On Mon, Jul 07, 2003 at 09:26:39AM +0000, Colin Hards wrote:
So what's my point? I think LUGs should be concentrating 100% on education. If you want to stay as a group of professional enthusiasts meeting every so often, then fine. Rename yourselves APLUG. If you want your favoured OS to become universally popular, get out there and start passing on your knowledge. I've been to four of five ALUG meetings and to me they're a waste of time. They're disorganised, and have no focus or agenda, no advance billing of what's to occur. With one exception I don't think I've
hangon, if you think Alug should be doing this and doing that why are you moaning about it and not doing anything? Alug is run by the members for the members if it is not meeting your needs then *you* do something about it. Their are many people here who are willing to to give talks etc. etc. but until someone asks for them they are not likely to do them because of a lack of a perceived need and because they are busy working on other things.
I have not seen you ask for a topic for the meetings before so why are you telling us how bad they are? Also many of us are working on things to make Linux more universally popular just we don't do it within Alug as it is not the most suitable framwork for us to work within. The meetings are not really "disorganised" either, they are a bunch of geeks/hackers/linux users/friends who like to meet up every couple of months to talk about computers and other crap, in some ways they are deliberatly disorganised as even without a formal agenda we always end up locked out of the venue standing around talking in the cold because we run out of time. If anyone comes to us with a specific need or topic they need a talk on then we will try and arrange something. If you find the meetings a waste of time why do you come to them? I really like them as it gives me a chance to catch up with people that I have not seen in a while.
Many of us also work directly with spreading the word and the software, indeed all my previous jobs have seen me spreading Linux and free software where possible within companies and organisations. The main reason Alug exists is for a group Anglian Linux users to talk about one of their favourite interests, it is not just a group to help evangelise Linux and free software.
If Alug can provide you with something more then why are you not asking us for help or guidance? Unfortunatly my crystal ball got dropped last year and I can't afford a new one, and I have not had the time to practise my mind reading skills recently.
Once I'm achieving something as easily on my Xandros system and I can under Windows, then I'm sure to tell friends and recommend Linux. I can't at the moment.
Once people can show me how to do things I do on a windows system that I can under windows then I am sure to tell all my freinds and recommend windows. I can't at the moment. Or whatabout if I change that to Mac OS X? Many tasks that I have worked on with Linux in the past couple of years are tasks that could not be completed on windows. One of the more interesting ones was working with a special effects company doing effects for what was (and remains) a rather high profile movie.
Adam