Hi there, me too I appreciate having being nominated as an OSGeo Charter Member ;). Ok let's include first something about my background: I've been a long time GIS user with a background in Geography and Soil Science. I am a german national currently living in Seattle USA and am operating my small GIS consulting shop. I came to the open Source Geospatial world and later OSGeo mostly because I held a position at a non-profit organization in Seattle that was called CommEn Space. At the time Tim Schaub was a colleague and spurred my interest in Mapserver and all other things related to OS GIS ...Since then I have been excited about this approach (Open Source) and made a choice for myself that this a great approach on how to do things including running a business. It makes it so much easier to indentify myself with my work and get satisfaction instead of attaching myself to particular brands and proprietary approaches. Read more of my views here http://www.terragis.net/about-terra/motivation/ if you are inclined to do so ;) I am participating in the CUGOS OSGeo chapter and involved with user training. I have been giving frequent talks about OS at the local conferences (WAURISA 2007 -20100 and also FOSS4G this year. Because my background is more of an GIS user rather than of a developer (even though I write some scripts) my perspective is that of representing the "user" of OS Geospatial . I am planning to start ( actually I am in then middle of) starting a new website that allows users to share their (first or second) experiences of all kinds of OS geospatial software. I would like to enhance the documentation resources especially for users in the OS GIS world and see one of the biggest challenges to provide adequate training, support and recourses such as manuals tutorials. This stems from my personal background but also the fact that software without many users will not spread around that much. I have organized several workshops for the CUGOS chapter over the last two years and I am also active teaching professional classes for web GIS and desktop GIS. Most recently my (one person) company became a collaborator of the gvSIG association http://www.gvsig.com/news/the-international-network-of-the-gvsig-association -has-been-extended-usa-japan-and-germany.
I would be excited and honored to get more involved with OSGeo through Charter Membership. Cheers Karsten Vennemann Terra GIS LTD Seattle, WA 98112 USA www.terragis.net _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss