Since this seems to be an interesting topic, I will go ahead and add more fineness of detail.
First, the reason I personally am interested in this survey as a communications person, is that I believe that looking at the actual data about how OSM'ers communicate may help the community uncover more effective ways to collaborate. It will almost certainly give much finer grained detail on how this large, diverse, global community connects online than any other study that I, personally, have seen. We believe that this research will have a direct benefit to OSM users. Though my colleagues work at TomTom, this project is not "for" TomTom, it is adjacent to their community engagement work and comes from our collective realization that there is a need for this kind of data within the community, and that we have the skills to provide it. Second, the survey is part of a bigger project; we have been looking at the publically available data on OSM communications channels for several months. By sending the survey out, we are looking for qualitative data to support our quantitative research; it is not our only data source. Third, re: our requirements.We had several requirements for what we needed the form to do and how we wanted to distribute it. One was that it needed to be mobile friendly, for the aforementioned reasons. We also needed it to be anonymous. We also needed to be able to make multiple, identical copies of the same survey because we are using a dedicated link for each kind of channel so that we can correlate responses to the type of channel in which the survey was accessed. We also needed the form to be able to handle certain types of question/answer combinations. We also needed it to be able to handle potentially hundreds of answers and collect the data in a way that we, with our limited time, could process. We looked at all of these things and also consulted with friends who are OSM users within communities in Africa and Asia on useability of the survey, as well as on best channels in which to post--this, as an anecdotal check on what we already knew from our preliminary data. Fourth, we took the feedback and are now going to offer a limesurvey as an option for those who cannot or do not want to take the Google survey, as a courtesy. We will report that choice as data as well. Fifth, I appreciate the concern about software that is not OS, but I thoroughly reviewed the FOSS policy quite recently and will call everyone's attention to language such as "we strongly prefer" and "we will consider a full range of criteria". https://wiki.osmfoundation.org/wiki/FOSS_Policy. As well, this is not an OSMF survey, nor is it a CWG survey. Yes, two of us volunteer for the CWG, but it is not formally "from" or "of" the OSMF. Many people study OSM and post surveys. We are amongst those people and are looking forward to presenting our findings back to the community in several phases over the rest of 2023. Speaking again as a communicator, and not for my team, but just myself, I think that we would do well to be wary of assuming that "access" means something like "100% of everyone everywhere can easily use all the time, no matter what". There is no such accessibility in any tool, anywhere in the material world, nor the existential one. Our aim was to distribute the easiest to use tool in the most often-used channels and to get as many surveys as we can, so that we can learn more about how this remarkable organization communicates. Finally, the best way to increase the efficacy, access, and inclusion in OSM communications is to get more data and study it. Therefore, I hope that readers of this forum will share the link widely within the listserv ecosystem. And, if you are on other channels, please amplify the link that is in that channel within that channel. As mentioned before, I do hope many folks tune in to our presentation in Richmond. I am the writer in the research group, not one of the analysts, but I believe the results are going to be surprising and interesting for many. On Fri, Apr 28, 2023 at 6:19 PM Andy Townsend <ajt1...@gmail.com> wrote: > On 28/04/2023 22:50, Allan Mustard wrote: > > Rather than criticize the CWG for using Google because certain people > > are restricted by their governments from using Google services, it > > would be more useful to suggest alternatives that might work in those > > countries. > > > Mikel already mentioned that OSMF had used Limesurvey earlier; that was > also what the DWG used when we last ran a survey a while back, and what > the organisers of this survey have suggested they will use it too (in > various of the other channels that it has been announced). I don't have > up to date info on where that might be blocked, but at least a couple of > the channels in which this survey has been announced have contributors > who may have more up to date info on whether something is reachable or > not - from both of the countries you mentioned.** > > Best Regards, > > Andy > > ** I'm not being more specific because I don't want to advertise an > activity that might be "frowned upon" in a particular country, or which > particular OSM channel people doing that might be found in. > > > > > _______________________________________________ > talk mailing list > talk@openstreetmap.org > https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk > -- --Courtney Cook Williamson survivalbybook.substack.com
_______________________________________________ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk
