Did you ever bury a time capsule? During my elementary school years I distinctly remember my 2nd grade class burying a time capsule deep (well likely no more than 2ft) beneath the tulip beds in front of the school. The time capsule contained letters to our future selves, news articles from 1985, small toys and keepsakes that we each contributed, and was locked with the combination hidden away. The idea of a time capsule is to be able to preserve that moment in time and look back years later at the nostalgia of that time in your life. I cannot remember if that time capsule was intended to be recovered and discovered 5, 10, 25 years into the future (all past) or even later. I certainly was not there at the time if it has already been unearthed.
Did you know that the Atlassian Community is a time capsule of sorts too? There are hundreds of thousands of posts that are living in the community. Some of them are a peek into the past. The past of the product, the process, the Community. Many questions are no longer relevant, yet the questions and answers remain. Many products have undergone so many developments and facelifts the articles, discussions and questions from just a few years ago seem to be foreign. The Community itself has evolved, developed and matured and just a look back at some of the posts from a few years ago can seem anachronistic. But they are all our time capsule. A peek into that moment in time, and can still bring inspiration, introspection and interest.
I recently participated in a group volunteer effort led by Community Managers @Monique vdB and @Saralie to re-classify all of the off-topic posts from the INTEREST off-topic to the COMMUNITY GROUP The Watercooler. This required the group to click in to thousands of posts, determine where they belong on the Atlassian Community and relocate them to their appropriate spaces. There was a lot of time capsuling going on!
Looking back, I discovered the following:
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off-topic was really something powered by the Community Manager team in it’s early days. Almost all of the Friday Fun, Miscellaneous Monday and Welcome Wednesday posts way back when were from @Monique vdB and @Bridget Sauer. Shoutout to @Meg Holbrook for really launching Miscellaneous Monday and @AJ Barks - Old Street(in his previous rendition) for keeping it going!
- The oldest post in The Watercooler is from May 2011
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The first off-topic tagged post was in April 2017
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2018 was a watershed year for off-topic, it really took off during that era
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The COVID-19 pandemic was the pivotal moment in off-topic. So many contributors to articles and discussions during the pandemic created a living time capsule of what it was like to live, work and just survive during that period.
With the time capsule theme in mind I wanted to (re)surface some time capsule content I found interesting, engaging, quirky and fun (some all at the same time!) during my tour through the gone but not forgotten off-topic.
Have a Happy Monday, and please…
Have a great week ahead!
