Back to Conference appearances ... What value for Perl *can* *we* bring to a conference that isn't YAPC but has other FLOSS folk there?
I am asking concretely since the Boston LinuxCon is 5 months away. I am not asking about what could a well-funded staff do sometime, but what if anything would we LIKE to do? I noted > @perlfoundation <http://twitter.com/perlfoundation> Two reviews of the > Perl presence at CeBit - > http://szabgab.com/blog/2010/03/1267974609.html, > http://padre-ide.de/blog/?p=111 > Sounds successful. > > Do we want to do something at the LinuxCon in South Boston in August ? and got one reply about conference outreach as opposed to language issues - TM > I'm not entirely sure what the message should be about Perl Indeed there are several different agendas possible. But ... Surely ANY Perl presence that subliminally communicates a subtext of "Rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated" [Twain] would surely better than no Perl presence at all? TM> There's certainly enthusiasm for promoting Perl, Making that enthusiasm manifest to those who "know of Perl" (as John said) but haven't heard anything good lately, that would be good? TM> but it isn't clear that we (as a group) TM> can articulate clear and compelling reasons for using Perl. Do we NEED to articulate "clear and compelling reasons"? Or do we need to articulate that Perl is still a *viable* *choice*, that Amazon rank and magazine page count isn't the only measure of vitality, that 5.8.0 and 5.10.0 count as recent major functional releases even though they aren't 6.0? That a second implementation isn't needed if the first runs everywhere? TM> The CeBit approach seemed to be to answer whatever random questions TM> that came up, and to show off demos of a few projects. While that doesn't TM> hurt the situation, And disproves the exaggerated rumor. TM> a more organized and intentional approach might do better. Quite possibly. TM> Doing it better, though, isn't trivial. Right. I am not opposed to Best or Better, except as striving for such blocks Good Enough. If TPF or someone else has results of some market-research & PR study to guide us, great. But in suggesting we consider what *we* can do when a conference comes to town, I meant consider what *we* locals actually might be able and willing to *do* then & there, at a specific time in the not so distant future. FIRST - HOW MANY of WE would be interested? Possibly available then? Might buy a badge to contribute? Might get work to buy a badge, but would have to like actually attend some panels on Linux to justify the expense? Might get/make time off to work, but only if a FLOSS booth exhibitor badge is donated? Send message to other PM groups asking who is coming? (URI Ronald & I have access to that list of list-owners)) SECOND - WHAT * ask TPF if they have any official plans for LinuxCon Boston ... ... and if so offer $n locals to help; ... if not, would we ... * sponsor a Perl Birds of a feather session, * hold social event for us & the out-of-town PM.ers & Perl-friendly penguinistas, maybe scheduled so far ahead it's in the official program ? * Our Own Booth - if LinuxCon have free .org zone or cheap FLOSS rate ? * only if so does "which Agenda, which marketing angle, if any" matter, which decision does NOT need to be made now, and may depend on whose money sweat and name is on the booth * if not our own booth, maybe help at Boston Linux / Unix booth (assuming they get one) wearing camel & camelia & onion logos "loud & proud" for a presence, with any collateral material we can scrounge. DOES ANYBODY HAVE INTEREST IN BEING PARTY TO ANY OF THOSE? -- Bill n1...@arrl.net bill.n1...@gmail.com _______________________________________________ Boston-pm mailing list Boston-pm@mail.pm.org http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/boston-pm
