Re: [PLUG] May Speakers?

["Paul L. Snyder" <plsnyder@drexel.edu>]

Thanks to everyone!  We now have speakers confirmed for June (Amir at 
Central and Rich at North), but let's not rest on our laurels.  There was a
very nice stretch last year when we had four months worth of presentations
lined up.

Due to my schedule, I've been limited in my ability to attend meetings
frequently for the past few months, and this is likely to remain the
case for a good chunk of this year.  Thus, my usual "eye contact" method
of finding speakers (i.e., with anyone who's not guiltily averting their
gaze after a solicitation for presentations is made) has been hard to
implement.  Please try this yourselves!  

Speaking of schedules...it looks like the first Wednesday of July is the
4th, which is definitely not a good day to hold a meeting.  Shall we
just cancel Central for that month?

On Tue, 29 May 2012, Eric H. Johnson wrote:

EHJ> 1.  Promote our meetings widely outside of this mailing list.  PLUG
EHJ> Central meets at USP which is close to both Penn and Drexel.  The
EHJ> bulletin boards of the CS/Engineering departments should have our
EHJ> announcements every month.  There are lots of other colleges and
EHJ> universities in the area.  Anybody have any contacts?  I drive by
EHJ> Widener a couple of times a month and could see about posting a
EHJ> notice there.

EHJ> Perhaps the math/computer departments in local school districts?
EHJ> Certainly our meetings are suitable for high school students.  The
EHJ> after-meeting at the Best House?  Maybe :-) <<

These are great suggestions!  Please do!  The more people who take PLUG
into their own hands and push things forward, the better.

EHJ> Other means of promoting it include setting up a group on Facebook
EHJ> or meetup.com. I see there is something setup on twitter
EHJ> (@phillylinux) already. Facebook groups I believe is free, and last
EHJ> I knew, meetup.com was something like $12 per month or $75 per year.

I try to make sure all the meetings get posted to Twitter and get the
meeting announcements sent out by email.  Meeting dates are in the
Google calendar, and TPG pulls from there.  I'm not on Facebook (and am
not going to be anytime soon), so someone else would have to keep that
synced up.  IMO, we should only choose to do something if it's going to
stay up-to-date; otherwise, it should just be a static pointer.

Currently, our only recurring cost is DNS.  I'm not sure the benefits 
that a paid Meetup group would bring us are worth the management
overhead, but please feel free to disagree.  The two things it would
provide are a bit more discoverability and the RSVP interface, and RSVPs
are pretty much no longer needed for our current venues.  Since we have
fixed meeting dates for all the groups, scheduling help isn't needed.
Also, the canonical discussion forum for PLUG is this email list, and
I think it's best to avoid fragmenting that.

EHJ> As for "regular" meetings I think it's a shame that we have so many
EHJ> people and so much talent in this group and still have a hard time
EHJ> finding speakers.  I've spoken 3 times in the last few years - Code
EHJ> Igniter in 2009, Drupal in 2010, and I did a lightning talk about
EHJ> using and configuring Compiz in 2011.  Others have spoken more
EHJ> frequently that I have. <<

Yes, we've relied pretty heavily on a few individuals for a lot of
talks.  More first-time speakers, please!  (And if you've presented
before...more multiple-time speakers, please!)

EHJ> The open discussion portion of the last PLUG West meeting was
EHJ> dominated by MythTV. We are probably long overdue for something on
EHJ> Myth, be it a presentation, workshop, or just general discussion.

I agree, another Myth talk would be great.

On Tue, 29 May 2012, Amir Tahvildaran wrote:

AT> I work at Drexel and can post stuff here (mailing lists and bulletin
AT> boards).  Would someone share a template if they beat me to creating
AT> one?

That's great...the more exposure the better.  We don't have a poster 
template, so please feel free to contribute one!

On Tue, 29 May 2012, Brian Stempin wrote:

BS> Perhaps a good way to gain some exposure would be to join something
BS> like Technically Philly (http://technicallyphilly.com/tpgroups)?
BS> Maybe this would help us attract speakers and members that are members
BS> in neighboring tech circles.

Yes, as Eric mentions, we are listed with TPG.  Anyone who attends
another local group where there's speaker who seems like a good fit for
PLUG's interest, please hit them up!


On Tue, 29 May 2012, Eric at Lucii.org wrote:

EL> iCal feed?  Is this something we already have?  (hope, hope)
EL> Yes!  We are already on the technically Philly list via our Google
EL> Calendar:
EL>   http://technicallyphilly.com/events
EL> Look at 6/6, 6/12, and 6/18

Yes, iCal feed is also listed on the PLUG home page.  Easily accessible
at

  http://bit.ly/plug-calendar-ics

EL> Per Eric J's suggestion we're now have a page on Facebook:
EL> www.facebook.com/PhillyLinux

Excellent!  Looks like a good idea, nice and straightforward.

Cheers,
Paul
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