continually disgusted, yes. I would like to have objective opinions, the objective comes when there are many subjective ones. Therefore there should be a neutral place to make this happen. HospeEx Ne>>t is build up in a way that there can be a lot of bottom up things happen (Forum, Wiki), but it also has an editorial part. I would like that people from all the different networks would join in a team to fill this part and keep it up to date.

Apologies if you felt personally assaulted (I can’t say I did not mean so, but apologies nevertheless. Hope this comment will make it easier to understand my reasons of saying so).

Simply saying things as they really are – especially since you know that we know the situation all too well to your liking – would be better than hiding behind the no comment facade. If there are conflicting stories, surely one or the other must be wrong, so on the outside it really does appear like the leadership team is not being totally honest! Just let us know which one it is, and back it up with some real evidence, I think a bunch of less “bad shit” would be written here and on the CS groups.

I applaud your mission but I’m convinced you’re looking in the place for objective opinions. The “O” in OCS is far from standing for objectivity.

But even without an open forum, it would be cool to move Planet Hospitality to hospitalityguide.net/planet or something.

they must have the “either retarded or stupidly idealistic” disease that seems to be widespread in cs.

Diedrik “But like: LT (Management team or whatever), is how the founder of that particular hospitality-site wants to have it?”
This is where it shows you are a newbie to the working of couchsurfing and its history.
Please check what happened in the past year. From the collective at new zealand onwards.Maybe you need to check from the fake crash last year when the founder said he is not going to make decisions and it would be done by volunteers. Many organisations teams were made by volunteers working “free”.Have you heard words like DO-O-cracy on couchsurfing?
The founder gave the wrong impression that the LT (Management team or whatever)would be democratically elected. What happens ? All his friends are made management. This was a huge huge surprise most people on couchsurfing. The LT then copies the NDA draft from an online site made for a pharma company. And says it would be discussed they then invite only people who they know will not speak out against their decisions.Jim stone then kills the wiki by thrown out the creator and all the sysops who were the main contributers and people who really cleaned up the wiki.Having your girl friend on the management team is not a good idea.

I guess you do not know about hospitality club and its founders.Maybe when you know more we will talk about that.

“how the founder of that particular hospitality-site wants to have it?”

This would have been ok if heather(caseys ex-girlfriend?) has not sent out the sad letter signed by casey which caused many people to contribute for a project they loved. Also when they made cs 2.0 the emphasis was on this site is going to be run by volunteers not by the founder(who crashed the site 1.0?).If it was very clear couchsurfing would be run only on the decisions made by casey no one would really mind. They did mind because of the mis-information (again had to explain a lot for people who do not know the past) .But I think you are a good genuine guy so i dont mind doing that.

@Diederik
Fair point. I was just brainstorming

[quote]Actually, maybe this website *should* be renamed. It’s evident now that you will never have a truly open Couchsurfing – this website merely serves as a venting ground. So how about rebranding to OpenHospitality.org to be a watchdog over all the hospitality sites – especially BeWelcome, which shows the most promise in achieving OCS’ goals.[/quote]
But why should all hospitality-websites be like the wishes of OCS?

Openness with financials, ok, agree. But like: LT (Managementteam or whatever), is how the founder of that particular hospitality-site wants to have it?

Also: OSS, some sites (CS) don’t want that for reasons, others have an other opinion. Some site’s advantage is others disadvantage right? So there should only be one taste: OpenHospitality’s, or bash until death?

Have a great weekend (for the few hours remaining)

Diederik

@azarethroy: Comments get held for moderation if they contain links, I think that’s why your comment was held. It is weird though, because you’re an author on the blog, so you should be able to publish comments right away. If you notice any other problems give me a shout and I’ll look into it further.

Sounds like a good idea . Though adia.info used to do a pretty good impartial job at hospitalityguide.net .Keeping track of all the pros and cons on all the hospitality networks.Though there hasn’t been any activity on that site for quite a while . And also we have LT promi/konstantinos on the team

After all, it’s not like there’s some conspiracy to redirect “anti-OCS” posts to an obscure new group like “opencouchsurfing-politics & policies” or something.

