The Maryland LoCo Team's Future Activites

As we have discussed at previous meetings, there are a number of things we can do as a LoCo team, and I've been wanting to post a thread about this for a while. I decided not to because I didn't think anyone would respond and the lack of enthusiasm for the team would further depress my own (enthusiasm, that is).

Ideally, I'd like us to use this thread to discuss the following:

• What is (or SHOULD be) the core function of our team.
• Why did you join the team? What do you think about it?
• Finally, what do you think our team should be doing?

I'll start.

So far, the events have sort of been planned haphazardly, without much discussion on what the purpose of these events are. Frankly, I think this is a waste of time and energy and I think it severely alienates members who cannot be present. If you look at the description of a LoCo team, it gives a variety of examples for team activities. That list of examples *does not* include install fests. Personally, I think install fests are traditionally LUG activities and should remain the least of our concerns. I enjoy a good install fest as much as anyone, but that isn't why I joined the team. I think an install fest does nothing but preach to the choir. Most people willing to try Ubuntu can install it on their own and I believe our time is much better spent on advocacy and on improving Ubuntu.

For example, the NY LoCo had a highly effect campaign giving away CDs. They just walked around and handed them out. Why can't we do that? I'm willing to bet that we'd get twice as much exposure doing this than if we're cloistered away at some esoteric install fest. Plus, events like these are simple and require very little planning. This frees us up to do other things and keeps our activities fun, light, and accessible to everyone. And the last benefit is that it requires no advertising, can be planned on short notice, and it doesn't expect the user to come to us. We need to be taking Ubuntu to the streets. That's the only way we're going to be effective.

In addition to advocacy, I would really like to see our team get involved with things like bug triaging, translation, and community support. Many of these activities can be performed online and this gives ALL of our members equal opportunity to contribute to the team and to Ubuntu in general.

I suggest that we broaden our scope to include all kinds of simple activities, with no more than two or three major events a year. An install fest is a major event that requires a lot of time, planning, coordination, and leadership. I think we're exhausting our resources by focusing on this and I seriously hope everyone will join me in calling for an end to install fests and for a new direction for the team. We need to make this less formal, more fun, and encourage people to participate. Install fests are for the hardcore among us, not the casual user who likes Ubuntu and would like to help out without having to make a lifetime commitment.

I agree - I would like to see things done more on a decentralized basis. For example, could we get a pile of CD's from Canonical, see if we can leave free piles of them at local libraries and offer to do quick show and tells. Or get to some of the local festivities, like In the Streets in Frederick and have a booth where we hand out the stuff.

Although I do enjoy meeting with everyone, it's a chore to drive an hour to Columbia - and I would like to do some things locally

matthewboh said: I agree - I would like to see things done more on a decentralized basis. For example, could we get a pile of CD's from Canonical, see if we can leave free piles of them at local libraries and offer to do quick show and tells. Or get to some of the local festivities, like In the Streets in Frederick and have a booth where we hand out the stuff.

I agree. I think it would be wise to hand out pamphlets along with the CDs to explain what it is and why one should be interested in it. Regardless, I think this sort of exposure is exponentially more effective than an install fest. In general, I think the LoCo teams are intended to be advocacy groups first and technical support groups second (or third, or fourth, or fifth, etc.).

Although I do enjoy meeting with everyone, it's a chore to drive an hour to Columbia - and I would like to do some things locally

You live in Frederick, right? If you'd like to, we can set something up in the coming months for a Frederick-based event.

I agree with the idea to broaden the focus of this group. I joined hoping to get more involved with development on Ubuntu.

I don't think it's wise to abandon installfests, although I agree that we have emphasized them too much so far.

The average user (who I think is our target audience) would no sooner install a new OS on his machine than he would replace the firmware on his VCR. It's not even on his radar screen, and handing out CDs with no offer of hand holding will waste 90 percent of the cds. They'll never get put into the drive. (I also don't want to come off like a bunch of hari krishna's passing out propaganda, and I think we would appear that way if we fanned out in an area and threw cds at people.)

