Archive for the 'Participation' Category

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What’s happening in the other networks

Published by on 12 February 2008 at 01:39 in BeWelcome, Donations, Finances, networks and Participation. 10 Comments

Hello,

I just received a BeWelcome newsletter about what is happening there; main point was that they just had their first conference (where following my knowlegde everybody could participate, not only “approved people”, so if you want to go to the next one keep your eyes open for the dates). I’m not going to post the whole text here, but there were some interesting links in it that I’m pasting in at the end of this post. I want to point out that this is not supposed to be advertisement for BeWelcome, but an insight in other networks and more specifically a network claiming to be transparent and democratic.

I want to draw your attention to this line in their blog, which I found interesting (but make up your own mind!):

“We had 200 € in expenses, which covered all of the food and drinks for the entire weekend, except of course the party on Saturday night. The participants payed 9 € on average (2,2 € minimum, 11 € maximum), no BeVolunteer money was ever used. To put this in perspective, we could (theoretically) do 58 of these weekends with the money that Couchsurfing spends on their collectives and meetings in 3 months (as an example), without spending any of our donation money.”

As said, make up your own mind, here’s the links about the conference which were inside of the message:

(Sorry, I don’t know how to make the direct links on this site, you’ll have to copy-paste them) Update: Links have been added.

The video:

http://video.google.nl/videoplay?docid=-5605653070159143554

The blog:

http://blogs.bevolunteer.org/blog/2008/01/20/sunday-activities/

The tech blog:

http://blogs.bevolunteer.org/tech/2008/02/04/antwerp-unconference-seen-from-the-outside/

I hope nobody minds me writing this here; I think comparing the networks and their ideas is interesting for all of us. In my opinion the OCS site is not only about Couchsurfing, as the ideals of transparency and democracy (I dare to suggest all people writing here share those) are not about a specific network.

Nevertheless I want to draw special attention to Kaspar’s (in whose critical opinion about the conference I’m interested) stylish hat while he is “Couch-Surfing” (Couch-Relaxing? Being Welcomed on a Couch? Alright, I’m not funny..) in the video.

All the best

Michel

What is OpenCouchSurfing

Published by Callum on 22 January 2008 at 16:47 in General Info and Participation. 55 Comments Tags: CouchSurfing.com, OpenCouchSurfing.

There seems to be some confusion around what exactly this thing called OpenCouchSurfing is. I thought now would be a good time to remind people of what OpenCS is and what it is not.

Let’s start with what it is:

It is a label, a title, a word, a term
It is a web site, a blog, a mailing list, a wiki
It is a loosely (dis)organised campaign
It is related to CouchSurfing and hospitality networks
It is a movement, a meme, an idea of loosely shared values

Now what it is not:

It is not an organisation, it has no offices, no officers, no constitution
It has no members, there is no list of “OpenCSers”
It is not “official”, nobody can speak on behalf of it, nobody can say they represent it

OpenCouchSurfing cannot agree or disagree with statements. It’s simply a means to communicate. As one can’t say “I am not E=MC²“, so one cannot really say “I am or am not OpenCS”. OpenCS is an idea, a campaign, at the very most, a petition.

Of course, all of this is simply my own opinion, because OpenCS cannot express an opinion or describe itself. So I speak on my own behalf, not in any official capacity on behalf of OpenCS.

Ill communication

Published by on 14 January 2008 at 13:20 in Collective, Participation, tech team leader and volunteer coordination. 53 Comments Tags: ill communication.

Diederik wrote:

I have left the couchsurfing system administration team. The main (and almost only) reason is communication, and the bad, or even non-existent version of it.

I am not surprised and not particularly happy with this news. CouchSurfing keeps on growing and growing and it’s not healthy to depend on a stream of new and unexpecting volunteers who are not experienced with the specifics of the technical and social side of the CouchSurfing website and organization with an ever growing number of members.

Diederik, I’m looking forward to finally meet you. If not in Antwerpen this weekend surely somewhere in the Randstad very soon.

Thailand Collective members communicating

Finally the new NDA! Beware, it’s very funny!

Published by on 04 December 2007 at 16:37 in Censorship, NDA, Participation and volunteer coordination. 29 Comments Tags: NDA.