Actually, maybe this website *should* be renamed. It’s evident now that you will never have a truly open Couchsurfing – this website merely serves as a venting ground. So how about rebranding to OpenHospitality.org to be a watchdog over all the hospitality sites – especially BeWelcome, which shows the most promise in achieving OCS’ goals.

Just a thought, for what it’s worth. Have a nice weekend…

This is also my personal experience, I for one could not have stayed as a CS volunteer for any longer without sacrificing my personal integrity; it became a matter of choice of staying and shutting up or leaving and living up to my principles. I guess for some the former is the only way to go, either because they never had ethics in the first place, or thought the benefits would far outweigh the cost of letting go of one’s principles.

I’m also wondering if there’s a WordPress plugin (found this) for tagging/categorizing/”digging” post comments, might give an idea of what value is actually placed on anonymous contributions (plus the rest too, of course)

Well It was pretty obvious when you have groupies living in the same house as casey and his broads and jim stone.(please check out fliptophead.com for all the photos of the groupies).

@continually disgusted I guess the new brainstorm group set up by ulf failed? That’s why you spend all your time on the really exciting site (read opencouchsurfing) and with the cool guys who really made it happen.

continually disgusted at the way ulf and donna killed the brainstorm group we already have one of the outcast’s on this site trying to fit in here .Newbies like Donna who dont know how to run group caused the groups to fail. Funny thing about the new brainstorm group all the ideas there are OLD and have never been implemented in years even though they have been brought up again and again so many times. Funny to see ex communications members trying to figure ways to get those posts noticed by the LT.

@continually disgusted is you don’t have any burning man orgies to attend please go and do some FREE work for couchsurfing your work would be so appreciated there. (IF you are LT stop outsourcing your work so you can come here to bitch).

That’s putting it mildly. More accurate would have been “I guess the readers do know we are not open whatsoever to any sort of positive change ever coming out of CouchSurfing or the LT’s involvement in it and look to discredit anything and everything the comes up immediately with absolutely no hint of an opinion that could be considered unbiased or encouraging a reasonable discussion on it that might actually get somewhere because then what social injustice would we would spend all of our time and energy complaining about, world hunger?”

Change your website name to couchsurfingbitchfest.org and get it over with. You’re obviously not trying to open CS anymore or do anything actually constructive, just bitching about anything and everyone involved and preaching to your choir. When someone comes in with a differing opinion you trash them immediately and fail to consider a perspective that you didn’t already have. Is that really open? No, of course not. It’s a bitchfest. If you’re not going to be honest with us at least be so with yourselves!

Or maybe OpenCouchSurfingOnlyOnOurTerms.org OCSOOOT is kind of cool if you think about it :

Considering the LT seems to be doing a pretty good job with piling up the untruths & degrading whatever respect they might have enjoyed at some point all on their own, it’s only a matter of time it’s gonna bite them in the ass regardless of what the bloggers here write or do.

Happy I’m outta there, have enough venues to do things that matter, and that some people at least have had a chance to see them emperor’s new clothes as they really are.

Disclaimer for the LT possibly reading this and thinking who else to label as a pirate for betraying their trust: regardless of whether I’ve been sourced of his employment status being as good as official, it’s been clear to me he was the one they were posting the job application for back in late July.

But I guess the word volunteer is a bit ambiguous – volunteering seems to fall under these: getting paid (nominal amounts, sometimes enough to cover living costs), other compensation (such as room & board), no compensation whatsoever, or sometimes you even have to pay to volunteer (!) (just google “volunteering” and see the text-ads

CS seems to have taken the first one of those approaches with what they consider appropriate perks. Some Rotterdam attitudes about volunteers, respect and money were a bit weird: basically volunteers who work for free don’t necessarily deserve respect for that alone, and the “doing good” feeling working for a project you adore alone can NOT be enough for a volunteer – since money is the currency already used in the society, why not just use that as a form of respect towards volunteers? (which to me translates that the Americans in the LT have very different views than I do of volunteering and how volunteers should be treated.)

I have nothing against Weston as a person, he’s a sweet dude and can do good stuff for CS I believe, but the LT should really really start thinking how the constant hiding of information (nastier expressions would be lying and bullshitting) is starting to look more and more shady (not that it was ever good to start with).

(oh, and I guess I’d change the title of this blog post as it “might” be considered hostile but not really my call)