My idea of an ideal LoCo is a split somewhere between 60 percent advocacy, 20 percent installfest and 20 percent "new user get-your-feet-wet help." That's a sustainable model (I think), and will grow our population into a more-or-less stable userbase.

Installfests by themselves will miss 90 percent (or more) of our potential audience. That's why I'm so disappointed in the facilities we have on SFD. There doesn't appear to be any room for both activities, so we'll lose the casual in-library-browser who could otherwise be a recruit. But we could hardly be blamed for our allotted space.

-J.

parma1 said: I don't think it's wise to abandon installfests, although I agree that we have emphasized them too much so far.

Yes, I think install fests should be held twice a year, perhaps a summer and a winter one.

The average user (who I think is our target audience) would no sooner install a new OS on his machine than he would replace the firmware on his VCR. It's not even on his radar screen, and handing out CDs with no offer of hand holding will waste 90 percent of the cds. They'll never get put into the drive. (I also don't want to come off like a bunch of hari krishna's passing out propaganda, and I think we would appear that way if we fanned out in an area and threw cds at people.)

That's a good point. It be better to have a booth with one or two demo PCs, a stack of free CDs, and some reading material. But if I were given the choice between handing out CDs and an install fest, I'd rather hand out CDs.

My idea of an ideal LoCo is a split somewhere between 60 percent advocacy, 20 percent installfest and 20 percent "new user get-your-feet-wet help." That's a sustainable model (I think), and will grow our population into a more-or-less stable userbase.

That's a pretty good analysis, but I also think it's important to have team-building activities that help Ubuntu, such as bug triaging, documentation, etc. These are critical to Ubuntu's success and a LoCo is a great way to coordinate with like-minded people to get these tasks completed.

I don't believe I'm on the "team" but I would suggest if you are going to have an install fest that you hand out disks which have been updated before hand. There's number of reasons but I here folks grousing about having to make several hundred updates.

I've been using Ubuntu since Hoary and always found this first update situation to be somewhat daunting, particularly on dial up. Not everyone who'd be interested in Ubuntu or fleeing from MS has the latest hardware or on a high speed line.

Might be nice to see if it was possible to get someone from one of the local cable or other ISP providers to help in Broadband instructions. FIOS is out without the ISPs cooperation or a set method which doesn't seem like cracking a safe.

Just some thoughts.

I'm not exactly sure what the core function is of our team. I've never been to a LUG or any other sort of FLOSS group activity that actually met face to face and consisted of more than 3 people.

So having no idea, that gives me a mostly gestalt-free starting point.

Honestly I guess I expected some sort of user support, or at least some way to connect problem solvers to problems. Whether it has to be done at the meetings or simply schedule someone to drive over and take a look, it should be something that is quite local for people.

We're supposed to be (eventually) the official Team for the State of Maryland--so anything we do should begin with a local focus, and then expand outward from there.

The other thing is--even though Maryland is one of the smaller states, it's still pretty wide. We might need a Western sub-team and an Eastern sub-team instead of concentrating our efforts in Columbia. I live in Westminster and I work in Frederick and Columbia's about 45 minutes away from each. A Southern sub-team might also help--however we may not be big enough membership-wise--but if we don't have sub-teams we alienate anyone who can't drive to Columbia--and with gas prices, that's going to be a LOT of people.

Installfests...I don't know. Once in a while, sure, but they seem like they will take up a bunch of our time, and really only help people who are already interested in Ubuntu. We should try to reach people who are not.

I was pleasantly surprised to see was the donation project to the Senior facility (pardon my lack of specificity here). We're volunteers, so we don't want to get into situations where we have to continually support something, but we should definitely take advantage of the price and customization and reliability of Ubuntu to help people in need. (It's why I asked about advocacy for CompuKids--it's all Windows XP on the machines. That's gotta be expensive.)

Bug triaging...a hack-a-thon might be a good idea. We can offer install services, but getting a bunch of us together on a Saturday and spend some time looking at bugs and trying to do something about them, or get some finicky hardware to work and document how we went about it.

