agree that WTSHTF no one is going to have time to go off topic. So I guess it’s a good thing that for the time being, we can

Thanks again

Melanie – at 05:11

On a rotating scale of 1–10, 10 being unable to dial the other mods on the phone, tonight I’m at 1. Anon has her snoring new beast and I’m blogcasting a panel at a think-tank here in DC in the PM. All’s right with the world for now and I plan on enjoying that. Besides which, the think tank panels supply lunch. The weather is extremely awful, but, for the moment, I’m going to enjoy the fact that I can even notice the weather.

As Lily reminds us all the time, life goes on and I’m going to try to remember to enjoy this day while I’ve got it.

lugon – at 05:29

Melanie, I remembered looking at a grand-dad and a grand-daughter and thinking “both have 24 hours a day”.

See what you make me think!

Friends, definitely this thread needs to be linked to from the main pages of both servers (wiki and forum).

In time, a number of such a series of threads can and will be, guess what?, combed for content, so that a “Frequently Asked Questions” may be compiled, most frequent first.

Soon we will be just like so many other internet communities, with kind suggestions to RTFM (read the fine manual) and so on.

Ain’t we sweet.

Seriously now: a “Users’ FAQ” will get some people up to speed quicker, and release time and attention for dealing with tougher things. And it will get done if you keep this thread/series open and linked to from the main pages.

beehiver – at 07:55

When using the pmwiki markup to post a link, are you supposed to put a space after and before the link url, (and the same spacing in the link description)? Thanks!

pogge – at 09:07

The spaces aren’t necessary. This would work just fine if I didn’t have it enclosed in the escape codes:

[[http://www.fluwikie.com/|Flu Wiki]]

DemFromCTat 09:09

Desn’t matter whether you put any spaces in at all. I don’t.

SaddleTrampat 10:34

Did I miss a report on what happened at the Fluwiki Summit recently? I saw something from Melanie, but that didnt seem detailed enough for a final data-dump. Was anything actually posted? Or did you keep all the fun to yourselves? Thanks.

Watching in Texas – at 10:48

Hillbilly Bill - speaking of email, you’ve got mail.

Melanie - I sure do wish I’d known you were having a meltdown too! I got lonely melting down here all by myself.

Melanie – at 10:50

SaddleTramp,

Mod Summit report is [http://www.fluwikie2.com/pmwiki.php?n=Forum.ModsSummit|here]], but you are seeing what we learned everyday in the way we do what we do.

SaddleTrampat 11:09

Thanks, Melanie.

But I was sort of looking for the same things Floridagirl wanted to know and that no one ever answered.

DemFromCTat 11:24

SaddleTramp – at 11:09

same things Floridagirl wanted to know

Where was that? i don’t know what FG’s questions were so i can’t yet address them, but this would be a good thread.

we decided to:

  1. commit to running the site moving forward (seems simple, right?)
  2. discussed recruiting more mods, no decision
  3. discussed financing the site (look for payPal soon - we’ve already incorporated as a non-profit).
  4. discussed the major issue, which is the server and platform upgrades. we’re okay for now, but more traffic would crash us.
  5. short term, we’re looking at conversion of the forum to SQL database from flat file (requires registration)
  6. midterm we’re looking at converting the forum to a different platform, such as scoop
  7. longer term, we’d consider movign the wiki to a different platform such as media wiki (like wikipedia) because it scales well to traffic

we discussed the sociology of the forum, the pre-pandemic adjustment reaction, the origins slides (see the large file project), which I had just put together and presented at the summit.

what am I leaving out?

anonymous – at 11:35

not hard to guess. The one and only most decisive question, which everyone wants to know but few dare to ask and no one likes to answer.

anonymous – at 11:41

spoiler














FloridaGirl – at 19:05
I would certainly be interested in what concensus you guys arrived at concerning the likihood of H5N1 taking off

DemFromCTat 11:46

FloridaGirl – at 19:05

I would certainly be interested in what concensus you guys arrived at concerning the likihood of H5N1 taking off

We. Don’t. Know.

That was the consensus. (Don’t you love committees?) ;−0

anonymous – at 15:38

I assume the consensus was:
..and when someone asks for likelyhoods then everyone should say: I don’t know. and don’t say that half of mankind could die !


There was a recent thread, where the mods did give likelyhoods (though low quality) but it was almost secret and the thread was quickly closed and presumably they don’t want a link to be posted here.

Lily – at 15:50

Isn’t that one of the charms of living. Every day a big suprise. We all have our ideas and so many, many threads and words have been posted.

DemFromCTat 17:24

anonymous – at 15:38

It’s so super-double secret that you know all about it. ;-)

Worried in the City – at 17:57

Hillbilly Bill, Dem, Melanie, Anon_22 and all others. I just had the most off topic discussion ever, but I felt it was important.

I don’t want to post my e-mail address because if identified I am subject to workplace retaliation. It would clearly identify me.

So my apologies, I think you are all great, I will do better in the future.

lugon – at 17:59

Maybe the moderator’s role is to “keep the space open”, “provide the platform”, and all that? Anonymous, you want independent estimates. Many if not all non-mods would not be able to provide independent estimates after the mods provide their own.

