ConferenceCall 2005 03 03

= [ontolog] Member Conference Call - Thu 2005-03-03 =

Conference Call Details

 * Subject: [ontolog] member conference call Thu 2005-03-03


 * Agenda Comments:
 * this session will be devoted to our Annual Ontolog Community Strategic & Work Planning work
 * please post any suggested agenda items to the call wiki page and upload any material to be shared to the list, to the wiki or by [[WebDAV] upload] prior to the meeting
 * VNC session (if needed) will be started 5 minutes before the call at: http://vnc2.cim3.net:5800/
 * view-only password: "ontolog"
 * view-and-control pw: to be supplied during session as needed
 * Wiki page for this call (i.e. this page) is at: http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?ConferenceCall_2005_03_03
 * Date: Thursday, Mar. 03, 2005
 * Start Time: 10:30 AM PST / 1:30 PM EST World Clock
 * Expected Call Duration: 1.5 ~ 2.0 hours
 * Dial-in Number: 1-702-851-3330 (Las Vegas, Nevada)
 * Participant Access Code: "686564#"


 * ERRATA: please note that an earlier freeconference.com announcement had inadvertently stated the wrong date (2005-02-10) on the subject line (too fast on the cut-and-paste, sorry! -ppy). It should read, instead: "[ontolog] member conference call Thu 2005-03-03 10:30am PST / 1:30pm EST"

Attendees

 * Attended:
 * KurtConrad
 * PeterYim
 * BobSmith
 * AdamPease
 * JamesDouma
 * PatrickHeinig
 * DuaneNickull
 * LisaSeaburg
 * PatCassidy
 * NicolasRouquette
 * SusanTurnbull


 * Expecting:
 * AndrewSchain
 * BrandNiemann (joining, but late due to an earlier meeting)


 * Regrets:
 * ChrisMenzel
 * ChrisWelty (traveling)
 * SteveRay (meeting conflict)
 * MarkMusen (traveling)
 * MichaelUschold
 * MonicaMartin (traveling)
 * AndreCharland
 * LeoObrst (schedule conflict)
 * BillMcCarthy (originally planned to call in; got stuck in a plane, unfortunately)

Agenda Ideas

 * review / update Community Charter (--PeterYim / 2005.02.28)
 * ref: http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontolog-forum/2005-02/msg00020.html
 * review / survey regular weekly conference call time (--PeterYim / 2005.02.24)
 * possibly assign a task force to work on this
 * do we officially have an "OrBS - Ontolog Review of Books (and Stuff)" Project yet?

Resources

 * Last Year's Planning Session Results - see: OntologPlanning_2004

Agenda & Proceedings
1) Welcome & confirmation of agenda


 * KurtConrad took the chair and welcomed everyone.

2) Appointment of secretary to take minutes


 * Kurt volunteered to capture the input from the participants too.

3) Roll-call of participants


 * see above

4) Introductions & Everyone's No. 1 Issue for this Exercise


 * Have an ontology of project planning. Who we are, opportunities, constraints
 * Sustainability of CoP, as a whole
 * Continue technology transfer, help people "sell" ontology approach
 * Do real work that gets used by somebody, especially UBL focus, concrete results
 * Decide what's feasible within next 6 months
 * Create clear distinction between various metadata representations and ontology
 * Learn what ontologies will do for me
 * Clear priorities
 * Figure out what next generation of ontology-based systems will look like, how ontology work is practical and useful
 * Better technology than wiki for forum
 * Continue valuable exchanges with other communities of practice, especially those associated with federal initiatives

5) Planning Principles


 * Engaging lurkers
 * Stratified membership
 * Orientate new initiates
 * Community of Practice
 * Help people learn
 * Balance education and practice
 * Eat dogfood: apply ontologies
 * Sub communities
 * More formalized governance / steering body
 * Accept / enable / nurture new initiatives
 * Scope and structure of Ontolog
 * Boundary conditions
 * Tag pages w/ ontologies
 * Sustained planning process
 * Asynchronous
 * Membership levels
 * Decision making

