Drumbeat/events/SanDiego/outreachletter1

Good Afternoon,

Thank you for your interest in Drumbeat San Diego. The event will be happening Saturday, February 5th from 12:30-6:30 at the Queen Bee Art and Cultural Center. Registration is free, but we have limited space so please register today at 

http://www.newmediarights.org/drumbeat/register

This is a unique, very different type of event than what you have probably attended in San Diego. It is a highly-participatory event that will give you a great opportunity to meet a diverse mixture of web developers, graphic artists, programmers, idea people, filmmakers, activists, community organizers, and creators of all types that want to be involved in projects that better our community and the larger world.

The Drumbeat initiative is based around the idea that an open web is essential to innovation and education, and the goal is to cross-pollinate ideas from creators of all types to advance projects that better our community and the larger world. If you would like to learn more about the philosophy behind the event please read our introduction to this event.

As a key element of the event, we now have open submission and voting for project ideas on the Drumbeat project site. Once you have submitted an idea to the Drumbeat project page please fill out the form on the New Media Rights Project Proposal Page. We look forward to seeing your ideas !

On the day of the event, in addition to participatory sessions where participants can discuss their views and interests in the open web, we will be working together and in smaller groups to actually make progress on 3-5 projects. The Drumbeat project site has many great projects that people all over the world have pitched. The site helps to build a community, sometimes worldwide, around the project. So take a look at some of the projects at http://drumbeat.org, share your own project, and then get help moving it forward at Drumbeat San Diego by submitting it! We're looking for projects that merge great tech tools and community engagement.

The event will also include speed geeking circles (similar but less stressful than speed dating!) which will offer an opportunity to meet and network with the types of people that you need to move your projects forward.

If you would like to learn about how we have been organizing for the event please visit the San Diego Drumbeat Mozilla Wiki. We also will be adding to the Drumbeat Agenda on the New Media Rights site. This way you can see what is going into creating this event. Please comment on the different elements if you would like to add some information or insight. If this event is interesting to you, let us know how you would like to be involved. We are working with volunteers, some who want to spend a couple hours a week or some a couple hours a month contributing to the projects. Contact us if you would like to help out, or have any questions.

If you would like to recieve our monthly newsletter on new work that New Media Rights is doing you can subscribe to the newsletter.

Thanks !

Art Neill & Mera Szendro Bok
New Media Rights