Fellow ROSNF members:
This past week the board discovered some changes were needed to the ROSNF bylaws to clarify how the upcoming election of ROSNF Chair for 2012-2013 is to be conducted. Since these changes will require membership approval, the board has been reviewing and revising the bylaws to include a few other recommended changes as well. Once the board approves the bylaw changes, they will be submitted to the membership for approval. Hopefully this will be completed next week, and the board can move on to other pending issues.
Exciting news from ROSNF vice Chair, Mary Kathryn DeLodder, is the birth of Mary Kathryn and Eric’s first son Henry. Everyone is doing well, and there are some great pictures of Henry and parents on Facebook.
The Rotary Survey Lab group has started first step in building survey using qualitative survey to identify different categories where Rotary communications could be improved with help from RI. Once these categories are defined, the final survey questions will be developed.
Within the next few days we will pass 900 members. This reminds me of another project just getting started within ROSNF which is translating the ROSNF website pages to other languages starting with Spanish. Jorge Verdera, a ROSNF member from Spain, has volunteered to help lead this effort.
The ROSNF Group on Facebook now has 689 ROSNF members and there is now a daily ongoing exchange between members about topics of interest along with sharing of pictures, links, etc. Recent topics include help with promoting club Facebook pages, startup of ROSNF blogs lead by Simone Carot Collins, and ongoing discussion of new Google+ social network. Most of the ROSNF board members are now on Google+ and some have invitations available if you check with them and send them your email address. Google+ has 10 million users in current pilot by invitation only and is expected to open access soon, but opinions are mixed as to how it will compete with Facebook which now has over 750 million daily users.
The ROSNF Group on LinkedIn now has 273 members and the most recent ROSNF specific discussion topic is “How can we make ROSNF better?”. For general rotary discussion topics be sure to also visit the RI Official Discussion Group on LinkedIn with 16,921 members. This is the RI discussion thread on social networking which has led to current survey effort underway.
The ROSNF Forums on www.rosnf.net has introductions by new members and also has discussion about how we can improve ROSNF.
Don Higgins don@higgins.net Facebook LinkedIn
ROSNF Chair 2011-2012
yes, 894 members right now. Who will be number 900? Maybe we should have a certificate for the 1,000th member (and a free “Like ROSNF” badge).
We hit over 1,000 members some time ago, but not all have signed up here on rosnf.net. We still have a gap of 200 we haven’t made the transition across! (All 200 of them are on the Facebook and/or Linked In group but not rosnf.net). I’m still working on them, encouraging them to sign up here, or removing them if they still don’t sign up. The new blogs have encouraged 2 more members to sign up here. We’d have had closer to 1,500 members if we weren’t writing people off for not signing up here.
Almost 1000 members in our first year is rather amazing! Good job everyone. Anyone want to guess how many members we will have at the end of Don’s term? I wonder what other possibilities we might have for recruiting?
Dear Philip, old classmate, colleague and friend,
I’m convinced that a good way to do so is the same we have done in ROTI. Remember ROTI_Latino?. Evolve to a multilingual group, where, people could be in touch in his own, or best known, language.
We have to this as well in ROSNF …
Hi Guillem,
Yes, I agree. Last year in Simone’s term I suggested to the board that we move ROSNF into other languages, with the first one being Spanish. I think it would be very successful. The board informally agreed and we took some first initial steps, but we will need to have some bilingual members to help us with this. My vision was to have separate ROSNF groups/pages etc, that are completely in Spanish. Would you be interested in helping with such an endeavor? Or know some others that might be willing? Yes of course I remember ROTI_Latino very well and all the years we collaborated. I’m fairly sure the ROSNF board would be agreeable to this if we can come up with a reasonable plan. Let’s discuss this if you are interested.
Best wishes old friend,
Philip Merritt
I see that someone at RI is proposing that RI set up and exclusive social medium for Rotarians. I wonder who comes up with these ideas. Sure with ROSNF, ROTI, Facebook, Google +, etc, we don’t need RI spending our dues on something like this. Remember RICAS and RIDAS? Someone should do a bottom-up needs assessment instead of deciding “at the top” what is needed at the grassroots level. John
I am fully convinced in this John … We would not make the same mistakes of the past. Trying to leverage and integrate efforts, rather than trying to compete with others …
John, all
Currently there is a group of volunteer Rotarians working with RI staff to survey Rotarians and try to identify what if anything they would like RI to help provide to improve Rotary online communications and networking. Prior to the current effort, there have been several discussion threads on the RI Official Discussion Group on LinkedIn about it and the thing I think it is safe to say is that RI is not planning to build a private social network to compete with Facebook, LinkedIn, and other social networks. I believe what will evolve is a sort of Rotary hub which helps Rotarians find others on email, websites, and multiple social networks and includes ability to update and search Rotary profiles for members including things like classification, positions held, service project experience, etc.
Dear Don,
I am glad to read your words, because in Spain we’ve been working hard on the issue of communication, we call strategically: CERE: Spanish Rotary Electronic Communications, (I have a strategic document, in Spanish, I could share with you), from a few days ago appeared an offer of Rotary Social Network (www.rotarians.es), regardless of our coordinated action in this field, taking advantage of personal circumstances, little or no related to the four way Rotarian test… We are working to clarify this, and your premonitory words surely be of great help …