scribing thoughts

1) a moan and 2) constructive suggestions?

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I found scribing yesterday's meeting the hardest telecon I have ever 
scribed for.

Basically the problem was that the group is big.

The key consequence was that it was harder to know who was speaking at 
any one time.

It also meant that administrivia was harder (e.g. roll call, having some 
confidence that the roll call in the minutes is correct, given people's 
comings and goings).

I wonder if the sound quality ends up as worse ... although most people 
were muted most of the time. I sometimes found it difficult to hear.

Also 90 mins is a long meeting, and I was unhappy with any extension 
really, simply because I was tired of scribing.

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I wonder whether any of the following might be helpful:
- allocate a second scribe to each meeting. The role of the second 
scribe could be: (a) to help clarify who spoke (b) to add additional 
stuff to the IRC when the main scribe is having difficulty. Of course, 
this role is often informally filled by participants in the telecon, but 
I wonder if formally allocating this role each meeting might help.
The main scribe would still need to produce the minutes, which can be as 
big a task as scribing
- don't overrun, unless we really, really have to. It is possible to end 
a meeting half way through an agenda.
- all participants should check the scribe notes on things they say real 
time, and clarify if needed.
- do not use any nicknames on IRC but full names (both Zakim IDs and 
IRC, e.g. JeremyCarroll not jeremy or jjc)
- the first and every fifth or so time that anyone speaks, they say 
their name (Benjamin was good at this)

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Jeremy

Received on Wednesday, 21 December 2005 11:37:48 UTC