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Newbie help, and public relations.
On Sun, 17 May 1998, Yuval El-Hanany wrote:
> How about people who ask newbie questions would add newbie to the subject,
> and those experts too busy to bother to read, answer or help newbies who
> join the Linux community will set a mail filter on the subject to filter out
> Newbies. Those busy experts would surely know how to set such a mail filter
how about a simpler solution: a new mailing list? I created "general Q&A"
about a year ago, and no one seems to be interested. I offered a newbie
list before but it wasn't really accepted. back at the time, I was hosting
linux.org.il and creating a new list was one commandline for me. Now a
black cat passed between me and Jonathan and I don't have access there
anymore, but I'm sure he'll create the list if enough people want.
> Personally, I won't filter out newbie questions. Seeing the proliferation of
> the windoze non-OSes, I think the more people using Linux would increase its
> viability as a an alternative, and this group can do its share by helping
> people, who find the learning curve of Linux too steep, pass that hump.
I wish they would come out of the woodworks then. Here in Silicon Valley,
the SVLUG arranges installfests at LEAST once a month, the last two
arranged in an arena the size of a basketball court (!). We need a few
dozen newbies to justify opening a list, we need a dozen programmers to
justify opening another, we need to pull LOTS of people out there in
Israel that use linux but are not on linux-il because the topics here are
so broad. We need to simply make ourselvs known!
linux-il is not a great public relations - oriented bunch of guys. We
don't have enough installfests, no "serious" meetings took place in over a
year, and it's really hard to get people to even organize for dinners. I
believe the real way of pushing things is have a monthly lecture/open
discussion somewhere in Tel Aviv, publish it on the net in some strategic
sites or even papers (YES, it may cost some money if we don't have
reporter friends) like a press release, and start doing things to attract
the public at large. the SVLUG members are now being quoted not only in
the local newspapers of San Jose, but even on C|net and other places with
connection to Linux, Corel announcements or Mozilla parties. We should
push ourselves forward the same way.
now I'm not reading Ha'aretz from here, but do Avi Blizovski and Gugi
Doodleman write anything about Mozilla's progress? about the Corel
announcements? do they go into details and explain what linux is? is their
report about MS's latest shenanigans include explanations about the OS
alternatives out there? did they mention the fact that the "mimshal zamin"
will only support MS hebrew? Do they ever write about the statistics
reports of netcraft, about OpenSource, about the fact 25% of American
ISPs run on Linux, second only to Sun?
I'd expect the majority of the topics above will yield a "false" resault
when put to the test. I'm willing to write some professional looking press
releases "on behalf of the Israeli LUG" (though we would do better by
finding an Israeli as the official rep), and start sending weekly or
bi-weekly press releases to the big papers' computer section editors. I
believe we need headlines like "Gimp, is this the death of photoshop?" or
"Corel completely ignores MS in new line of products, a brave briliant
move?" and so on.
replys and flames to the list please, do not CC: me personally :-)
--
Ira Abramov <ira(a)scso.com> whois: IA58 (a linux enthusiast)
She sells cshs by the cshore. - Rob Malda