Collaboration:Remote Access

Remote Access to Events

To date, remote access has not been a regular component of Aspiration events. Such access allows those who can not be present, as well as those who have participated in previous events, to read and contribute to the wiki and offer comments on any IRC channel that was active.

There are significant concerns in supporting remote access to events:

• Establishing community at an event is always a challenge; the added chemistry of faceless remote participants only complicates this task
• While managing in-person attendees is relatively straightforward, there is potential for distraction in dealing with remote participants who don't “play nice”, polluting the wiki or acting as provocateur on IRC rooms. While somewhat unlikely, it must be considered.
• It is challenging enough to generate a coherent wiki in real-time with live attendees; adding input from remote participants certainly doesn't simplify this task. A constructive counter-scenario is that a remote “wiki gnome” or “wiki gardener” can provide a valuable service that allows those on the ground at the event to focus more fully on the human energy at hand.

We are experimenting with limited remote access at events, in no small part to try and build bridges across different event communities. In such a scenario, we do not generally publicize or publicly announce the addresses of the online venues, but invite specific groups and individuals to engage and contribute. We encourage organizers of other events to offer their input and feedback on this dimension of event facilitation.