[H-GEN] Room Bookings Update

[Benjamin Fowler]

Hi all,

2009/1/13 Robert Brockway <robert at timetraveller.org>

> > This has always been a problem, at one point we always had a first point
> > of contact person on duty. Meeting numbers these days probably make that
>
> Yes, I wonder when this stopped.  The first point of contact was
> specifically so someone approached new people walking in the door so they
> would feel more welcome.
>
> > It also has to be appreciated that not everyone wants to help anymore,
> > alot of us have been doing it for so long that dealing with the same
> > issues [that are easily solved by looking at google or doing some basic
> > reading] and doing tech support for a living means we have had our fill
> > and given back over a hundred times what we have taken.
>
> Which comes back to the problem of HUMBUG attracting new blood.  It is
> ironic that was OSS has become more popular HUMBUG membership has
> declined.   Online resources are much better now, granted, but there is
> still an important place for user groups.


A proper plan for advertising the existence of HUMBUG -- and then making
sure people feel like they're not getting cast aside when they actually get
in, would be nice.

I know from experience that HUMBUG can be cliquey -- sometimes extremely so,
and perhaps fixing that is just a simple matter of being a little more
organised.

Alas, I'd volunteer to help out, if it weren't for the fact that I'm 10000
miles away in London these days.  Some bad experiences as Talks Maintainer
[1] put me off for a while, but I'd be happy to pitch in again with some
hard graft at some point in the future.



>
>
> I have to say I like  James Iseppi's idea of holding regular talk meetings
> like other groups in addition to the existing meetings.
>
> What about one "talk" meeting and one long "computerfest" meeting per
> month.  If I was back in Aus I'd really be pushing forward with this, but
> I'm not :(
>

I see a pattern emerging here :-)



> > HUMBUG is also fairly unique amongst user groups, in so far as all our
> > meetings have had network access (hence the massive size of meetings
> > before widespread, affordable broadband - and the issues we had with
>
> Or even before broadband.  I used to go from 2400bps at home to 10Mbit/sec
> at HUMBUG.  The difference was so astounding that I had an odd occurance
> one day.
>
> I downloaded a file.  The download window appeared and disappeared.  I
> thought something was wrong so I tried again.  Same thing.  This happened
> 3 times before I realised I _was_ downloading the file.  It was so much
> faster than home that I didn't accept it was working.
>

HUMBUG has definitely shrunk since the bad old days of dialup, but I'm
actually kind-of glad the leechers stay home these days.  I think this can
only be good for our core mission -- to promote UNIX in a hobbyist/home
setting, face-to-face (as opposed, to, say, face-to-Usenet, or
face-to-Limewire, as it were).


> >> Appreciate that we don't want to deal with
> >> problems relating to MS products. That's we do for a living.
> >
> > Windows is not a *nix operating system. that's why we don't deal with
> > it. I know I personally haven't dealt with windows professionally for
> > years now and many long term members are the same.
>
> I'm glad you said this.  I haven't touched MS-Windows to any significant
> degree for more than a decade :)
>

Even though I never use Windows at home, I'm amazed at how it's all but
impossible to avoid at work.  I blame Exchange and Outlook.



> > People should come back to meetings in the hope of meeting like minded
> > people with similar interests and learning more about *nix operating
> > systems and OSS.
>
> Exactly.
>
> HUMBUG does need to pick up the advertising though.  Even in the early
> years we did quite a lot of online advertising (comp.os.linux when it was
> very popular, etc).  Is that still occuring?


Online advertising, I suspect, would have to be better targeted.  Maybe we
could even do targeted banner ads, if we could find somebody to donate
banner ad impressions or similar.  Would somebody like Google come to the
party for non-profits?  (Adwords would be perfect, especially if we didn't
have to pay for it)

OTOH, O-Week stalls, posters at university campuses, presence at other geeky
events, also work well and has worked in the past.

Another idea would be to find out what the introductary programming and data
communications subjects are at the major universities, find out where the
lectures are being held, and put "shit sheet"-style HUMBUG adverts on the
seats in all over the lecture theatres in the first few weeks of classes.
Cheap, targeted and effective!

Maybe Brenton or Nikolai would be better qualified to comment on how
effective poster campaigns are?

Have fun,

Ben.


[1]  "Creative differences".  Ask me off-list if you want to know the gory
details.

-- 
Ben Fowler.

(E) somelamer567 at gmail.com
(W) http://bjf-codebrown.blogspot.com/
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