Garrett D'Amore wrote: >This is an interesting position to take. Probably more so than anything >else, Branding is going to suffer from the bikeshed syndrome. (Check >wikipedia for bikeshed if this doesn't make sense.) > > > Probably correct. But I spent a decade in marketing before joining this project and I know pretty much nothing about branding. :) It is a pretty specialized field.
>Its also the case, that unlike other decisions advocacy *might* make, a >major decision effecting the group's *identity* could wind up leaving a >lot of folks disenfranchised if they feel they didn't get to participate >in it. > >So, can I make a suggestion? > >Make a broad announcement targeted to the entire community (possibly >post it up on the front page at www.os.o) indicating that a "branding >project" is being formed to figure out how branding is to be done. > I don't think we need a meta-community project for this. We have an Advocacy CG that contains all the marketing people from the old Marketing Community (plus UGs and Immigrants via the recent merger) and a few hundred other people. So, the infrastructure is already in place to host branding conversations with community people who know about and who are interested in branding. If the branding/marketing people want a project, I'm sure the Advocacy CG would approve of a project. I doubt it's necessary since advocacy-discuss seem an good place for the discussion. Sign up here: http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/advocacy-discuss >(This >is distinct from Indiana, since Indiana is resolving the technical >issues around building a specific distro, and may not be viewed with the >same community-wide relevance as branding is likely to be. This is also >distinct from "advocacy", since, at least to this external viewer, >"advocacy" sounds like handling websites, evangelism, advertising, and >other marketing collateral that code monkeys are likely to have little >desire to participate in. Issues impacting our core "identity" seem a >bit more relevant for *everyone*, I think.) > > The Advocacy CG sponsors all the user group projects, the BeleniX development discussion list, and it will soon host the mentoring project (which will initially be focused on technical contributions). So, the topics we address range widely and that was the intent all along. Our mandate is to help people get involved with OpenSolaris, and that will involve non-coding issues such as marketing but it will also involve some technical issues as well. >This will give the folks who care most about this issue a chance to >participate (or to know that they are welcome to do so, at least.) (Of >course, if Sun decides to just ignore the community and do its own thing >without seeking the community's input and approval, well then Sun can't >expect to folks to stand up and cheer it while feeling disenfranchised. >I don't *think* that is Sun's intention here, but I could be misreading >things.) > >All that said, I *do* care about Branding, but I also recognize that the >dot product of how much I care, with my expertise in branding, means >that I probably have no business participating in such a project. So >don't look for me there. But I hope a branding project is created, and >the smart folks who do care and have the expertise will participate, And >that nobody will feel disenfranchised by Sun or by any other subgroup >within the community. > > I, too, hope people don't feel disenfranchised by Sun since the people at Sun participating on OpenSolaris are very enthusiastic community members. Jim -- Jim Grisanzio http://blogs.sun.com/jimgris
