[Bradford] Proposed Bradford GNU/LUG FOSS day for Bradford CVS members

[hudsonjr at ntlworld.com]

---- Alice Kaerast <kaerast at qvox.org> wrote: 

> It sounds like you are planning a Penguin Day
> <http://www.penguinday.org/> without realising it.

No that is not the intention; a Penguin Day would be quite different.
> 
> > Why?When the Bradford GNU/LUG was set up, there was quite a lot of
> > discussion about publicising Linux. Now that we are a regular feature
> > at CVS, it might be worth taking advantage of the relationship to
> > publicise what we are doing to our hosts.
> 
> And indeed the wider community, why limit it to just CVS?

Because this is a definable potential market with whom we already have a relationship. Something aimed at the wider community would have to be completely different.

> > 
> > 
> > How?Discussion of the feasibility of the event among members; we would
> > probably need at least six users and six from businesses to have
> > enough resources to put on something worthwhile but, if there were
> > more, people could give a half-day commitment because I think that,
> > once we got above about 15 involved at a time, coordination could
> > become a problem.
> 
> Surely the more people the better, the more people willing to help out
> the more activities we can run - talks, presentations,
> demonstrations, installing software, etc.

The issue here is the size of the projected venue and the number of people available to manage the event.
> 
> > 
> > Discussion among ourselves about the arrangements for facilitating the
> > day.
> > 
> > 
> > The day itself – possibly 10-4:
> > 
> >       * Half a dozen timed presentations spread over the day on
> >         different types of FOSS software, some of which might be
> >         repeated.
> 
> So we need to think about what people are likely to want to be
> told/shown, what skills we have, who is willing to talk about what.
> 
Yes - that is one point of the original email.
> >         
> >       * Booths/areas in which business users could meet potential
> >         customers.
> 
> Would we want to charge businesses for a booth?  I'm thinking just to
> cover costs rather than make a profit.  I'd be quite interested in
> having a stall where I could talk about web-apps, CRM and CMS systems
> (Drupal, Civicrm, etc)

The intention is not to meet our needs but the perceived needs of CVS members; by drawing their attention to the fact that there are companies in the Bradford area who could support them, we offer reassurance that they aren't going to be left high and dry if they adopt FOSS
> 
> It might also be worth talking to Bmedia about this if you wanted to
> expand it so as to offer it up to as many organisations as possible.
> I'm sure they would publicise it around their membership.
> 
> 
Obviously, if members want to expand the event, that is up for discussion. But, at this stage, the idea is to restrict participation to GNU/LUG and CVS members.

However, everything it up for discussion - so let the discussion flow.

John