Tag Archive for 'couchsurfing'

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Reviving an idea – Rideshare

Published by on 08 August 2007 at 16:24 in Collective, Crash at Mine, Open Source and volunteer coordination. 1 Comment Tags: car_sharing, couchsurfing, crash, laid_back, new_zealand, rideshare_database, rideshare_system, trento, wiki.

During the CouchSurfing Collective in New Zealand several people had been working on a rideshare system. Unfortunately the CS volunteering environment is (was?) not the right place to do this. So I was happy when Meinhard today wrote something about a rideshare system in a chat. “Imagine a “lifts to Trento” box on your homepage!” For this we need to create some stuff:

An open Rideshare database.
A Rideshare site API for all the participating car sharing sites and
A Rideshare RSS API for all sorts of websites.

We decided to put it at the Crash at Mine wiki, because it’s open, available under a free license and, well, Morgan is a laid back Ozzie. In the future we’ll probably have to move it elsewhere though, somehow Crash at Mine doesn’t seem appropriate for a rideshare system

More CouchSurfing Censorship

Published by Callum on 06 August 2007 at 19:32 in CouchSurfing Wiki, employees and Volunteer coordinator. 10 Comments Tags: couchsurfing, CouchSurfing Wiki, Jim Stone, Kasper, OpenCouchSurfing.

Not content with blocking Kasper from the Wiki for a week, Jim Stone has now made the block indefinite. Furthermore, he has removed sysop (admin) rights from myself, Phauly, Tgoorden, and Calum (not me, another one!).

It seems that Jim wants to keep all the power for himself. No longer will he be sharing his Wiki admin rights with us mere CouchSurfing Corporation Customers, no, no, no. He’s a paid member of staff now, he’s special…

It’s a little ironic, I was thinking about unblocking Kasper from the Wiki, but I decided it would be better to try and talk it out with Jim. With hindsight, perhaps that was a mistake. Jim apparently ain’t one for talking.

From a BeWelcome volunteer

Published by on 06 August 2007 at 12:20 in BeWelcome, Donations, Participation and Transparency. Closed Tags: BeWelcome, couchsurfing, hospitality_club, volunteering.

I was just reading the BeVolunteer forum and I was happy to read lemon-head’s post about the BW mission and objectives. Here’s a part of that. Of course I was especially pleased with the remark between brackets.

No interest in organisation politics?

It was said that the ordinary CouchSurfing or Hospitality Club member doesn’t care about the legal structure of the organisation behind.

I agree that most members will choose a hospex site mainly based on the chances to find a host etc. However, as soon as volunteering or donations are involved, at least some people will start thinking. For me this was the point where I started to become interested in the legal structure of couchsurfing and hospitalityclub. Later a talk with some CS people mentioned BeWelcome, and I felt pushed to read more about it and find information from external sources (opencouchsurfing, at first).

2000 US$/month

Published by on 06 August 2007 at 10:25 in Donations, Leadership Circle, volunteer coordination and Volunteer coordinator. 2 Comments Tags: couchsurfing, donate, donation, friendship, participate, Participation, special_treatment.

From Jim Stone ^{Aug 4}

Extremely Negative

I once thought Kasper was able to separate friendship from business and keep things professional. I was wrong. Friends don’t routinely bash each other personally in public and scream “you’re a f*cking asshole!” in public forums. I should have known better, but Kasper will do whatever it takes to push his twisted agenda. He’ll demand special treatment and then cry when he doesn’t get his way. Beware – this man will stab you in the back after he borrows the knife from you. In his own words ( http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=3886&post=304127 ): “I don’t know what I’m trying to achieve. But I’m not stopping.”

Thanks Jim. How do you seperate friendship and business now that you get 2000 US$ a month to coordinate volunteers?

CouchSurfing – An Equal Opportunities Employer

Published by Callum on 03 August 2007 at 13:22 in Donations and employees. 8 Comments Tags: couchsurfing, OpenCouchSurfing.

According to the job spec for the new CouchSurfing Lead Software Architect, CouchSurfing is an equal opportunities employer. Yeah right.

The position is “contract at-will” under US law apparently. This means either party can terminate the arrangement, at any time, for any reason. In other words, this means absolutely zero job security. If the verification propaganda starts to fail, and members stop donating money, you can bet the paid developer will be the first person to get fired.

