Which Way Is Up?
It is a few years now that David Chapman and I talked about trying a Linux Club in Coffs Harbour.
The original plan was to have a club so that we could encourage more and more people to the many advantages of Linux operating systems.
With David's generosity we did set up a once a month, Sunday afternoon session at his shop in Ocean Parade Coffs and on occasion we did have a good and interested attendance.
I was a new chum, so it was good for me to be able to learn how to take advantage of Linux. However, David left for Peru and the club took a different direction.
I was lucky enough to get the Park Beach Bowling Club to give us access to their upstaris rooms to continue club activities and we also have access to the internet thorugh the Bowling Club's facility.
We have had almost 12 months at the Bowling Club but the attendance has not increased that much, nor has the introduction of new members been all that great.
This 12 months may not have been possible if it had not been for the work of Matthew Davidson, but you must agree that our club should not hang on the efforts of one person alone.
Personally, I would like to see the club grow with the introduction of new members, learners and total newbies as well as the Gurus to pass on some knowledge. This is only getting back to the original idea.
I have been remiss in my attendance, but I was getting nothing out of the meetings in regards to the simple usage of the Linux system, and although I was the contact phone number, some that did go and have a look were not happy at the reception or the learning facility of our group.
I hand the baton to you, the members, to come up with some ideas and offers on how we can make the club more interesting, viable and to bring it into line with the original concept.
Sponsored by:
Remiss
I think we all would like an increase of members. I'm allways out there promoting GNU/Linux and making people aware of the club. People are taking notice but I belive it will take a few more years before we see more people taking GNU/Linux as there primary operating system. It will happen...
I'm not to sure what you are saying in regards to the running/operation of the club. Are you asking for more structured meetings ie main topic then break up into discution groups or are talking something more ie creating an association with a commity?
Personal I would want to keep away from having to create an association/commity. I have no problem steping up to the plate and help with organising,
I like the fellowship and don't mind the informal approach. We could have topics but we would have to rase the question before hand then find someone to reseach/present it.
\_/_/alLY
(Paul Templeton)
Caution
While I don't agree that the club made any particularly noticable change in direction after the move to Park Beach Plaza, apart from the obvious loss of a great educator like David, I broadly agree with the rest of what Peter has to say.
When Peter and David started this club, I thought "Great! Here's an opprtunity to sit quietly at the back and enjoy myself without any responsibility and stress." Unfortunately, in any gathering of nerds I'm likely to look the most nerdy, so some people make the understandable mistake of thinking I must be in charge. This is not a misunderstanding I'm keen to encourage, as giving me any organisational responsibility is only a good idea if you are keen to see the organisation die.
Particularly now there is once more a retailer in Coffs Harbour selling systems with GNU/Linux preinstalled, I think that it is very desirable to offer free (as in beer) community-based support to complement and encourage commercially available services. However the most important advice I can offer is to proceed very carefully.
Currently what we have is a monthly gathering of friends (and the occasional visitor) with a shared interest in free (as in speech) technology. These meetings are often pretty well-attended, and invariably quite enjoyable. I can't emphasise enough how rare and precious this state of affairs is for a non-profit community organisation these days. We should be very careful that any effort to encourage greater attendance doesn't backfire by alienating those people who have so far contributed greatly to (what I see as) the club's success.
The major problem with encouraging greater attendance, particularly among "newbies", is that many of the people likely to be attracted are going to be free riders. Thanks to a quarter of a century of economic rationalism, most people are familiar with only two modes of service provision: for-profit and philanthropic. I think it's fair to assume that nobody in the club wants to work for nothing teaching people who will disappear as soon as they've learnt what they need.
Long and painful experience with the former Ex-Services Computer Club has demonstrated that the surest way to turn away potential members is to explain that you are not a charity providing free lessons, that this is a mutually-supportive community of peers, and that the only way every member can benefit is is every member is willing to contribute. This mode of productive activity is how almost all of the software I use came into being, and something I see working every day in many different communities on the Internet, but I wish somebody could tell me the secret to making it popular in Coffs Harbour.
The other thing we have to be careful about is not promising what we can't deliver. We are all (including you Peter, despite your protestations to the contrary) pretty proficient at using our computers for the things we do day-to-day. The problem is that what I use my computer for is likely to be very different to what a little old lady wants to use her computer for, which will be in turn be different to what a teenage kid uses her computer for. Sitting me down in front of your copy of Microsoft Publisher (if you're a little old lady) or Yahoo Messenger (if you're a teenager) is about as useful as popping the bonnet of your car and asking me to tell you what the problem is (ie. not even slightly useful). Even if we wanted to, we couldn't promise an instant and well-informed solution to every problem, and we should be careful not to imply that that's what we do.
Don't want to be a wet blanket, and if I sound like it, that's just the last couple of years at the Ex-Services Club talking. I think what we've got is pretty darn good, and if we can come up with ways to make it grow without damaging it, we should definitely go for it.