There is a Less Wrong IRC channel somewhere. Maybe you could coordinate with the regulars there.
I've had more problems with skype and google hangouts than with tinychat (which is still being used for the lesswrong studyroom IIRC). I'd be in favor of having semi-regular virtual meetups.
If I were you I'd skip the democracy and simply announce a time and set of topics, like with the real life meetups.
Tinychat has the aggravating property of it being impossible to copy text from it. Which is annoying if something particularly witty/useful is said.
So, since tinychat seems to work, just use that and instead of the study hall where we all do work, in this we'll chat about...? I guess whichever topics are picked for that session.
I think we should plan set of topics to discuss. I prefer to start with the same topics that were discussed on the regular meet ups.
This sounds great, when and how? Video chat, phone, or just use multiple IRC rooms for different discussion topics?
Video and audio conferences are good if you have 3-5 people. But I think we will have more participants, so multiple IRC rooms devoted to the different topics should work better.
I think this is a fabulous proposal. I'll lay out a few ideas I have regarding functionality of the platform and I'd love to get some input:
I think it would be great to have one overarching "virtual meetup" that would have a broad structure/agenda. Once a user enters the virtual meetup, they are then presented with a layout that illustrates the numerous rooms that are currently active, presentations that are occurring, etc.
The user would be able to see everyone else who is participating in the meetup, and has the opportunity to send private chats/ video requests throughout all those involved.
The only issue is that all the platforms highlighted above aren't capable of hosting a unified "meetup" that would encompass multiple rooms and the ability to search/message all users involved
I would like to consolidate LW members in a new way. I believe we can organize an on-line gathering in some form, for example as a set of chat rooms to discuss different topics in the real time. This event can be announced in advance to help everyone to arrange plans. I hope the discussion can be more intense and productive than in chats that open for prolonged periods of time. And comparing to the lesswrong.com this event should give some feeling of a real conversation, which I can not get while posting articles and comments here.
If you have any additions, ideas and proposals please let me know.