Almost all the written information you receive about League activities is official information. Official information is approved by a League president before distribution, e.g. your Voter is an official League publication.
"Conversations" among Leaguers are unofficial ways to share information. Conversations about League have generally been face to face or by mail or telephone with people you knew. Based on your knowledge of the "speaker" you could decide whether the information was sense or nonsense.
The sharing of unofficial information was limited, pre-cyberpublishing, primarily by cost. It was just too darned expensive for most of us to contact every Leaguer by mail or by phone. So, most of us conducted our conversations about League within our own Leagues.
This unofficial LWVUS Convention webpage is a "conversation" about Convention on a larger scale. I have always been a big fan of League conventions. And national conventions are the most exhilarating of all. In past years I have hosted pre-convention meetings for delegates from my geographical area. No one designated me to be the spokesperson about convention. But I am a "known quantity" and it was enough that I had been to conventions and was willing to share what I knew. In general, participants thought that the conversation at these pre-convention meetings was useful.
I am now going global with convention information. My goal is to gather (what I consider to be) pertinent information about convention in one spot online. I hope that you will find this useful. But there are dangers in doing this. This "conversation" is written. Written information seems to carry greater weight than spoken information. Another danger is that a reader could assume that because some of the material is from official sources all of the material is official. The reader might also assume that because I am writing about convention I have some official position or have been designated an official spokesperson. To guard against those mistaken assumptions I have put unofficial on every page with convention information. Please take that notice seriously. I, Barbara Wardenburg, have no direct pipeline to the national office. I get convention material from my LL president and from the LWVUS webpage just like the rest of you. I proofread the material I put on these pages, but I make mistakes. And I include only the stuff that interests me. :) I add material from my personal knowledge but my knowledge is limited. I don't claim that the information I offer about convention is, in any sense, complete. For official convention information you must go to the official sources: the materials that LWVUS mails to your League and the material on the LWVUS webpage.
There are other dangers lurking. If I can create a webpage anyone can do this. Gasp! Someone who might not be as loyal, trustworthy, honest, sincere, devoted, meticulous, etc. :) But, I saw the same dangers lurking when we, a couple of members, launched CyberVoter and the League e-mail lists so we created rules to guide these unofficial conversations and communications among Leaguers.
Here are the unofficial rules I have made up for what I call "League material/information on a League member's personal webpage".
I welcome your suggestions for additional rules.
And now, who am I? What are my bona fides?
I joined the South Palm Beach Co., Florida LWV in 1969 just as the women's movement was becoming active again. I was president of the SPBC LWV and attended the national convention in 1972 in Atlanta (and voted to include the Equal Rights Amendment in our Positions). I moved to Connecticut in 1974 and was on the Board of LWV Ridgefield and LWV Connecticut. I moved back to California in 1987 and was, for a time, on the Board of LWV Los Altos/Mtn. View Area.
In 1992 I saw a demonstration of e-mail (at a League meeting, of course), was converted and became a missionary. My missionary activities increased each year. At the 1992 convention I observed a demonstration of Compuserve, at the 1994 convention three of us worked out the beginnings of CyberVoter and at the 1996 convention I spent the entire time in CyberCorner talking about online communication. Not too long ago I could honestly say that I knew everything that the League was doing online and all the key players. It is with a great deal of pleasure that I acknowledge that, today, I don't even know everything that LWVCalifornia is doing online.
Barbara Wardenburg - barbward@pacbell.net
a member of the League of Women Voters of Los Altos/Mtn. View Area, CA
September 25, 2007