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Page ContentsIntroduction
Commenting
Joining the Discussions
Signing In
Contributors/Speakers
Moderators and Expert Panels
Volunteers
Sponsorship and Support
Help Wanted
IntroductionThere are various ways in which you may wish to treat the meeting. Since this is intended above all to be a collaborative enterprise – but also something that will be useful for those who are interested in the issues but for one reason or another not able or interested in contributing – it will be useful if we take a moment to clarify. There are basically a handful of options, including:
This can take several forms, all of which are invited. On the one hand you are asked to let us know what you like and don’t like about the Web site itself. What we might try to do to improve some specific parts of it. We also will be interested in hearing from you about software that we should be trying to integrate into the conference to do some useful jobs. And other sites and programs to which we should be linked. And people and lists of people whom you think should be informed about this activity. As you will note, we have made it very easy to contact the organizers in any of a number of locations across the site. They are there for you to use. One is right here: 
Another, here: 
This of course is one of the main objectives of the conference, and we hope that you will give it a try. In the first weeks this will proceed entirely by direct e-mail. You comment directly to the postmaster at postmaster@the-commons.org, and he then (poor soul) will manually review and add your contribution to the relevant discussion area. In the various tracks of the conference, the discussion is being handled by the volunteer Moderator, in conjunction with members of the Expert Panel). In a few weeks however, we hope that this will be fully automated and rendered even more easy and productive. You will be kept informed about this on the site itself.
We are hopeful that most of you will chose to let us know a bit about yourselves and perhaps what you would like to get from the conference. We have tried to make this very easy, as well as to organize things such that you will not be pestered by more email and information than you really want. For this, we invite you to move over to the Registration Desk right here.
The organizers are inviting papers, thinkpieces, and even full reports that can make the various conference tracks fuller and more interesting experiences for all concerned. We are – it is worth pointing out – looking for great variety in thoughts and points of view. Our conclusion is that the various approaches that have been relied on until now – whether in the policy or the research and scientific communities -- are still showing themselves altogether inadequate in fare of the challenges.
So new thinking, new directions, and new interactions are encouraged. Of particular interest are approaches that can help bridge the gap between expert knowledge at the leading edge on the one hand, and the actual direction that policy and individual decisions are being taken on the other.
We also are eager to get contributions that make use of media other than print. So if you have a video presentation, an audio session, interesting graphics that make a point, chat sessions, WebCasts to other ideas to share with us, well.. we are just waiting to hear from you and work with you to figure out how to share the best off these ideas with the others involved.
These hold the keys to the success of this whole venture. Each conference track has its own moderator/expert panel team, and while the first experts to join in will usually be among the moderator’s colleagues and contacts, it is hoped that others will steadily step forward to join this more active, core group in each case.
The role of the panel members is usually worked out in arrangement with the moderator in charge. In some cases the cooperating experts will want to share the first rounds of comments and proposals to the team, and to reply as they feel most appropriate. We are hopeful that the panel members will also take a more active role in developing new papers and thinkpieces, in the discussion sessions, and in pointing out yet other programs and sites to which our discussion should link. In order to be put in touch with the moderator in charge of the track covering your particular interests, we invite you to go directly to teh entry page of the track that interests you in particular, where you will find all that you need to take contact with the moderator and other team members.
Organizing and maintaining a conference and Web site as ambitious as this requires considerable resources and effort. Until now most of this has been on a volunteer basis, and we are hopeful that others of you will get in touch and let us know of your interest in lending a hand. Technical help that can permit us to make the various multimedia extensions needed are high on the list, but help is also needed in site maintenance, correspondence processing, editing and translations. This is the place to get in touch to discuss any eventual contribution on your part.
Thus far financial support has been received that is adequate to cover about ten percent of the total program costs. We are hoping that some groups or institutions may be sufficiently impressed by what we are doing to help us not only reach beyond what we have thus far achieved in order to make a better and more powerful site, but also that help may come in to cover come of the debts that have been incurred to get things this far along. Your ideas, suggestions and help here will be most appreciated.
Technical help and financial support is wanted for the following tasks, which are possible, certainly useful for the conference, but beyond our present budgetary possibilities:
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