Stanley Park announces the new Korean Open Space website and adds:

For many of you who find Hangeul (Korean language) rather uncomfortable, please just enjoy viewing two videos of OS events here and here. When the site becomes fully in operation, it will have a section in upper right that serve our friends whose language is not Korean.

I can’t read Korean, but it sure looks like Open Space to me!

Harrison shared the following today on OSlist:

Every now and again we seem to get ourselves involved here on OSLIST in
creating and comparing “elevator speeches” about Open Space. I have never been very good at all that, but a young Korean friend caught me early in the
morning on the shuttle to the airport. Given the hour I wasn’t sure how it
would all turn out, but I guess it is a good picture of The Hat. And for
sure it is the shortest speech I have ever given. If interested, check out

http://youtube.com/watch?v=TDi0GLTO9ao

Jost Wagner is a Thailand-based German facilitator and consultant working in the Asian region and beyond primarily working on development issues. He sent this news and video from Bangkok:

Media fighting stereotypes - a short Open Space Session in a unique environment.

In September 2007 the German Friedrich-Ebert Foundation (FES) organised an Open Space Session during the Asia-Pacific and Europe Media Dialogue taking place in Germany and jointly organised by Deutsche Welle and Asia-Broadcasting in order to create a dialogue about the role of media - especially TV and Radio - can play in fighting stereoytpes and discrimination. Participants were senior members of broadcasting authorities and broadcasters from Asia and Europe and many other invited guests from politics, industry and civil society. The Session took place in the former German parliament in Bonn - a very unique and challenging environment. The Open Space was facilitated by Janice Lua from Singapore and Jost Wagner - a Thailand-based German facilitator. FES sponsored also a production of a short and nice video.

The space looks a bit unusual, but clearly the spirit of this event was completely Open Space. That you can hear in the many participant comments in the video. Nice work, Jost and Janice!

Marty Boroson has developed a video companion to his book, Becoming Me, inspired in part by open space. Acclaimed by spiritual leaders of different faiths, the clip has been posted to YouTube. Becoming Me is a simple, daring, and moving story of your/my creation.

This resource might be considered as another video to inspire one’s open space practice. An addition, perhaps, to this collection?

Raffi Aftandelian writes from Russia:

Phillip Guzenuk, a young St. Petersburg (Russia) trainer saw OST applied at an Intertraining (professional association of trainer and consultants in the NIS) annual conference in Moscow last year.

OST was something he had been looking for, which led him and colleagues to start a “Director’s Club”, a professional networking space for St. Petersburg CEO’s.

This first meeting, which brought together 60 CEO’s, was titled “In the fight for talent”.

I love the contrast of the handwritten signs and the hotel space

Guzenuk made a video which you can see here.

I love the way the pre-conference conversations mimic the in-conference conversations.

Here’s a cool short (less than 2 minutes) video from a health policy open space in India in December, 2006.

Sharon Quarrington shared this, via the OSLIST, on the Toronto Transit event previously reported here:

A group in Toronto held a “camp” for the Toronto Transit System - and
their opening is posted on YouTube:

I found it very interesting - how it was similar to and yet different it was from the OS openings I am most familiar with. I found I missed many of the “traditional” elements that were skipped - and yet wonder if perhaps that is just me being stuck in a rut!

I think not a rut at all. The “camp” and “unconference” movement and language is flourishing in the info tech world, which has embraced “open space”, but seems to have lost some of the “traditional” elements Sharon refers to. I, too, think something is lost without some of these elements, a certain elegance and ease in the opening process and story.

Opening can be easier than it sounds here, I think… and And AND… it obviously still worked. I’m glad to see opening practices seeping into the management of urban transit and other community institutions. I’m glad to see real work getting done with circles, invitations, marketplaces, and references to The Law of Two feet. I’m glad to see people making and sharing videos like this, that show real people practicing in this way. So props for opening practices and public sharing!

See (hear) also our podcasts archive for two (audio) recordings of more “traditional” openings by Chris Corrigan and Harrison Owen.

What do you think? What does it take to make an opening open?

This is just about the coolest bit of OS documentation I have ever seen. There are words about this event at Johnnie Moore’s Weblog, but this is the cool part, posted at YouTube… Open Space in 30 seconds, time-lapse video of his one-day event at the BBC.

London-based facilitator Johnnie Moore describes how Open Space Technology works in this short video clip from a recent event he did on education and social software

More and more, traditional conferences are being called to answer for the big wastes of time that many (most?) of them really are. The best parts are always the coffee breaks!

The term that keeps popping up is Unconferencing. Johnnie Moore offers this podcast of a Skype conversation with Chris Corrigan and Rob Paterson, talking about Unconferencing and Open Space Technology.

How can we get away from unsatisfying conferences where the audience is often bored, towards much more engaging learning events? Listen here…