I just caught up with Anthony last Sunday on the advise of pauchai to discuss on how MFM can better engage its community and on furthering MFM outreach to the masses. Anthony also discussed briefly with myself on the areas of strategic planning and for me to open up the topic for discussion, review and feedback by the community.
This document is NOT complete; each post from me should be approximately 25% of what I need to write, if not for the fact that I have been tied down with lots of incoming project work these 2 weeks I would complete this faster.
Overview
- MalFreeMaps ('MFM') is the de-facto user generated garmin mapset for the Malaysia and Singapore region.
- MFM mappers and contributors perform their work with transparency, ethics and professionalism.
- MFM adopts a "release fast, release often" strategy, empowering its community to contribute, check and correct the MFM mapset rapidly and precisely.
It is proposed that MFM will work on further improving the following aspects in 2009:
1. community engagement and contribution
2. MFM organization direction and roadmap
3. capabilities building and standards
Present Day Situation
MFM has adopted a mapper-focus since its inception in 2008; marketing, outreach efforts and communicating with the community and public-at-large has not been a priority. While MFM has gained accolades for its efficiency in map releases, it has been slow to move out of the shadow of its former community. This has lead it to be open to assault, in part due to the lack of infrastructure to effectively reach and engage and in another part, due to the lack of strategic direction and positioning.
There has been growing number of Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt and Misinformation campaigns being semi-systematically waged on the MFM community on a regular basis. Noted response by the MFM community tend to be via forum posts rather than formal notices, lacking authoritativeness and showmanship.
Current contributors tend to be extremely technical and almost exclusively middle age male; by virtue of the difficulties in contributing, many willing-and-able individuals are either apathic or turned off. Additionally, the single point of failure within the communications loop is Anthony as there is no clear organizational structure of which specific areas of strategic responsibility and communications (apart from mappers for each state) can be taken up and deputied, and of which specific areas of contribution are in need of assistance.