6) Planning Issues


 * Right people not necessarily involved, volunteers vs skill mix vs availability vs continuity
 * Ability to record and communicate planning issues
 * Charter not reflect current focus
 * Deadlines that create real stress (sneaky)
 * Unclear success criteria
 * Allocations of responsibility and accountability
 * Conflict management and resolution
 * Managing communication, engaging people
 * Stay on course
 * Knowing true value of community
 * Balancing / appropriate levels of rigor for CoP-level planning vs project vs unstructured
 * Continuity of planning effort
 * Unclear status against plans, need for corrective actions
 * Difficult to assign real responsibilities to see that things get done
 * Standing meeting times problematics for many members
 * Depending on volunteer effort / management support

7) Strengths


 * Open forum
 * In a space that is very hard, very few alternatives for similar discussions
 * More people need to learn
 * Years of history
 * Membership with demonstrated expertise
 * Increasing membership (authorative on technical aspects)
 * Attractive forum for experts that aren't necessarily involved to make presentations of work
 * Cream of crop of work in many areas
 * Viable alternative to conference hopping
 * Distributed collaboration framework (reduces need for travel)
 * Recording of sessions
 * Expanding reusable knowledge base
 * Multiple entry points for wide variety of people (novice to network, asynchronous, geographically diverse)
 * Degree to which have layed down a track, systematic nature of what you have done (sustainable KM)

8) Planning Strategies


 * SUMO-like indexing of Ontolog Forum archives... how would we plan an activity like that?
 * Optional volunteer type thing
 * Add "person" to each SUMO page
 * See: http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?OntologDiscussion/OntologSUMO


 * Planning "Project" w/ defined subteam


 * Kick off projects w/ a scheduled technical discussion


 * Membership survey (why Ontolog is valuable?)
 * Online
 * How they use the Ontolog Forum


 * Consider incorporating as a non-profit organization
 * Adam has experience w/ 501c7 (educational) 3(deductable)


 * Funding
 * Fund companies to underwrite participation
 * Should set up task force to actively pursue finding
 * Potential role for dedicated planning/strategy team
 * Governance model consistent w/ 501


 * Some sort of take aways / tangeable thing that could get started with to get momentum on planning
 * Scope issue: survey of areas of study that ontolog could address to help draw boundaries
 * Collaborating on wiki, imporant that viewpoints come together... To continue discussion around ideas, use threaded mail to avoid contention mechanism... Take topics that came out of planning and solicit input (e.g., what are 5 projects that should focus on this year).
 * If had an outline of the issues that have come up, post series of messages to community
 * Post call for volunteers for standing ontolog planning / governance committee
 * Demonstrate repeatable processes for planning and tracking of planning
 * Demonstrate willingness/unwillingness of people to become more formal
 * Balance free-form communitiy and more formal hierarchies
 * Is there a model other than OASIS's that would like to model


 * Jointly plan forum w/ orgs like Oasis that we would like to learn from
 * Identify top 5 organizations
 * governance for communities of practice


 * Use use cases a way to organize various communities/tasks/projects
 * Tuning up around reference models

9) Follow-on Activities


 * Get discussion threads up to maintain momentum from discovery process


 * Set up task forces


 * Put updated charter out for adoption process


 * Leo to post a definition of ontology


 * Get Bosak to talk about OASIS governance model


 * Rethink Thurday standing meeting
 * Survey on that specific topic, not precluding surveys on other topics
 * What's the best time for the weekly conference call?


 * call adjourned 12:00 PST
 * No follow-on call was scheduled

-- minutes captured in real time on this wiki by Kurt Conrad / ~12:00 PST

Audio Recording of this Planning Session

 * To download the audio recording of the presentation, click here
 * the playback of the audio files require the proper setup, and an MP3 compatible player on your computer.
 * Conference Date and Time:	Mar. 3, 2005 10:36~12:01 PM Pacific Std Time
 * Duration of Recording:	1 Hour 24 Minutes 42 seconds
 * Recording File Size:	       29.8 MB (in mp3 format)
 * Telephone Playback Expiration Date: Mar. 13, 2005 11:26 AM Pacific Std Time
 * Prior to the above Expiration Date, one can call-in and hear the telephone playback of the session.
 * Playback Dial-in Number:	1-805-620-4002 (Ventura, CA)
 * Playback Access Code:	513500#