How to Use Discord to Attend a Community Call (Proposal)

Community Community Calls
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The SourceCred Community Call is for anyone who wants to learn about SourceCred or join the community. Everyone is welcome, regardless of experience or knowledge. The Community Call is a space for introducing yourself, posing questions and ideas, and getting to know other community members and what they are working on. Community Calls are every Tuesday at 11am PT.
Add to GCal

This guide is to walk you through how to set up and use Discord, how to find the SourceCred Discord, and what is waiting there for you!

  1. Download Discord
    Here is a Discord Installation Guide in case if you have any trouble.

  2. Find SourceCred: Once you are on Discord, find the search bar in the upper left corner. Search for ‘SourceCred.’ A list will appear with SourceCred at the top, with this icon next to it. :sourcecred: You can also just use this link once you have downloaded Discord and made a profile.

  3. Getting Started: You are now on the SourceCred Discord. From here, find the Getting Started branch on the left hand column and click on the README channel. This is a channel to welcome newcomers and provide useful links. (This is based on @LB’s Discord channel ReOrg)

  4. Join the Community Call: When it is time for the Community Call (every Tuesday at 11am PDT), look on under Voice Channels and click on the General channel. You will instantly join the voice channel, where you can hear everyone else on the channel and they can hear you. If you click on a different voice channel, you will automatically leave the General voice channel. It is okay if you join slightly early or late. Feel free to come with questions and ideas - this space is for you!

  5. Follow Along: Under Media, there is a channel called Community Call. Here, you can view and share relevant docs discussed during the Community Call, including the agenda for each call. If you click on any channel with a ‘#’ before the channel name, you will not leave the voice channel you are in.

  6. Chat with Fellow Community Members: You can chat privately with other community members both during and after calls. Right-click on a community member’s name and then hit ‘Add Friend.’ Next, click the Discord Icon in the top left corner. Then hit the + button next to Direct Messages to create a new DM.

  7. Come back!: If you have more questions, ideas, or want to understand more about SourceCred, come to the next meeting - each is different! If you’re interested in joining the SourceCred team, learn more about our weekly Team Call every Thursday at 11am PT. Add to GCal



    Questions:

  • Is there a better way to phrase 'the SourceCred Discord?"
  • Do we eventually want to include other resources for newcomers once they have been implemented? Such as all the welcome ideas @LB had for the Getting Started branch?
  • Which platform(s) do we want to include this guide in and which do we want to be the one we link in posts about Community Calls, such as on Twitter? There’s a Plugin Setup Guide on GitHub that’s a broken link but maybe exists somewhere…
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This is great! I think it needs a bit of tuning up, but having the foundation is fantastic. (which is the point of a rough draft)

I’ve given a bunch of #nit comments for the content you’ve written, but at the bottom of this comment I also express some thoughts on restructuring how this content could appear in our docs.

When it comes to polishing this doc up, it may help to answer the who, what, where, when, why, how questions.

Who: People who are interested in sourcecred, especially newcomers.

What: An hour long voice call where newcomers get the chance to introduce themselves, get a feel for the community, and learn about the project.

Where: In the Discord “General” voice channel

When: at 11am PT every Tuesday

Why: to provide our newcomers the opportunity to learn about what sourcecred is, to encourage newcomers to get more involved (with the help of some participation cred), and to build connection and trust between new members and existing members of the community.

How: By: getting discord, joining sc discord, joining the voice channel at the right time, and speaking up to get participation cred.

I think the most important things will be to convey who should be coming to these calls (so that new folks realize this is for them and don’t feel too intimidated to attend), what the vibe of the call is like, when to attend, and how to attend. I see the most effective version of this doc being one part guide, and one part invitation/explanation.

That could look something like:

"Every week SourceCred holds a Community Call with the purpose of creating space for newcomers to get to know the community in a synchronous way. If you’re new to SourceCred, the Community Call is a fantastic way to dig in deeper and find out what we’re all about. Come join us and take some time to introduce yourself and who you are, ask questions about the project and get some clarity, as well as feel out our vibe with some fun conversation! If you speak up, you’ll even earn some cred for it!

Our Community Calls happen every Tuesday at 11am PT in the SourceCred Discord voice channels. (Gcal)

If you aren’t familiar with Discord, below you’ll find a helpful step by step guide to joining our Discord community and finding our weekly Community Calls:"

Quick #nit I’d omit “in case” and just go with “…Guide, if you have any trouble.”

