It has been my honor and pleasure to be here, meet so many amazing and inspiring people and see so many positive actions. Thank you for your generosity. Thank you for managing the community/communities. And thank you for giving me an opportunity to grow.

Thank you too for giving us an opportunity to self-organize for transition.

A huge thank you to my many friends and partners in conversation and collaboration. Looks like graduation day is here.

Methinks this is going to take some processing!

The people and the actions and the things that have transpired here over the last three years will be a special bond for everyone that was fortunate enough to truly and deeply engage. I count many among dozens of o/net members as friends I truly respect, trust, and admire.

What matters most? The people. The friendships. The actions. The friendships. The connections. The partnerships. The bonds.

Those things can and will live on.

This new situation seems to provide the opportunity to help branch out into a possible ever-growing network of networks. Not one, but many (I'm guessing).

Remember...

Not an ending, but an evolution.

oh my goodness.

hmmmm, well, might as well get the 'negative' out of the way!

from the immediate negative view,

• "Thanks for wasting my time for almost three years!! I'll send ya a bill" hehe!

from the positive, not sure yet, need to think past the obvious of "the great members met here", to see if anything "good" can come from this move.

Question #1,

Does Omidyar Network have intentions of providing server space and maintenance for these new communities? if so, can we chose our own platform?

note: this is primarily a security concern, will Omidyar Network be around to insure that the data and sites are kept intact?

This news is disappointing - I've had the chance to poke around on the web quite a bit and I haven't found a place as easy, invigorating and compelling to use. Despite my history of contribution here, I don't feel like a moment of my time has been wasted - except perhaps in unproductive grousing... Best of luck to everyone, ON included, in your efforts to build and inspire new networks for action.

I do hope that O.net will find a way to make the zope development available to other users, perhaps as something like a quixote install wizard...?

also, if network members do find some 'magical' place beyond the rainbow to move to en masse, i hope that O.net will scrounge up some resources to help make any necessary tech upgrades effective.

cheers, and bon voyage - see you beyond the sea on some other island ;)

I'll be sad to see it end. But I'm interested in seeing what emerges. I think it is smart to support community sites which have a clear focus.

Will you continue to make the software plaform available for other communities?

Thomas and ON staff, this is by far the best "shutdown" notice I've ever seen. While I've always found plenty to criticize, I value very highly your good faith efforts to respect this community and the work that's gone on here. The rest is just details that will be moot in a few months anyway.

As for the actual transition, I see little point in migrating the community as a whole. It seems far more likely that groups of people working on specific areas will migrate their work. My hope for the transition is that we make sure we all stay connected to those people/areas we care about. If we can do that, it's all be a success, including the transition.

Absolutely Ted, and I echo Lars' sadness that the quality here will be hard to replicate anywhere else. Thank you for fostering this community and please do whatever we can together to migrate the useful resources compiled by us here into spaces where we can effectively communicate together again.

To all of you at Omidyar Network, thanks for your friendship and support as we grow new endeavors and communities.

I am processing this big change.

And I echo everyone's good vibes about this very interesting and wonderful community.

It's an interesting proposal as an evolution to divide in many different directions.

However, one thing I will really miss is the cross-pollination. I hope that the board - which we will choose ever so carefully - will consider that factor and perhaps find a way via technology for the transparent sharing of ideas.

In the future, even though our interests may be divided, I'd love to see something like Design Feed linking us all together. With tags.

Thank you to o/net for the 5 months I've shared here. I feel very blessed to have met quite an extraordinary group of friends and colleagues here that i believe will be lifelong connections.

hehehehe!!!

Brad Byrne asked:

Does Omidyar Network have intentions of providing server space and maintenance for these new communities? if so, can we chose our own platform?

The choice of platforms is up to the members to make, as is the decision around where to find hosting.

Arthur Brock asked:

Will you continue to make the software plaform available for other communities?

We'll continue to make the source code available for anyone to download and use, but we won't continue to host the platform on our own servers.

I am sorry to see this happen. I came here because it was the only site I could find that had a human trafficking discussion. While that turned out not to be the reason I stayed, it still is the only place with such a discussion

There are reasons that not that many folks come here, that Skoll has struggled with their forums, and that social topics on myspace facebook zaads etc are all a bunch of noise and not really worth the time.

