Coming back.

[Esmond]

Kaltxì brothers and sisters,

I left about a couple of months ago without any notice (though I doubt anyone realised). Its funny how all the things that happen around you can discourage you so much. I didn't see any progress therefore I left, thinking I'd get over this feeling I have. But its just all coming back to me now and I regret leaving back then.

I hope I could come back and join the tribe again. I have a clearer vision now and a more focused mind. I really want to help out.

I promise I'll be as active as I used to and not give up easily.

[Predict]

Welcome back.
There isn't a great deal happening now but I will try to fill you in. I think we have sorted out how to run the tribe during this on line phase and should be really getting things together now.

Okay, in the last few weeks we have begun collaborating with The Revolutionists (http://revolutionists.aurora-glacialis.de/), sharing their wiki and a few of us from each tribe/clan are active on the other site. We have established that the tribe would like to locate in a tropical climate but recent developments have led to a shift in favor of one subtropical, definitely in a forest as our primarily hunter-gatherer lifestyle would be much easier. We are pretty settled on this although have decided it must be augmented by small scale arable farming. Right now we are attempting to regroup a bit and set out more of a long term plan. As far as research is concerned I think immigration laws are a top priority along with establishing land requirements.
To help out with anyone else returning from a period of inactivity I am about to start some weekly progress updates so if you're ever away for a while you 'should' be able to check out a summary of what's changed.

Hope that's informative. 

'Eylan

[Esmond]

Thanks tsmukan for the brief. Its good to know that the tribe has decided on a climate. =)

Well, is there anything I could do now to help out? Any research or so on?

[Maweya Hufwe]

Welcome back! I share the same story about leaving and coming back. I only ask that you be active. It is extremely disheartening to return to mostly empty space. Just wanted to express that it is good to see people coming back. Hopefully there will be more of us =)

[Esmond]

Yeah, back when I left a lot of people were leaving and nothing was done. It was a terribly discouraging scene. But I'm just grateful that you are all still keeping this dream alive. I was kind of worried that I might come back to find a dead section. Thank god.

[Predict]

It's not as empty as you might think. Quite a bit has happened but it's hard to see how the various posts connect together, largely because they fail to do so.

[Esmond]

Well, it was not that it was empty, it was just that it felt as though we're going sideways, not forward.

[Key'ìl Nekxetse]

Has anyone noticed that that's what they ALWAYS fail to do in Star Trek? They never use up, down, or sideways!
We're trying to get things going, but it's difficult to manage an international organisation where people keep not being here!

[Predict]

I have managed to be on every day for 3 months - excluding a one week vacation, yes I have too much free time - and I really hope my 'all new' updates will help bridge the gap as people drop in and out. It's so easy to lose track of things when you've got different people working on the same thing at different times.

By the way, get the abuse ready Key'íl, because I'm running late dash it! (can anyone Na'vi-ate that?) 

[Esmond]

Perhaps the reason behind this problem is that we're not getting people involved enough. Sure we participate is polls and stuff but people weren't involved in real progressive tasks. I believe that was why some people left. I know that was why I left.

[Predict]

I think I understand what you mean. You're saying we should make it easier for people to become involved in the real running of the tribe, not alienate people from the decision making stuff?

[Key'ìl Nekxetse]

We're mostly relying on people doing things themselves. Having plans, and a record should help.
I'm trying to do things that I think need doing, it would be good if people organised themselves as much as possible, although I think that's already mostly the case.
It's good having lots of the group online at once, it makes discussion easier.

[Esmond]

Yes, we need to involve people in real progressive tasks. Like before I left we'd have polls on which climate we want. After all the voting has been done, still nothing was decided. Then anoher poll was started and yet nothing came of it. People feel as though their say isn't doing anything. It's very demotivating.

So maybe if we start to assign tasks, certain responsibilties, not only would people feel more contributive, we'd be more organized, we'd have a more evenly distributed workforce and at the end of the day, we get more things done.

[Tsteu'itan]

I think what made the group change from wanting tropical to sub-tropical was when people started having open debates about the pros-and-cons of each issue at hand.

I don't know if it could really be much more help then that, I was just something I noticed.  Maybe if the debates were geared more in that style, the decisions would get made more easily.  Open a thread about an issue, have people put pros-and-cons they know in relation to each, and then go from there.  What was being expressed before simply seemed like opinion-based and not fact-based.

[Esmond]

So from what you're saying, it feels that perhaps we're not being focused enough. Instead of having multiple threads with multiple issues going on at one time, its better to have just one issue at one time and only move on when this issue is resolved?

Like for example if we're discussing about climate, we'd talk about nothing else other than climate. Then once that's decided, we'd go on to diseases and discuss.

This way it'll be easier for people to know what's going on at any one moment because there'd only be one thing going on.

[Tsteu'itan]

Not necessarily.  We don't have to only focus on one thing at a time.  It's the type of discussion that is being given.  Fact-based information, actual research about the issues, is what should be done, not opinion-based discussion.  When the Tropics were decided on the first time, what it seemed like to me was mostly that the tropics were wanted purely because of the aesthetics of it, and not because of the actual facts behind it all.

[Esmond]

Okay, I get what you mean now. Well, I believe having one going on at a time is still the way to go since we're all from different places and we come on at different times of the day, different times of the week.

Its not a necessity but I feel that we'd see decisions and progress being made in a much clearer way.

['Itan Atxur]

I see what you're saying Esmond. Perhaps along with the weekly update we could have a weekly "focus". It would be very specific (not just "focus on location").

[Key'ìl Nekxetse]

Perhaps have it stickied temporarily?

[Esmond]

Yeah, like "Current Focus" or "Weekly/Monthly Focus".

Something that requires us to spend more attention on at any time so that it gets done faster and we could move on to the next focus. Measurable progress. Cause now, we're having multiple things going on and we don't all know which one is still active or the progress or who's working on what.