Government Communications Bill

[Patroklus Murakami]

Rationale

This bill is intended to help improve communications in the CDS. The intention is that citizens will know where to look to get information and that the government will make reasonable efforts to let everyone know what is going on. Good communications are everyone's responsibility - the government needs to put information in easily accessible places in a timely fashion and citizens need to look in those places if they want to know what is going on. I think that includes joining the CDS group if you want to know what is going on. (I don't propose that we duplicate messages in the Al Andalus, Colonia Nova, Alpine Meadow, Locus Amoenus or Neufreistadt groups for example).

We are a community of volunteers so most of these notices will be posted by people who do not receive any recompense for doing so. We need to keep our communications channels streamlined and few in number so that posting information does not become a chore and so that citizens are not bombarded with messages.

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Proposed Government Communications Bill

1. The CDS Government will publicise official meetings (which include, among others, RA meetings, Town Halls, SC meetings, Executive meetings) and events through the Google Calendar and inworld CDS group notices.

2. Meetings and events will be added to the Google Calendar at least a week in advance (unless the meeting is called with less than a week's notice). Meetings and events will be advertised by inworld CDS group notices about a day in advance and when the meeting is about to start.

3. Each branch of the government - RA, SC, Chancellor - is responsible for publicising its own meetings and events. The outgoing team is responsible for ensuring that the incoming team have the right permissions to update

[Arria Perreault]

I take it in the agenda of the next RA meeting

[Rose Springvale]

Unlike the CN and AM and NFS groups, the Al Andalus group reaches over 300 people who are interested in our project. When we merged, the understanding was that there would be no attempt to override that group. All CDS government officials have the right to post there. EVERYONE is short on LL groups. I can support this measure only if you add the Al Andalus group to the list. Otherwise, we are right back to the CDS takeover argument, instead of merger.

And if you disagree and think that posting to one more group is onerous for the CDS elected officials, shouldn't we use the AA one instead of the CDS one, as it reaches more people?

[Keila Forager]

And what about the SL events calender, which you can search inworld? I wouldn't even know how to get to google calender.

[Kaseido_Quandry]

And what about the SL events calender, which you can search inworld? I wouldn't even know how to get to google calender.

Keila, it's been my experience that the SL events calendar is so drowned in spam as to be totally unusable - and is completely broken in Viewer 2. If that's *not* the case any longer, that'd be good to know. Do you use it effectively to find things? I've got to say, I gave up using it as either a seeker or an advertiser years ago.

Pat's proposal would be fine with the addition of "at minimum:" certainly anyone inclined to undertake *more* outreach efforts should not be prohibited from doing so.

Oh, one other forum I've used to *very* satisfactory ends is the "Chestnut's Choices" column at New World Notes - it's probably the most widely read events-focused SL medium, and always good for a large boost to big events.

[solomon mosely]

i understand that this bill is about announcing events, but regarding government communications, i would be just as interested to see relevant results of the meetings posted. i know you'll say, "read the transcripts" holy cow. i HATE reading transcripts, i would love to see a brief outline of the actions, like the proposals, votes, results. a "score card" of the meting, rather than having to go through an entire transcript to see what, of relevance, happened.

[Jamie Palisades]

I like Pat's bill.
But there have been so many poorly-announced meetings that perhaps it needs teeth.
What about something like this?:
1. No official government meeting shall have effect or be deemed quorate unless either:
(a) notice of the meeting including its final time and location is posted to the CDS Forums and announced by group notice to the C.D.S. SL group at least five days in advance; or
(b) the agenda item to be decided is deemed a necessary emergency, by a unanimous vote of those voting in the body in an otherwise quorate and duly called meeting, and this vote is recorded in the CDS Forums.
2. No official government meeting that takes an action directly to or against a specific individual CDS citizen (such a hearing regarding her appeal to the SC, or an appeal of an action by her, or an RA action to appoint her or remove her) shall have effect or be deemed quorate unless: notice of the meeting, including its final time and location, is posted by SL IM to the individual, at least five days in advance, in addition to the public notices above.
Regards JP