Gridwide Auction Calendar - Continue or Discontinue?

[Ivy Lane]

I personally love and hate the grid wide auction calendar. I love it because as a tool it's a wonderful thing to help the community know what is going on. It is a great tool for auctioneers to attempt to schedule sequentially instead of on top of each other, thus improving the auction experience and service to the community. Competition can be healthy but if you have too many auctioneers and auctions and not enough buyers many will not survive if they are not well attended. Personally I would love to see an Auctioneer's Union and not just for KittyCatS but for all communities that utilize auctioneers. It would be a place that could create a set of rules, regulations, ethics and morals for the Auctioneering community.
But that is not the question Bree has asked. Personally I like the calendar for the most part, it is a great tool for the KittyCatS community. I used to be a mentor in the early days of Second Life and old habits die hard; I keep a folder in my inventory of information cards I have collected including URLs and SLURLs for new comers to learn about breeding and community events. I spent many months lost, wandering, not knowing what was going on until the last minute or too late, and dependent on people who may have had their own agendas. Information promotes personal power and helps the buyers and sellers. So I give out my little folder of information to anyone who says "yes I would love one, ty" . One of my favorite things is teaching, helping and mentoring people so it makes me happy to help in what ever way I can.

I do like the set of rules for the Grid Wide Calendar that Fabao set forth in his logical manner although I strongly believe that times need to be associated with the auctioneer who uses that time slot. I would like to see the calendar continue if it's not too much bother and frustration for you (Bree and your new assistant). Maybe something that promotes knowledge of it's existence so that more can use it would be a good thing as well.

Phil Metalhead suggests trying to use Google Calendar for the Grid Wide Calendar. The reasons he suggest this are
1. The calendar can be made public and easily shared like other Google Docs (the process is a little harder, but once it's set it's done)
2. Overlapping events are natively supported; you can have an auction that runs from noon to 2pm, and an auction that runs from 1:30pm to 3pm, and Google Calendar will neatly layer the events on the calendar
3. Events can have a short title (e.g. auctioneer's name), and then a lengthy description that can contain more information such as location, auction type (patron, etc), and SLURL
4. Events can be color-coded -- this would be most useful to highlight charity events, etc
5. An "All Day" event that repeats forever can be posted that contains instructions and other useful info, and it will appear at the top of each day in the calendar
6. More complex schedules are easier to set up (e.g. an auctioneer alternates each week between normal and patron auctions)