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Tag Archive for 'News'

CS becoming a for-profit business: A message from Hospitality Club Founder Veit

After the shocking news of Couchsurfing accepting a $7.6 million investment and becoming a for-profit company, I just wrote a message to the hospitality exchange community. Most important: Hospitality Club will never be a for-profit business, we are currently developing an open-source site for HC and some behind-the-scenes info on CS. Please read the statement here: http://volunteerwiki.hospitalityclub.org/couchsurfing-for-profit-business-now

Oh, and a special shoutout to my haters here :-D

Announcement: Couchwiki.org

It’s been in the pipeline for a while. In fact, I should have done this in 2006 ;) Still, now it’s 2009 and I’m happy to hereby announce Couchwiki.org:

“WikiCouch is open to anyone and everyone. It is in keeping with the philosophy of inclusion and open hospitality. We believe in decentralized control, self-moderation and that everyone has something valuable to contribute.”

* Available under the Creative Commons ShareAlike Attribution license.
* Open for editing to anyone. You don’t have to log in – but it’s appreciated if you do – you can also log in with OpenID.
* Independent from the official CouchSurfing organization, but supportive the CouchSurfing community.
* Very soon: a version in French and in other languages if requested by the community.
* We have registered several domains, and there will be a discussion about the domain name where all participants are welcome to join.
* Several nice extensions are installed, and if needed I’ll be happy to install more.
* The costs of running a wiki are very low – to me. No worries about that, I’m happy to take care of the technical and financial aspects of the server.
* In the future we’ll have XML dumps for downloading.

Let me know if there are any issues. And… Enjoy!

How to Digg for News on Couchsurfing

After reading Mandys latest post on the present state of the communications systems in place on couchsurfing . I decided to write this how-to article.

CouchSurfing has morphed over time from a one-man gig to a volunteer-based community with people pitching in to help everyday. The problem is that no system has ever been developed to help those people communicate with one another.

That happened in 2006!!! But mandy makes it sound like it was yesterday.

I would love to think of myself as some sort of wonder-woman, but the simple truth is that I am not and my mere presence at this Collective doesn’t solve a problem that goes far beyond one person. But what I am trying to do is develop the system that will enable everyone to communicate with each other.

Once an actual system is in place, with each team understanding the communication channels that exist and how to access them and what information needs to go where and when, then I think we will see a dramatic difference in the way we all feel about communication within CS. But developing a system takes time, and that is what I have been working on

.

http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=3585&post=780947

The best places to find news

Closed to most

The most important group on couchsurfing.You need to be vetted to get in here.
Ambassador’s Private
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=1668

Member Disputes & Safety – Private 18 1 1340
http://www.couchsurfing.com/organization.html?gid=6223
Ambassador Management Private 9 – 1310
http://www.couchsurfing.com/organization.html?gid=3577

Important Orgs Groups

MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS
http://www.couchsurfing.com/organization.html?gid=3583
Community Communications

Location: CS Organization >> >> MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS >> Community Communications
http://www.couchsurfing.com/organization.html?gid=3585

[CS Tech] News Feed

Location: CS Organization >> Product Development Experts >> Technology Team >> [CS Tech] News Feed
(Notice the deeply embedded group )

Interested in being informed about many small changes happening on the website? In being up to date on what the Tech Team is currently improving? Then this might be the place for you!
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=7856
Open but difficult to find

Ambassador’s Public

Casey emails certain close ambassadors how share the news with other ambassadors.
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=2125
News from CSC Thailand, 2007-2008

CSC Thailand, 2007-2008 – Public

Location: CS Organization >> PROJECT TEAMS: Collectives >> CSC Thailand, 2007-2008 – Public (Almost a dead group right from the start of the collective )

http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=7944

CSC Thailand Public – Questions and Answers
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=8871 (Almost a dead group)
Location: The CouchSurfing Project >> QUANTITY VS QUALITY….IMPROVING CS THROUGH YOUR SUGGESTION. >> CSC Thailand Public – Questions and Answers

Discussions group with titbits of Information

Brainstorm – the old and original one….
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=429

The redefined same topics less feedback (People say techs implement stuff from here. Fact no they do not)

http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=7621
QUANTITY VS QUALITY….IMPROVING CS THROUGH YOUR SUGGESTION. (Almost a dead group)
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=1589
Thoughts from the General Manager (Almost a dead group)
The CouchSurfing Project >> Thoughts from the General Manager
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=7218
Public Comments for GM (Almost a dead group)
Location: The CouchSurfing Project >> Thoughts from the General Manager >> Public Comments for GM
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=7219

Present active groups /Groups with sprouts of activity.

Meetings upgrade team

Location: CS Organization >> Community Experts >> Events & Outreach >> Meetings upgrade team
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=4882

Translation – General

Location: CS Organization >> >> Translations >> Translation – General
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=3568

Finance

Location: CS Organization >>  >> ORGANIZATIONAL OPERATIONS >> Finance Coordination
http://www.couchsurfing.com/organization.html?gid=3593
Location: CS Organization >> Operations Experts >> Finance
http://www.couchsurfing.com/group.html?gid=6207
Location: CS Organization >>  >> MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS >> Community Communications >> CouchSurfing Newsletter MrRico
http://www.couchsurfing.com/organization.html?gid=518

News item: not allowed!

It seems obvious that it is important to reach as many Couchsurfers as possible with Open Couchsurfing. If nothing else, it allows us to see the community’s thoughts and opinions on the topic.

For this exact reason, we have proposed a news item on Couchsurfing.com.

Mattthew Brauer posted the following in reply: “Constructive criticism is great and needed, but the purpose of the news is to inspire people and promote CouchSurfing, not to highlight the things that may or may not need improving.”

There are couple of things wrong with this attitude:

  1. There is no good way for the community at large to understand what’s going on if this kind of news is effectively shielded from them. While not every discussion is worthy of news, this surely is it seems.
  2. Quite often in Couchsurfing we hear the argument to “not be so negative”. This is certainly one form of that. And certainly, if there were channels where we could get answers to some pressing questions, we would take it there. However “don’t be negative” often just means “shut up”.

Help us publish this news item. Write Mattthew Brauer to show your support.