[Gloucs] Future meetings and/or future of the LUG

[Bob Henson]

On 13/02/2012 10:18 PM, Glyn Davies wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> Next Tuesday is our next planned meeting date. No talk planned as yet.
> Any offers?
> 
> Last month Tony turned up as 'back up' talk with more of his Perl
> masterclass. Unfortunately, he was the only one to turn up. Thank you
> for your effort Tony and sorry it was wasted.
> 
> So, this raises the question "Is it worth trying to continue with LUG
> meetings?". Have LUGs 'run their course'? Will new initiatives such as
> hackerspace kill off LUGs (they certainly won't help)?
> 
> Interested in your thoughts. Lack of discussion would imply lack of
> interest in which case I'd suggest we state that the LUG is inactive
> on the website and leave it for new blood to resurrect. From my PoV as
> unelected/adopted meeting arranger it would make things simpler.
> Perhaps quarterly socials would be better?
> 
> If we continue, it would certainly seem sensible that we get some
> confirmed attendees before holding future meetings.
> 
> As I said, interested in your thoughts.
> 

I don't know if the views of a lurker in the background are of interest,
but you asked, so here goes. One of my problems is that Tetbury is just
far enough away to be a tad difficult to get to the meetings on time,
but I doubt that has any relevance to the issue. Gloucester is a big
place and many Linux users must be near to what sounds like an excellent
venue.

Your talks seem to be aimed at computer professionals. If not many
experts are turning up, what about the learners? Would "dumbing down"
bring in more people. The talks are way above the level of many ordinary
Linux users, and have not been relevant to a learner like myself. Many
have had little to do with Linux per se - at ordinary user level, at
least. Are existing members sufficiently evangelical about Linux to want
to "spread the word" and increase the number of users out there? Would
that bore you all to tears? I don't know - only you can say.

It might well be that young people or new users generally these days
really aren't interested in how the operating system works (I'm retired
and have time to play around a little with Linux) but perhaps most users
want to *use* a system, not learn about it, in which case there would be
no point in trying to change things in that direction.

Regards,

Bob