[Scottish] The Future of the LUG

[Ben Thorp]

>I dont think we should rename the LUG, just accept that we are the defacto

>Glasgow LUG and offer as much as possible via the website and IRC to our
>members who are unfortunate enough to live outwith the dear green place.
Just
>cos they cant come every month for a meeting or a pint, they arent any
less
>important.
>We need to keep the SLUG name and all that goes with it (even the
confusion)
>and we should encourage and assist our "provincial" members to start up
their
>own LUGs. I believe a succesful experiment has been carried out in that
>quaint little village in the east with the castle.

LoL. Agreed. Although perhaps we ought to get our LUG whipped into shape
first ;o)

>I think we need to restart the meetings in Strathclyde Uni (if that is
cool
>wih Kenny). We need (IMHO) to take up Colin's offer to share his
considerable
>knowledge with us. There may be a case for some talks aimed specifically
at
>newbies.

Agreed. We have had a number of offers for talks/slots and I think we
should take them all up. Also, I still think we need to have some 'other'
ideas, as arranging talks is a little time consuming, and it would be good
to have some other non-talk based ideas, like in my original list.

>Im concerned that we _may_ have put off some folks who turned up
>once or twice and were put off by the "uber-geekiness" of it all. I have
no
>evidence for this, just a hunch we may have lost some folk that way.
>OTOH we are a bunch of geeks so thats kinda hard to avoid. Possibly it may

>evolve into 2 talks per month, one for beginners and one more advanced.

This sounds like a good idea, although arranging 2 talks a month seems like
even harder work! However, Tony has offered to do a beginners slot, and I
would be happy to do some beginners stuff, now that I am fairly sure that
I'm not quite a beginner any more myself.

My early memories of coming to the LUG was exactly what you described -
overawed by the wealth of extremely complex knowledge. However, the talks
that I remember are not necessarily the basic ones, but more the ones that
were presented with everyone in mind; assuming 0 knowledge. Having said
that, it didn't put me off totally - a group of geeks meeting will always
have an attraction for other geeks, but it's the non-geeky users we need to
watch out for.

>As the list admin (with assistance from Kyle) I/we need to investigate why

>some folk are getting funny reply-to addresses. The only ongoing prob I
was
>aware of was the antiroot's DNS is screwed up regularly generates bounces.

>But I keep thinking he'll sort it out in a day or two so I dont do
>anything :-)

If it helps, the bad messages seem to be sent by
scottish-bounce at mailman.lug.org.uk and when you hit reply, it goes back to
the sender, not the list.

>Possibly we do need a formal structure. I have resisted this in the past
due
>to previous experiences of commitees in the voluntary sector that turned
into
>ego-trips, disputes over handling of finances and slagging matches and I'd

>hate us to go the same way. But thats probably the kind of negative
attitude
>that ensures nothing ever gets done. So maybe I am moving closer to the
fence
>on this one.

I don't think we need a very formal structure to be able to do this. But
some kind of structure is needed to make sure things get organised.

I would suggest that we get maybe 6-12 people who are reasonably committed
to the LUG, and to being at the meetings, and get them each to take charge
of 1 month a year, and they have to arrange some activity for that night -
be it a talk, a demo, a quiz, or anything like that. I think that there are
plenty of people who would offer to take charge of a month.

>Our website is a  greatly underused resource and the offer to write some
java
>applets to help folk onto IRC should be grabbed with both hands.

Agreed - I think there is still an IRC applet on the website, actually.

>It would be nice if we could get a meeting with the Green party to see
what we
>can do to assist Robin Harper. I dont always agree with all of what the
Green
>Party say but thats politics, working with those whom you can agree with
on
>some points to advance common interests. But I'll probably drive to that
>meeting :-) ( preferably along the new bit of the M74)

Perhaps we could get the key person to come to the LUG and talk about why
they want to move to Linux, what they see as the Pros, and Cons, what their
current barriers to moving are, and then see if we can offer assistance in
any way?


Ben Thorp