@Camilla: One key choice we have is between a 5 star type rating or a +/- rating for content.

Five star vs. Ned +/-

Benefits

Perhaps more positive (i.e. you can diss content with 1 Star rather than use a '-') - is that more WE?

Allows a user to be really positive +5, +4 positive, lukewarm +3, somehwat unhappy +2, or very unhappy +1 (ned only allows +1 positive and presumably -1 very unhappy)

Easier to understand the resulting rating which is a number from 1 to 5 (when compared to ned scale that goes from -1 to +1)

Standard approach on larger sites like Amazon so users familiar with UI

Downsides

Doesn't force a user to choose a positive or a negative rating

Doesn't easily allow the community to eliminate content based on many '-' rankings. But the 'Flag' for review button presumably achives the same purpose.

My bias 5 Star rating .....

With Peak Oil at an average above $3.70 a gallon in the US, it is an absolute imperative that we shift our thinking from the social patterns and demographic shifts that began after WWII.  With the onset of the Eisenhower Interstate Highway System and Suburbia, Americans began a shift to a future that through no fault of our own was simply an unsustainable way of life.  During the Mid to late 1960s when social unrest was alive and well in American cities, the people who were upwardly mobile moved onward and outward.  The desire for safe communities, good schools, and the American Dream drove millions of Americans out of the urban centers of America to the new Abyss: Suburbia.  It has become increasingly apparant over the last say two years that new population centers that simply did not exist twenty years ago are rapidly becoming the New American slums.  A very good example of this is Elk Grove, CA.  Elk Grove was a rural farming community to the south of Sacramento CA that until the 1990s and it had livestock and barns. The new landscape became rapid development, cheap real estate, developer greed, and suburban sprawl.  Elk Grove became the suburban American Dream with strip malls, shopping centers, endless subdivisions and the same desires that Americans have always had.....simply a better way of life.  During the insanity of the Not-So-Real-Estate scam  that the mortgage, real estate, and building industries perpetrated on a rather naive American public, Creative Financing, Alt-A, ARMs, CDOs and HELOCs became the new American way of life and the Dream of home ownership became a reality for anyone with a beating pulse.  The reality was that it was mortgage ownership and the reality of home ownership was only a misguided delusion for many. Today these once thriving communities have become virtual ghost towns.  In many cases, whole neighborhoods have been FORECLOSED and crime and vandalism have become rampant.  The further from the urban centers, the more likely these communities will become financially-engineered ghost towns.  Whole neighborhoods have become REO slums with "foreclosure tour busses" and very few takers.  REO Auctions with not so many buyers.  .   This scenario has played out in almost every "hot" real estate market in the country.  Developers and Wall Street began a series of events that may very well take down our once flourishing American economy and currency.  Only time will tell!!

How can we possibly pick up the pieces from such a social disaster?  I believe that a drastic shift of thought about priorities will be our only hope for survival.  It is very apparant that Corporate ownership of our Government, the psychology of American Consumerism and continuing our unsustainable ways of life are a recipe for disaster.  Only through smart and well thought out alternatives will we be able to survive.  We have the technology for smart and sustainable living in a New Urban environment if we only allow ourselves to stop and realize that the decisions that we make now will decide our futures.  We have the ability to redesign our urban centers in such a way that they become pleasant places to be. Centers for Living, the Arts and a cohesive Community.    We have the ability to incorporate sustainable alternative energies as part of the urban host through Green Infrastructure  in lieu of how we sustain our needs today.  We have the ability and intelligence to incorporate high-speed sustainable transportation systems within our environment to save our home: Planet Earth.  We as citizens have the ability to make those changes and  to vote for the candidates that will embrace our visions of the future.   I recently saw Leonardo DiCaprio's movie The 11th Hour and I believe that it should be required viewing for all.  In my opinion, he was able to state our case for the future without unnecessary and needless drama.  The cinematography was beautiful and it would be a good primer for Environmentalism 101.for anybody  It was a film that I would highly recommend to anyone that has not seen it.  It would be very insightful to hear others vision for a New Urbanism and how you envision life after the Housing Bubble in America and the seemingly economic disaster we are facing in 2008.  Any ideas, new visions or commentaries?

I think this is a good idea.

It' been suggested several times in the past, but oerhaps we can discuss further how this should look like and how it will integrate with WiserEarth's platform and existing features?

This book changed my life and brought me to a new level of activism. i highly recommending taking part in the Work that Reconnects with your community. There are practicioners all over the world sharing this work and helping activists move throught the emotional barriers we have about facing the greatest global crisis imaginable.

Check it out!

Hi Bowo,

It is inspiring to be working on an open project with a community of people who genuinely care so much. Since accountability, integrity, and transparency are so key to protecting and preserving our values, I can assure you that I will gladly share what it is that I know. 

For me, it has always been just a matter of when and how we include supportive businesses and government agencies.  At the same time there must be a clear values alignment amongst the participants whether they are affiliated with public, private, or civil society.  

Our experience has been that just and lasting change requires being inclusive and inviting those that have the power, authority and influence to the table to help bring about change.   Effective policy changes can go a long way to change the conditions in which NGOs operate.    The marketplace and its demand for innovation can help be a driver for social change and the flow of capital.

I am the executive director of the interra project, The work of the interra project is focused on three way partnerships -- the bottom up, the top down, the outside in.  This is true for the foodsystem work we've been doing in California and in the Pacific Northwest.  We all have groups on WiserEarth but have reached the limit of what we can do to include all the relevant and affected parties.

Of course they can add themselves as individuals.  That is appropriate and a necessary first step.  But we also want to identify and relate to the organizations that they represent.  My recommendation is that we simply extend the type field and the activity field to include organizations that are public and private.

As long as anybody can edit an organizational profile and comment on an organizational profile we can hear from all of us. We can at least start down this path and see what shows up. 

What I know from the wiserearth partners meetings and from my conversations with Paul Hawken and Peggy Duvette is that they are open and looking forward to the community as a whole taking greater and greater responsibility for the direction and future of WiserEarth. 

WiserEarth can become a critical place for finding and connecting to each other as we journey together toward our new tomorrow.  I look forward to our working together.  Thanks to everyone for their contributions!

Disregard my comment below on having lots of stats on a user's profile page - I dont think they should be very prominent. Hiding under  View Your Personal Activity Report in the Activity Reports tab is fine.

I agree - this will also help us to move forward with the recognition of user contribution.

hallo Hans,

het is lang geleden, maar misschien herinner je je me nog. Ik heet Cécile van Laar.

Ik ben in Alphen aan de Rijn bezig geweest met de Coupépolder (ben ik nog) en was technisch en juridisch adviseur van diverse milieu- en natuurgroepen. Daarna heb ik in Provinciale Staten het woord voor GroenLinks gevoerd op onder andere de gebieden groen en milieu. Om gezondheidsredenen verliet ik de politiek, ben geen lid meer van een partij, ben wel nog actief bezig ( zij het op een lager pitje) met milieu en natuur. Ik ben inmiddels verhuisd naar Gouda en ik ben voorzitter van de Stichting Waakhond.nl en zit in het bestuur van het Zuid-Hollands Landschap. Binnen Wiser Earth ben ik op zoek naar nederlanders om te bezien of er een nederlandse groep is of op te richten is als focuspunt voor Nederlandse 'activisten'.

M.vr.gr.

Cécile