By Brian Douglas
As more OWS supporters started to come out of winter/holiday hibernation, I decided I wanted to start focusing on connecting at a local level. The events I participated in during the end of 2011 were all “standalone” and I was looking to find a group I could meet with regularly and help create something more cohesive and sustainable. After some Googling, I found OccupyBK.org’s Bushwick group, started chatting with a few other members, and we decided to get together.
About six of us, counting my fiance Deb and myself, ended up meeting at Kave on Wednesday 1/25. We had an open conversation about our backgrounds, core issues, and what we are looking to accomplish through OWS. The consensus was to meet again the following Wednesday and to try and keep GAs going on a regular basis. We knew that it would be inappropriate to set any formal agenda with so few people, so we left that open and just focused on spreading the word. The goal at this point would simply be to bring in more people and listen. We also agreed that it would be good to have one person give a half-hour skill-share or teach-in at each week’s meeting. I volunteered to do the first one, focused on helping people to consume and contribute to the digital conversation more efficiently and effectively.
At 7pm on 2/1, the following Wednesday, my family and I arrived at Kave, taped one of our “OCCUPY BUSHWICK” flyers to a table, and waited for people to arrive. Within ten minutes, the cafe was filled with Occupiers, most of whom I had never met before. Since that night was unusually warm, we opted to take the gathering out into the courtyard behind the coffee shop. I setup two laptops, one for live streaming and another for demonstration purposes, and I commenced my skill-share. I primarily focused on social networking, micro-blogging, and leveraging the tools on occupybk.org. I emphasized that all of these are most effective when they are supported by offline interactions such as meetings like these. I wrapped up my talk going over an info page I designed with a basic primer on HTML tags and useful links for participating in OWS digitally.