The person is expected to work 40+ hours per week, 6 days per week. According to the spec, the position will be “an amazing opportunity for adventure”. Of course the unlucky candidate won’t have any time for such adventures as they’ll be on their computer 6 days a week working for CouchSurfing.

My condolences to whomever is unfortunate enough to be given this job.

CouchSurfing is Hiring

Published by Callum on 03 August 2007 at 13:11 in Casey Fenton, Donations, employees, general director and Volunteer coordinator. 26 Comments Tags: Casey Fenton, couchsurfing, Jim Stone, Mattthew-Brauer, OpenCouchSurfing.

It was announced yesterday that CouchSurfing is seeking to hire a full time developer. They’ve just hired two core volunteers (Jim Stone and Mattthew Brauer). Where are they getting all this cash from? If they’re each paid $2’000 USD a month, between those three and Casey, that makes $96’000 a year.

So the CouchSurfing Corporation is finally starting to pay off…

The CouchSurfing Censorship Plot Thickens

Published by Callum on 02 August 2007 at 15:59 in CouchSurfing Wiki, Leadership Circle and Volunteer coordinator. 5 Comments Tags: couchsurfing, CouchSurfing Wiki, Jim Stone, Kasper, OpenCouchSurfing.

I learned today that Jim Stone blocked Kasper’s account 4 weeks after Kasper moved the pages in question. As I suspected, without warning, discussion or otherwise. In typical CouchSurfing Corporation Style. Glad to see Jim is settling into his new job, getting the hang of how CouchSurfing runs things. He’ll fit right in.

CouchSurfing Censors Strike Again

Published by Callum on 02 August 2007 at 09:07 in CouchSurfing Wiki and Volunteer coordinator. Closed Tags: couchsurfing, CouchSurfing Wiki, Jim Stone, Kasper, OpenCouchSurfing.

Kasper (long standing CouchSurfing volunteer, founder of the CouchSurfing Wiki, ex CouchSurfing Tech Team Leader) was recently blocked from the CouchSurfing Wiki. Jim Stone (newly hired CouchSurfing staff member) explained the reasons on this group post.

Jim says that Kasper blanked a bunch of pages, then posted links to another web site. In other words, Kasper moved content from one Wiki to another. Kasper explained that he felt the content was more appropriate on the other Wiki.

In typical CouchSurfing fashion, there was no discussion, no explanation, no consultation, Jim simply blocked Kasper’s account. Gotta love dictatorships huh?!

CouchSurfing Didn’t Crash

Published by Callum on 01 August 2007 at 16:23 in Casey Fenton and Crash 2.0. 6 Comments Tags: Casey Fenton, couchsurfing, CouchSurfing-2.0, CouchSurfing-Crash, MySQL.

It would appear from this thread on the MySQL forum that CouchSurfing didn’t crash in late June 2006, but the database was deleted. For non techies, DROP is the database command for delete. According to the thread, posted by username Casey Fenton, a DROP TABLE command was issued.

The message was posted on 28 June 2006, exactly the time of the alleged “crash”.

If I understand this post correctly, the servers did not “crash”, but the data was deleted. I wonder if anyone else can shed more light on the subject?

CouchSurfing Disappointments

Published by Callum on 01 August 2007 at 15:58 in Casey Fenton, Collective and Leadership Circle. 2 Comments Tags: Casey Fenton, couchsurfing, CouchSurfing-Collective, Nelson, New-Zealand, OpenCouchSurfing.

Today I’m reminded of my time in Nelson, New Zealand. I went there, at my own expense, to volunteer for CouchSurfing. When I arrived, I found a job that was urgent. The servers badly needed upgraded, they were very out of date. I researched the situation, investigated a solution, figured out how to do what was required. Then I needed some information from Casey Fenton. I met with Joe and Casey and Casey agreed to pass the information to Joe the following day.

My work was dependent on this information. The information never came. To the best of my knowledge, this information was never given to Joe. My time was wasted.

Unfortunately, I feel this summarises the CouchSurfing “Visionary Leader”. Casey is a great talker, a very friendly guy. When speaking with him you feel like you’re genuinely connecting. However, beyond that connection, in my view, there is no substance. I think Casey is a politician, he tells you what he thinks you want to hear, then he does whatever he was going to do anyway.

It saddens me that CouchSurfing has so many great users and yet such a poor organisational structure. I hope networks like BeWelcome and CrashAtMine will lead to better things.