I think that despite all the press and hype, there are very few people interested in social entrepreneurialism and fewer still that actual do it. For some reason the fact that this site was small and difficult to use helped keep it useful since it created a great forum for a core group of folks that clearly wanted to help each other out and learn from each other. I hope to stay in touch with that group. My personal preference would be not to attempt to split up into separate topic areas as I have seen absolutely no evidence that works elsewhere. So I hope this core group moves somewhere else.

Interesting plan of action, am looking foward to seeing what transpires.

Thomas Kriese said:

Brad Byrne asked:

Does Omidyar Network have intentions of providing server space and maintenance for these new communities? if so, can we chose our own platform?

Thomas reply's:

"The choice of platforms is up to the members to make, as is the decision around where to find hosting."

well, Thomas maybe I'm reading it wrong, but that appears like there is no real evolution planned, but more simply a shut down, am I wrong?

Considering that this platform created networking with individuals and organizations throughout the world, it is a definite disruption of supporting projects many have been working as a community.

Gulp!!

(that's PG-13 for my initial reaction! ;)

My second reaction is:

The evolution I see is in how the community of people (not in the platform itself) decides where to migrate to continue their work.

The platform itself (the technology) will be shut down at the end of the year after members have had a chance to download all the content they've contributed here.

We're launching tools by the end of the week that will make it a one-click operation to download an archive of all the content you've ever contributed to omidyar.net, or to download the entire contents of a group on omidyar.net.

Do we need to be members or owners of a group? What version of the workspaces will download? Will it come with revisions? what about tagging? what about polls and file uploads? for some us the massive amount of information (or is that my ego talking) would take a long time...can we download chunks? will we know the chunk size of information we are downloading? will there be assistance in moving that information elsewhere? is some group wants to take the whole site, can they? even if other groups want to go elsewhere? is that up to the board?

If you have a story to tell about people, projects, or onet itself, I encourage you to post them in Community Stories: http://www.omidyar.net/group/com munity_stories/. Feel free to create threads for each person or project.

it will be interesting how the press treats this, if any?

I have felt so connected to the world through Omidyar.net

I thoroughly enjoyed being able to pursue my personal interests, as well as to check in on the current interests of others that I have come know and respect in this community.

Although it seems like it will be harder to keep up with the different groups once they are not all "under one roof", I will continue to seek out many different people/groups after September. A list is forming in my mind...

It has been my priviledge to have participated here.

thank you for offering this magical place in which i discovered myself and found so many others with the deep heartfelt passion to make a difference. thank you for sharing your voices and honoring mine. thank you for allowing 3 years to pass so those relationships could deepen. thank you for setting the bar for what i prefer in any future community i choose to engage in. thank you for presenting an opportunity for a fresh start beginning from such a stronger sense of purpose. The shared knowlege here has opened my mind and heart wider than I ever thought possible - i am emotional but trust this again is just another beginning of more good things manifesting. thank you for the relationships I know will continue......... mushpot today ~ logistics tomorrow

Much to be said about this, and much that we all need to hear and feel.

A strong possibility for transition would be to move the source code to another server and manage the site ourselves, moidifying the interface as needed.

We should also have some conversations around other possible platforms. Like Lars, I have found none better. This site for all its flaws breathes, it allows both focus and freedom, and it amptly reveals itself, though coyly, it must be said. But at least it does open through these loose dizzying threads in ways that email lists and most forums do not.

I hope Thomas and Haney are ok with this change, what will you guys be doing?

I do think that evolution, transformation, revitalization are helpful frames rather than "shutting down," closing, etc.

I think it is worth considering what possible relationship to the LLC whatever emerges will have.

Lets be kind with each other in this transition and keep the fires of caring kindled that brought us together in these troubled but hopeful times. We will look back on all of this as something so precious.

Thomas wrote:

The evolution I see is in how the community of people (not in the platform itself) decides where to migrate to continue their work.

I think this is a really tough proposition to migrate O.net users, because there isn't one distinct "community" here. I'd say there are several (LiA, Foodchain, Network Weaving, etc), with - in some cases - overlapping interests. As a result, I am not certain 'the community of people' will be able to decide on a place to migrate.

I propose that every existing group that considers itself a "community" decide where it would like to go, and work with O.net to make that migration work smoothly based on their needs.

The platform itself (the technology) will be shut down at the end of the year after members have had a chance to download all the content they've contributed here.

We're launching tools by the end of the week that will make it a one-click operation to download an archive of all the content you've ever contributed to omidyar.net, or to download the entire contents of a group on omidyar.net.

That sounds pretty groovy!