For your convenience I put it a copy of the new CouchSurfing NDA on the OpenCS wiki.

It’s so beyond anything that it’s very funny, and merely deserves to be laughed at.

The burning question is just: Who will be asked to sign this monstrous document?

CouchSurfing Thailand Collective Visas

Published by Callum on 25 November 2007 at 23:57 in Collective, Leadership Circle, Participation, Transparency and volunteer coordination. 2 Comments Tags: couchsurfing, CouchSurfing Thailand Collective, Thai Visas, thailand.

According to the FAQ:

We’re researching which visa type collective volunteers will need.

Later in the same paragraph:

CouchSurfing will ensure that all participants are in Thailand on the legal and appropriate visa, and that they are able to stay for the duration of the Collective.

The collective is due to start on 1 December, that’s in 6 days. Yet apparently they’re still researching visas? If I had volunteered to go to Thailand to participate, I’d expect to know by now what visa I need.

Volunteers are required to stay for a minimum of 2 months. To stay in Thailand for 2 months you need a visa, and you need to get that visa before you arrive. Visas on arrival are for 30 days and getting to the border and back can be costly depending on where the collective will be held.

I hope the volunteers are aware of the situation and have considered the consequences of volunteering for CouchSurfing, I fear most have not.

Reasons for not using CouchSurfing.com

Published by on 07 November 2007 at 17:47 in Casey Fenton, couchsurfing, Donations, employees, Finances, Leadership Circle, legal, Participation and Uncategorized. 91 Comments

To preserve this information in case of a decision by the CS ‘leadership’ to suspend my profile for having the wrong hairdo or something, and because OCS attracts more readers than my CS profile, what follows is my current list of 10 reasons for not using CouchSurfing.com. It is personal, not exhaustive, and contains little explanation. Still, I hope it will give first-time visitors to this website some kind of overview of all that is wrong with CouchSurfing.com. Comments and additions (and corrections if factually incorrect!) are much appreciated.

The company that owns CouchSurfing.com, CouchSurfing International inc., is privately owned and has Casey Fenton as is its sole owner and director. He holds all power over the company and, consequently, the website. This means that, when push comes to shove,
1. He cannot be held accountable for how donations are spent
2. He can sell CouchSurfing.com to whomever and walk away with the dough whenever he gets tired of it
3. CS users have no of influence whatsoever on anything CS-related
Although incorporated as a not-for-profit, CouchSurfing International inc. is not a charitable organisation. Not-for-profit status only means that the company cannot pay dividend to its owners (i.e. Casey); the company and its assets still are his, and his alone. Casey can do with it whatever he wants, whenever he wants it
1. In addition, not-for-profit status does give not any kind of guarantee that company assets are not utilised for personal enrichment. For instance, as its sole owner/director, Casey can give out loans to himself or others at zero-interest rates, and use that money privately to make a profit
2. Such potential abuse of company assets is even easier because CouchSurfing International inc. does not appear genuinely interested in obtaining a “501c3″ tax exemption. Non-profit organisations can easily apply for this designation with the IRS, but it requires compliance with strict disclosure and reporting duties, plus having a board of directors, and Casey doesn’t like that much openness. Therefore, part of user donations is waisted on avoidable tax-paying
3. Most importantly, CouchSurfing International inc. does not have a clause in its bylaws that irrevocably dedicates company assets to a charitable cause. This means that Casey can always revoke the company’s not-for-profit designation and cash in, by volition but also by necessity (for instance, when he or the company ever get sued for damages)
In clause 5.1 of the Terms of Use, CouchSurfing International inc. claims a virtually unbounded and irrevocable right to use whatever material you decide to upload to its servers for its own purposes, without limiting these in any way. This opens up the road to selling user data, including your contact and site usage details, to third parties. At the same time, CouchSurfing International inc. does not have a published policy detailing how they keep your personal information safe
There are no published protocols how the company deals with users committing crimes (violence, abuse, theft…) that involve other users; instead, these appear to be dealt with in an ad hoc fashion. In addition, it is extremely difficult to find who’s responsible for what when it comes to safety. By being so negligent, CouchSurfing International inc. puts the users of CS at risk
On the whole, CouchSurfing.com scores very poorly on transparency. There are hardly any protocols about anything; there is no full list of people on the payroll of CouchSurfing International inc., information is scattered across countless forums and scores of mailgroups, etc. The current management seems to take no interest whatsoever in even starting to improve this situation
Apart from being fraudfully sollicited (i.e., under the pretext that CS is a charity / non-profit), aspiring volunteers are asked to sign a non-disclosure agreement in which they cede all rights on the material they develop to CouchSurfing International inc.
All known employees of CouchSurfing International inc. (i.e., Casey Fenton, Matthew Brauer, Jim Stone and Weston Hankins, all of whom are members of the Leadership Team) are male caucasian US citizens.
The verification procedure is a blatant scheme for increasing donations. It does not offer any kind of added security, and could be carried out at a fraction of the current fee
What little financial information is available gives cause for suspicion. There are interesting discrepancies between assets and interest gained, and attempts to get this clarified are met with deafening silence
Casey and the other employees of CouchSurfing International inc., as well as the influential volunteers in CouchSurfing.com simply do not respond to any kind of question or criticism at all, while still hammering on CS being a community-thing

