Here's the link to listen to the call: http://ds1.downloadtech.net/cn1086/audio/15017383991946-001.mp3

Unfortunately I couldn't get the recording to start until I managed to troubleshoot it a few minutes in so we didn't catch updates from Jesse and James. What you hear begins with Brent speaking.

Meanwhile, what an amazing, rich discussion! Thank you all for your thoughts and Esther, I'm so sorry you had trouble connecting. We've got to figure out a better way!

To recap, we discussed

1) Connecting with other organizations and how we might gain their presence on the Alliance, through their own dedicated pages? A "town square" where many like organizations would have offices, storefronts, groups? What do we have to entice them? What can the Alliance "sell" that no one is is offering in the midst of so many forums cropping up everywhere?  What kind of a re-org of the logistical site would be needed? How do we reach out to them?

2) Opening the Alliance for everyone to read--this way the reach would be far, far greater, but people would still have to be members to participate and post. Unfortunately the current technical platform doesn't allow us to offer partial posts and require membership to read the rest, nor to make certain sections open and not others (i.e. we can't make the Events viewable to the public but not the Forum). What we CAN do though is create groups that are private or require membership or an invitation to join (like this Board Group--no one can see or enter but us). Opening the Alliance would allow anyone to share blogs, events or posts they find interesting on social media.

2) Money. How can we make the Alliance sustainable? What would it take? We agree we can't suddenly start charging for something that's always been free. Can we do levels? Should there be a yearly fee for membership instead of the request for monthly donations? Can we create a vetted group of Educators who would pay to be able to present and use Alliance presentation software, groups and programs to share their material? If there's a charge, we could do a profit share. Can we create an archive of programs and offer members unlimited access for a monthly fee? Can we offer a regular (monthly/weekly) program of webinar followed by moderated community discussion so members feel connected and charge a flat fee each month? How much income do we need to do what we want to do?--i.e. pay someone to do a newsletter, web work to promote the educators or book club, e-zine layout, etc. If we open the Alliance we could potentially charge for advertising (far wider audience who will see them so bigger draw for advertisers)

4) Groups - Can we establish a new series of groups that would have Active moderators who hold that position for a term and are elected or re-elected each year, bringing in speakers for their group and hosting active discussion -- i.e. someone runs the Dream group and is responsible for making it a rich program. We could charge for these groups (and maybe even offer a profit share to the moderator?--just thinking: we didnt' mention this on the call).

5) Committees - Think about which initiative you personally would like to work on:

a.) Outreach to other orgs (and getting the word out or developing special offers for Alliance members)

b.) Member frequency -- getting members to come back often: special offers, fireside "chats", surveys & results, newsletter, teleseminars with community discussion every week, board postings/State of the nation updates, etc

c.) Community Education -- sourcing, vetting, and managing a group of Alliance member educators who are qualified to deliver good content and might be willing to pay a low yearly membership fee to be in this exclusive group giving them unlimited opps to present and access to Alliance teleseminar/webinar software, event postings, and promotion of their events. Potentially developing a tier of Alliance members who would pay for the education track--i.e. unlimited access to all events in the program for a year, or flat monthly fee for unlimited access to the archived presentations. Events to be free or charge for them? Mix? Profit share with presenter?

Other: The mission statement is starting to take shape but we probably can't complete until we have a little more insight into what new direction the Alliance might take based on all this. As Patricia noted, we're in the "soupy" phase of cocoon; things are being re-made. It feels very fertile and exciting to me!

There was probably much more. If you think of other items, please respond with them here...

We'll do another call in a month or so to do more discussion and brainstorming around all of this. I'll send you time/day in the next few days.

THANK YOU ALL!