[Rnb] mailman vs roger / the future

[Aypok]

Hi,

On Fri, 2010-07-30 at 22:52 +0100, Scott Nichol wrote:
> If you like it let us know at the meeting. If you are not impressed and 
> prefer Mailman or something else, just let us know at the meeting. If 
> you can't be bothered to come to a meeting (Tue 3rd August The Golden 
> Cross, Bromsgrove, 19:30-21:30), well just keep your opinion to yourself.

I don't like where this is going and I doubt I'm the only one.

Meeting up in meat-space to have a chat is all well and good and is a
great aspect of user groups like this, but that should not be the
sole/central reason for the group's existence (nor its power-base). It
should be about helping fellow humans with Linux in /whatever way you
can/, be that digitally (email, forum, whatever) or by people bringing
their computers to the meet-ups so more knowledgeable creatures can poke
at them.

(Before you pipe up and tell me to come along to the meetings, I have
done. Those of you who attended the first meetings of this LUG may
remember me.)

Simply dismissing the voices of those who don't turn up to physical
meetings is a flawed idea since we appear to be in the majority. You
risk abandoning a large crowd of -- admittedly mostly silent -- members
of the LUG. Please remember that some of us are here just for the
mailing list and digital interactions.

Some of us joined up because we liked the informal, seemingly-haphazard
approach to the LUG - it was based on having a mailing list (that's not
to rule out web-based contraptions such as the one you've been
promoting) and occasionally getting together for a drink, a laugh and to
sometimes bring up Linux and computing topics. "Formal" meetings with
agendas and the like are not what I signed up for and such things are
the antithesis of this group's founding.

That sounds like I'm rallying against change, but I assure you I'm not.
Try new things by all means and stick with them if it works well (if the
whole careful planning thing is a hit, keep doing it!), but saying
things along the lines of "come to our meetings or shut up" is not the
way forward.

It also makes you sound like a cunt.


Aypok...

-- 
www.aypok.co.uk