More CouchSurfing BS

Published by Callum on 03 November 2007 at 13:14 in Casey Fenton, Donations, employees, Participation and Transparency. 24 Comments Tags: Casey Fenton, couchsurfing, couchsurfing volunteers, weston hankins.

The latest email from comrade Casey uses the word volunteer no less than 4 times, the only mention of the word employ is referring to Weston Hankins leaving his previous hot-shot employers. Would it be fair to say that Casey is misleading CouchSurfing members by not mentioning that staff now receive salaries from their donations? The email also asks for more volunteers, should those people be told some of their “colleagues” will be “more equal” than others?

The full email follows…

Dear Sucker,

This message is to give you an update about the technology behind the CouchSurfing website. We’re making exciting improvements to our website hardware, software, and volunteer Tech Team that we want to make you aware of.

On Thursday, November 9th, at 1:00am in New York, 6:00am in Paris, 10:30am in Delhi, and 4:00pm in Sydney, the CS website will be unavailable for a brief period of up to 4 hours while we install new hardware that runs the website software. This necessary downtime will replace some outdated hardware and improve the site’s speed and reliability in order to keep pace with our growing membership. To prepare for this down time, please make sure you write down or print out any important information you may need during the outage.

Thanks to your support and enthusiasm, CouchSurfing is now the largest website of its kind, with over 60,000 people using the site each week and over 10,000 members meeting each other face-to-face each week! We’re taking action in advance to prepare for the needs of our growing community. As we make these upgrades during November, you may experience other unannounced website outages, but we expect these to be few and brief.

CouchSurfing’s volunteer Tech Team has been acting literally around the clock from several time zones to fix the issues effecting our email delivery system. For several days scattered over the past few weeks, emails were delivered up to a day late, and we understand the frustration that can cause. We’re happy to report that the Tech Team now has the issue under control, and we thank them for their determined efforts.

Thanks also goes to our new Tech Team Coordinator, Weston Hankins. Bringing Weston on board has been a huge score for CS. Weston has previously worked for automaker, Daimler Chrysler, and he co-developed core aspects of the Microsoft Windows operating system. He was willing to leave his high-profile employers and volunteer for CS because he shares our mission and love of travel.

Providing CouchSurfing’s free service depends on the amazing output of our dedicated volunteers including Weston, the Tech Team, and many others. We’re always seeking more help to continue to provide members with excellent service.

If you are a professional Linux system administrator with several years experience and knowledge of distributed file systems, load balancing, or database replication, please contact us.

We look forward to providing all members with improved website performance and reliable email delivery in the next month and into the future.

Happy CouchSurfing,

–Casey Fenton

Modes of Governance

Published by on 18 October 2007 at 11:44 in BeWelcome, couchsurfing, history, networks and Participation. 6 Comments Tags: adhocracy, Democracy, governance, hospex, Hospitality-Exchange, politics.

