An Idea for a Possible New Support Mechanism

I have been starting some discussions about possibly starting a new support mechanism for FreeToastHost. Specifically, I am interested in piloting a possible once a month web conference (e.g. Zoom) call for FreeToastHost that would be led/moderated by experienced FTH users (crowd-sourced) and would be open to any users of the system (first come, first serve up to 100 person limit allowed by Zoom). I have created this forum thread to allow for some feedback and discussion on this.

At this point, this is just an idea... nothing is committed. My thinking is that myself and 1 or 2 other people I know would lead the first 1 or 2 web confs as a sort of "pilot" to set the "tone", see how well this would work, determine level of participation by users, and work out any kind of "kinks". If we decided that we should move forward with a full roll-out, then ideally, we would come up with a few "cheat sheets", canned PowerPoints, evaluation mechanism, and "best practices" to ensure that the later web conferences are of good quality.

If we decided to move forward, we would want to solicit experienced FTH users to lead/moderate successive calls. Keep in mind that the idea is that these would be *crowd-sourced* from our huge user base with some oversight provided by us--that is a key consideration of this. The experienced users leading the web conferences could likely get TM project credit (assuming they get evaluated) and we would want to make sure that anyone leading the web conferences do a good job for participants and are technically accurate. Unfortunately, in the past I have seen some people spreading misinformation and inaccuracies about FTH outside of these forums in social media--I do not want to perpetuate that.

If you are reading this, you should not assume that this is a "done deal". Level of participation would be a key consideration for continuing to provide these web conferences, and one of the reasons I would want to make sure that whoever leads/moderates them does a good job.

Additionally, Zoom costs money for the version that I would want us to use (for longer than 40 minute calls). Somehow that cost (~$150/yr) would need to get handled. I have been thinking that perhaps I could set up a Patreon account to allow people to optionally pitch in a few dollars towards that. I do not think this is unreasonable even though we are *Free*ToastHost--many software companies charge extra for more "premium" support mechanisms.

Another consideration is the variety of timezones and possible language differences. That would also have to be sorted out...

Steve,

I think the monthly or quarterly FTH webinars would be a valuable addition to the already amazing support that the team provides to club website administrators. I would recommend that you consider a FTH 101 session and another session on latest updates/changes to help everyone keep up with all of the great work that the FTH team is doing to keep our club websites functioning behind the scenes. And, as you indicated, you could poll the website administrators to see what other topics or "how-tos" they may need as topics for additional regular webinars. Finally, if you record them, people could watch them later if they could not participate in the original event. This may help with the challenge of different time zones. You might also recruit other native language speakers to replicate the webinars in their language or region.

Thanks again for all that you and the FTH team do!

Happy Holidays!

Tonia Norman
Club 9325-55
txdot.toastmastersclubs.org

Tonia,

Thanks for the input.

Keep in mind that as I mentioned above, the goal would be to have these "crowd-sourced" by experienced users, so that we (the current FTH ambassadors) can continue to focus mostly on handling forum inquiries (which are free). The way I envision this working out:

1. Providing Zoom Account Access - me, but I will want some sort of contribution to the yearly cost somehow.
2. Scheduling / Sending out notifications of upcoming web confs - Me or any FTH Ambassador. Could add someone new to handle this.
3. Oversight of "newbie" moderators - Me or any FTH Ambassador. Could add someone new to handle this.
4. Content Development and Moderation of Web Confs - Crowd-sourced. Experienced FTH users. Could get TM credit.

As for content, I am thinking maybe half prepared content and half Q&A from the participants... could include ad-hoc demos, or handling some support requests.

Also, if any of you would like to be part of the initial team to do the "pilot" let me know. I would expect you to be very savvy with FTH and also very savvy w/ Zoom web conferencing. (Bonus if you have led web conferences via Zoom before. )

Awesome concept. Count me in. Donate...yes. As contributor ... yes.

FYI: I am going to let this thread "run" for a bit to collect responses before I take any action...