did anyone make this meeting?

i am guessing that other bloggers got this meeting email. i didn't make it, i opted to have dinner with my wife. wondering though if others made it and what all happened with it.

PRIVATE INVITATION TO BLOGGERS
January 29, 2007

Good news! After two years of work redesigning UMC.org and adding new features, we’re officially launching the site on Monday, January 29! And we want you to be a part of it.

United Methodist Communications invites you to a launch event for bloggers where we will introduce the site’s new design, demonstrate its innovative features, answer your questions and discuss the church’s decision to take this “generation next” approach. 

The new UMC.org is about relationships, connections and bringing people of faith together in new ways. The site was created after more than 250 church members, leaders, and seekers around the world were interviewed in the research phase of the redesign.  This research led to the use of many innovative technologies and features, including:

· The new UMC.org Community, the first large-scale social networking site developed by a mainline denomination, where you can establish a profile, blog, name others as “friends,” and a lot more.

· “Our People” section, where visitors can identify and find ways to use their individual talents, and read inspirational stories of faith.

· “Pray” tab, where visitors can submit a prayer request asking others to remember their needs in their prayers.

· “Serve” section, which helps people connect with volunteer opportunities locally and around the world.

· MethoPedia, or the United Methodist encyclopedia, offers a subject-specific view of all resources and stories from the denomination.

We hope that you will want to review our site and help us to spread the word about the new UMC.org.  Join us!

WHEN:           Monday, January 29, 2007
7 p.m. ET/ 6 p.m. CT/ 4 p.m. PT

WHERE:  Web Link:  http://umc.acrobat.com/launch

NOTE: After clicking the link, select ‘Enter as Guest’, type your first & last name followed by the organization/site you represent, and then click ‘Enter Room’.

Comments

[beth]

Yep, I was there. Tomorrow I will be posting about it. It was - well - they didn't say much that I couldn't figure out by looking at the site. They had a Q & A time after their presentation, but there weren't many questions (I didn't ask any) - I just made my little 'profile' on the site - it's no myspace, but I think it might be fun once it gets rolling...

[John I. Carney]

If you want to hear the entire conference call, they said they were going to post the audio at http://umc.org/launch . The audio should be pretty much self-explanatory, since the visuals were just static screenshots of each page on the UMC site.

I do a lot of conference calls in my work with the paper, and I have to say they handled the Q&A portion of this one rather badly. The conference call service had the highly-desirable feature where everyone is muted by default, and if you want to ask a question you hit *1 (or some similar combination) to put yourself in a queue. But the UMC people specifically asked for this to be turned off so that everyone could speak at once. This was a horrible idea which caused immediate technical problems. I could hardly comprehend any of the other questions, and when I was asking my own question I was thrown off by hearing my own voice, delayed by half a second, coming back at me.

[gavin]

sounds like i didn't miss much. i'll look to catch up with yall thoughts (assuming john will blog it too). thanks for the audio note too john.

[natalie]

I got the email as well... but I forgot about it. Ah, well. I'll just look forward to reading Beth's post! : )

[Josh Tinley]

I missed it too, even after I'd RSVPed. I've really become a flake lately.

[Mark Youngman]

Thanks for asking the question. I wasn't going to use the word "flake" but I RSVP'd too. I chose to dance around the living room with my daughter instead.