Regarding “numbers” themselves, I think numbers provide some psychological comfort for some, and serve as a starting point for conversations when there’s no conversation. Here, I see many people taking comfort at preparing personally and community-wise, and no lack of conversation. I did some work with you so that there could be a framework for asking others.

Hey, I think I’ve said something new in this post. Now, I’ll shut up until I have something else to say that’s new in this regard. :-)

anon_22 – at 23:24

If I wanted to keep my opinions secret I would not have become a mod on fluwiki. Don’t you think?

:-)

BTW Just want to put in my 2C about this being an important discussion etc and thank everyone.

Also, I’m having an extremely hectic time currently, and not because of the pup, so if I’m not posting much except for purely flu-related science comments, etc, its because of that and not any other ‘secret’ reason. So if anybody asks me a question, or asks a question and wonders why I have no input, it’s because of that. I had 4 hours sleep yesterday, and none tonight. Its 4am and I have to be up at 6am. So apologies and hope this phase will come to an end soonish, although I suspect not for another couple of weeks.

If you have something really important to talk to me about, please post here AND send me a email anon_22 AT hotmail DOT co DOT uk in case I miss your remarks on the threads.

Thanks for your patience and hope this period of time will bear some good results.

23 June 2006

DemFromCTat 12:12

bump

malachi – at 12:32

Hello…I know you are all very busy but if anyone gets a chance,could you please adjust the sidescroll in the Michigan planning prep thread.Thank you :)

malachi – at 12:52

Thanks Pogge….U rock…btw,is it true you look like Rob Lowe?

;)

pogge – at 12:54

Should be better now. The real culprit was a string of asterisks someone had used to try and create a dividing rule between parts of the post. That drives the software wild. If you want to create a horizontal rule, do this: ----

pogge – at 12:55

I was recently told I look like Pete Seeger. Is that close enough?

malachi – at 13:05

If you dont mind I’ll keep the Rob Lowe image :)

DemFromCTat 13:28

Wait long enough and Rob Lowe will look like Pete Seeger.

anonymous – at 13:36

Let everyone keep their favorite illusions, noone will ever see anyone here. If were smart they won’t.

BroncoBillat 14:30

pogge—isn’t Pete Seeger about 85 years old? :-(

pogge – at 14:35

A bit older than that, actually. I checked. I, of course, assumed that the person who made the remark was thinking of Seeger in his prime. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

petperson – at 14:45

If some of the wikkians want to have an off-topic chat place, why not start a yahoogroup for that purpose. It’s free, very easy to start; you could restrict membership to members of the wikki, and those groups are easy to manage. You could consider it a sister-site.

BroncoBillat 14:48

Oops…guess we got busted! LOL!!
Back to the topic at hand: Does anyone have a question for the Moderators?

CA Mike – at 14:51

A quick question. Is it ok to bump topics at least while we are in normal mode?

Melanie – at 14:52

CA Mike,

Sure, if it is one that has a lot of interest.

pogge – at 14:52

Yes. Should we keep one of these threads running permanently so there’s an obvious place for people to come with their questions?

pogge – at 14:57

Is it ok to bump topics…

What Melanie said. I can think of several good reasons for bumping.

CA Mike – at 15:03

Ok, thanks. If I start to bump topics that are not of interest just let me know. What interests me may not interest others. Don’t worry, I will not go on a frenzy of bumping.

BroncoBillat 15:09

pogge – at 14:52 --- I think we should. I mentioned sort of the same thing to Dem the other day… :-)

I think when I split this thread, I may rename the new one to something along the lines of “Ask Questions of the Moderators Here”, or some such…then bump it occasionally to keep it afloat in the Last 50.

FloridaGirlat 15:12

Thanks for the answer Dem…. I did not think it would be any differnt than that.

I will say that our County efforts are stepping up a bit. I am doing some low-key presentations for different groups, individuals, etc.

What a fine line you draw when talking to the various populations about planning…

DemFromCTat 17:01

You sure do! I hope the liarge file project wiull help, as there are some great slide sets from CO there already.

Tom DVM – at 22:17

DemFromCT Melanie Pogge.

There was a thread shortly after I arrived I think in February, that was called ‘Asymptomatic H5N1’.

Would it still be avaliable if someone wanted to read it?

Melanie – at 22:26

Lemme look, Tom DVM. I sort of remember it and the seroprevelance studies have sort of destroyed the thesis.

Melanie – at 22:30

I’ll have to ask pogge ‘cuz I’m not sure what’s where.

Tom DVM – at 22:31

Melanie. Thanks. I don’t think it was listed as saved after the ‘crash’.

pogge – at 22:33

I’ve restored the thread I think you mean?.

Tom DVM – at 22:39

pogge. Thanks, that is the one I named but I think there was a long drawn out discussion i guess before ‘asymptomatic H5N1’ that involved just about everyone including Tram and I believe Alexis. It would be in the same time period. I thought it was named as above but I guess I am wrong. I think this thread came right after, sort of at the end of the discussion.

Anyway, thanks for restoring it.

24 June 2006

Bronco Bill – at 00:52

bump

Bronco Bill – at 01:42

bump

Closed and Continued - Bronco Bill – at 02:33

This thread has kind of become a “Ask the Mod” thread, so to accomodate that, it’s time to split it up and open a new thread right here. Kind of a morph of this thread…

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