For me, the failure of CS to sustain any democratic principles, freedom of speech, or abiding to the law or ethics, equality was the breaking point. So realizing they were not, nor ever would become that kind of an organization I had to go before further hurting myself being involved with people who could never understand what I stood for, what made me tick, and originally made me want to volunteer for CS. I tried as long as I could and was in no way “politically active” as the new race of outcasts on CS now is called (I was present in a situation where new person for some site tasks was needed, and the ones in charge went through their groups posting history to see there was nothing whatsoever that could indicate this was a person with critical thinking of any kind, especially towards CS). It’s only after seeing quite a bit of behavior and attitudes that I could not align with, as well as quite a bit of undermining, bullying and ignoring those who had, despite their differences with the LT worked very hard for CS that finally destroyed my faith in the leaders.

As an interlude, there was a strong push (in earlier times also officially sanctioned by the CS elite) to act in a more ad-hoc way (term coined by Dani I believe as “do-ocracy”). For me, this provided a way to get things ahead when no leadership was around to deal with many real issues rising up from the “bottom”, the community, through various means: groups, contact us section on the site, personal connections, real-life meetings. But at some point it became clear that in absence of leadership of any kind, it was those only interested in their own goals and visions for which Couchsurfing was merely a supporting platform, who were going to be the ultimate winners of the do-ocracy model. So naturally the LT might have been scared, I know I was. The critical error the Admins aka Leadership Team did in regaining their power was however to not take the good coming out of do-ocracy model so far, and not learn ways to actively listen to and engage with their community, which could have made all the difference in creating a network truly in line with its (current or future) vision statement and the values of its members.

On BeVolunteer/BeWelcome on the other hand the statutes clearly state what the values are, so that anyone wanting to volunteer clearly knows where they stand since the start. I’ve seen & heard “democracy doesn’t work” quoted by some along with rather condescending wishes of good luck. Well, this might be true – it’s certainly not easy to handle multi-national organization just starting out where many of the active people haven’t even met (yet). But still I’d say there’s a far bigger chance of survival thanks to the explicitly stated democratic principles (so neither dictators nor lone gunmen with their own motives can thrive for very long) to produce a sustainable organization and gradually grow into a viable alternative for those seeking hospitality.

external tools

Published by on 02 October 2007 at 00:22 in Participation and tech team leader. 2 Comments Tags: brainstorm, couchsurfing, tools.

In Brainstorm Christian announced a page with links to external tools for CouchSurfing members:

CouchFinder: “Choose any location on the glob, specify a within-range and click search. This handy tool will show you all couches within your chosen area.”
Joined Members: “A little tool that, provided any CS group-id, will list the last recently signed up members in chronological order”.

I wonder how far this approach can be taken though…

Now I’m trying to get the profile export tool somewhere in a public space, so that it can be added.

“Run the show how you think you must…”

Published by on 30 September 2007 at 20:51 in 501c3, Casey Fenton, Collective, employees, Finances, Participation, Transparency and Volunteer coordinator. 2 Comments Tags: attorney_general, casey, Collective, shame, show, thai, volunteering.

I might have used other words, and I definitely don’t have the skill to do (or bluff?) this sort of stuff, but I’m not unhappy to see that Pickwick is seriously kicking some butt:

It’s getting heart breaking in here. And cold. Icy cold. All the ‘open source’ and ‘charity’ debate left me disagreeing, but unhurt. This Thai project does me in.
www.couchsurfing.com/collective_thailand_application.html

First the cold, demanding, uppity language itself. Then what looks like a “suck ‘em dry & spit ‘em out” attitude of present and future ‘Volunteer Coordination’. Then the cynicism luring generous, well meaning people to commit crimes and risk jail for lying to immigration police in a post 9/11 world.
www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=429&post=401914#pos…

Shame on you. Shame on those who do it. Shame on those who sit close by and watch in silent complicity. It’s time to hold Casey & Friends accountable, if not to members, then at least to the law.

The Royal Thai Government have received a formal query about the immigration requirements for the project. They know you are coming, so you better cut out the criminal part of your plan.

The charity question needs a decision. Casey opened his mouth in 2003, and he now either sings, or shuts it again. No more smoke screens. Run the show how you think you must, but run it well, and stop lying. A thoroughly documented formal query about possible Unlawful Charitable Solicitations will be placed before the Attorney General of New Hampshire “practically tomorrow”. My advice: hurry and be there first, with a genuine charity.