#nit “If you are using a web-browser to access Discord instead of installing the Discord Application, then you can also use this link to find our community.”

#nit I think the word branch may be a bit confusing. What about: “Getting Started category in the left hand column of channels”

#nit “This channel will provide you with links and access to some of SourceCred’s most useful documentation and getting started guides.”

#nit “scroll down to the bottom of the channels column on the left hand side, there you will find a category of “voice channels”. Within the Voice Channels category you’ll see one channel called “General”, this is where the Community Call takes place.”

#nit “By clicking on the “General” voice channel, you will automatically join the discussion happening there. This means that you will be able to hear everyone in the channel, and they will be able to hear you.”

Eventually, there will only be one “Call” channel in the “Community Category”, however this is accurate for now. Just noting that we will need to update it once the discord reorg takes place.

My version for the future when that’s done:

“Further up the channels column, you’ll find the “Calls” channel within the “Community” category. The “Calls” channel is for any text or links that may relate to the conversation happening in the voice channels. Here you may find a link to the notes being taken of the Community Call, links to things people mention during the call, or written replies if someone is having technical issues with their microphone. It’s usually a good idea to have the “Calls” text channel open while you’re on the Community Call so that you don’t miss anything. Clicking on any non-voice channel (any channel in the left hand column that has a “#” in front of its name) while on the Community Call will not take you away from the voice channel you’re listening to.”

Not sure if we should invite attendance to the team call in the intro to Community Call guide. I view the Team Call as something a community member should attend once they consistently have work to update us on, have enough context to help with strategy discussions, and may need help with ways their current work is blocked. I think that once someone starts coming to the community calls and engaging with the community regularly, they’ll have learned about the Team Call and we can have specifics/tone setting about it in its own guide.

  1. I think “SourceCred Discord” while a bit clunky at first, is a totally reasonable way to describe it. Maybe “SourceCred’s community Discord” if you want to go longer.
  2. Not quite sure what you mean. Are you suggesting adding links to the basic guides (like the ones in the Read.Me/SignPost channel) to this doc also? If so, I’m not sure it’d be necessary? Those links will be in the SignPost and if they’re reading this guide it’s probably because they’re already parsing through the docs. If we were to add some links, I think I’d add ones to guides that are the specific “next steps” after learning about the Community Call.
  3. Also a little confused by this question, are you asking where this guide should be available? I definitely think that “Joining The Community Call” could be on the SignPost channel in Discord, as well as in our Getting Started Docs on the Website.

Some other thoughts to chew on:

  1. I think we could rename this “How to Join a Community Call”, because there’s no way other than discord to do so.
  2. I envision a larger document that outlines the whole of Onboarding Machine Zone 1 (Introduce self on Discord, check SignPost and docs, poke through discord, join a community call) like a “Getting Started” how-to with links to more granular guides inside it. That way, newbs don’t have to sort through a bunch of guides, they have the master guide to follow step by step. So I may suggest dissecting this guide draft a little and turning it into two guides that can go in the Getting Started master guide:
  • How to join the SourceCred Discord, with discord download instructions.
  • How to join a Community Call, with specific instructions on how to do that within Discord.
  1. I think it would be beneficial to have a “Zone 1 Getting Started” guide that is the only guide newbs have to put their eyes on, and that it would link to more specific guides that folks can click through if they need them. I can put some energy (or we can collectively if you’re excited about it) into writing up a Discourse topic explaining the Onboarding Machine “Zone 1” concepts which can then be easily translated into a Getting Started master-guide on the website.

Hopefully that makes sense.

I’ve given a lot of #nit comments, but I don’t want that to overshadow how fantastic it is that you’ve written a draft for these concepts! Thanks for putting in the time Bex! (And I do quite like having this draft on Discourse, it’s personally way easier for me to respond to).

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Follow Up: Wrote up my thoughts around the Onboarding Machine and its system for guiding new contributors into SC. I think it could be helpful for the overall process of discerning which granular guides we need to write for the Getting Started masterguide:

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Hey, I was thinking about some image as well so as to make it more visual

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image1920×1080 528 KB

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having just come from the discord where they wouldn’t accept any of my email addresses but excited to join one of those meetings, how/where else can i interact with you guys if i want to contribute to the sourcecred team?

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Discord is where we hold meetings and coordinate much of our work. I’ll message you directly to help you get set-up.

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