The problem is while that contributes to Ubuntu it doesn't really involve the population of Maryland at large.

I think we somewhat need to focus on one at the moment, and I'm leaning towards the latter.

There is definitely room for both--but not with our current resources and membership.

Hmm. Other ideas:

Collect Projects. User stories. Testimonials. How to interoperate with the rest of the world...how to interoperate with the rest of Maryland.

Hey, that might be something.

Being able to file state taxes electronically, for example. It's local in focus, it will allay people's fears, and it's contributing to Ubuntu in the form of documentation. A "you can do it" blurb is likely sufficient, with maybe a few sentences explaining any significant differences. (There could be a potential legal quagmire here, but simply saying "you can use these programs to do this" should be fine. Getting some sort of approval or formal doc from the state, while a longshot and probably more work than it's worth, would be an awesome win. Hey, you did ask for ideas. I'm allowed a few wild ones.)

okay, brain dump over, back to work.

Benanov said: Honestly I guess I expected some sort of user support, or at least some way to connect problem solvers to problems. Whether it has to be done at the meetings or simply schedule someone to drive over and take a look, it should be something that is quite local for people.

Some teams have started providing user support in this fashion and I think it'd be wise to offer limited support to new users. Maybe we could use the same model utilized by other teams to eventually implement some user support. At this point, however, I'm not sure that our team is active enough to be a reliable support provider. Unfortunately, only a small number of our members are active -- in the sense that they actively step in and take responsibility -- and I fear that offering support at this point would ultimately place one or two members into a position where they're the only ones stepping up to the plate. That would lead to more burnout and frustration.

The other thing is--even though Maryland is one of the smaller states, it's still pretty wide. We might need a Western sub-team and an Eastern sub-team instead of concentrating our efforts in Columbia. I live in Westminster and I work in Frederick and Columbia's about 45 minutes away from each. A Southern sub-team might also help--however we may not be big enough membership-wise--but if we don't have sub-teams we alienate anyone who can't drive to Columbia--and with gas prices, that's going to be a LOT of people.

We've discussed this in previous meetings and I think everyone agreed that regional teams was a good idea, but so far most of us are clustered around the Frederick-Rockville-Columbia area, so we haven't had much of an opportunity to put any regional teams into effect.

Bug triaging...a hack-a-thon might be a good idea. We can offer install services, but getting a bunch of us together on a Saturday and spend some time looking at bugs and trying to do something about them, or get some finicky hardware to work and document how we went about it. The problem is while that contributes to Ubuntu it doesn't really involve the population of Maryland at large. I think we somewhat need to focus on one at the moment, and I'm leaning towards the latter. There is definitely room for both--but not with our current resources and membership.

If you think about our team membership, there are some who are very interested in advocacy, while others are more interested in development. I do know that some people who joined our LoCo originally thought the purpose of the team was for development. Personally, I tend to lean toward development myself, but I also enjoy advocacy. I actually think that the two types of activities will draw upon different segments of the membership. Not to mention that these activities give us the opportunity to improve Ubuntu as a team while simultaneously building our team's sense of comraderie. I think of these activities as glorified "busy work" that have the potential to introduce people to open source development while making Ubuntu a better product.

Collect Projects. User stories. Testimonials. How to interoperate with the rest of the world...how to interoperate with the rest of Maryland.

Being able to file state taxes electronically, for example. It's local in focus, it will allay people's fears, and it's contributing to Ubuntu in the form of documentation. A "you can do it" blurb is likely sufficient, with maybe a few sentences explaining any significant differences. (There could be a potential legal quagmire here, but simply saying "you can use these programs to do this" should be fine. Getting some sort of approval or formal doc from the state, while a longshot and probably more work than it's worth, would be an awesome win. Hey, you did ask for ideas. I'm allowed a few wild ones.)

That's a great idea!

It may be too late to do this event, but Frederick's "In The Street" festival is coming up. This would be a great type of event to have a table at, or just roam around with CD and info to hand out to folks walking past.