[plug] What would encourage membership of PLUG?

[Adrian Chadd]

.. and I'll say here what I say to other groups. If you as members
think stuff isn't happening that you'd like, then take the initiative,
go make that stuff happen and you'll likely get support from the
rest of the community.

Eg - there's no regular installfests? No presentation topics
that interest you? Then go out and seek those. Organise them to
happen. Do the advertising yourself. etc, etc.

On Thu, Feb 18, 2010, Gregory Orange wrote:
> Just like with SAGE-AU's current and AUUG's relatively recent
> soul-searching, I reckon the question is "what do you want to
> achieve"? Personally I don't have any great desire to see PLUG as a
> booming organisation with hundreds of members. I am very happy with
> the mailing lists basically offering connection with part of the Perth
> IT community - with a strong Linux flavour. Of course, if the AGM was
> a bit of a fizzer that's disappointing. Hopefully it becomes a mere
> blip on the radar rather than a downward spiral.
> 
> If you do want more certainty and to be bigger, then it'll require
> more effort in asking people who are not even subscribed to the
> mailing list what it would take, you know market research and stuff.
> Me no expert, just throwing around some words I've heard elsewhere. I
> guess it's a bit like spending money to make money, other people's
> willingness to put in effort must start with a whole lot of effort
> from within. It's a difficult spiral to reverse.
> 
> I didn't realise most of the member 'benefits', except for the library
> (no use to me, I've got DSL). I think they're great add-ons and I
> might try to use them this year. They wouldn't be deal-makers for me
> because the mailing lists with all you fine posters are the reason I'm
> signed up, but they make me feel extra good about it.
> 
> Technically speaking: All of PLUG's tech offerings would be more
> useful to me if I wasn't gainfully employed in a place where I've got
> toy boxes as I need them. Xen and Qemu/KVM hosts too.
> 
> Oh and I second the motion to remind about dues - I don't recall
> paying mine in quite some time, but I'm more than willing!
> 
> Cheers,
> Greg.
> 
> On 18 February 2010 09:31, Tim White <weirdit at gmail.com> wrote:
> > My wife and I were talking about PLUG after our failed AGM last week. She
> > wanted to know what are the benefits of joining PLUG and why would anyone
> > bother?
> > Well, here is what the website says.
> >
> > *Benefits of joining:*
> >
> > ? * Being a PLUG member entitles you to borrow CDs and books from the
> > ? ? PLUG library <http://www.plug.org.au/resources/library>.
> > ? * You get an account on the club's computers (kettle.plug.org.au and
> > ? ? spark.plug.org.au), including web space for your own web pages and
> > ? ? an e-mail address @plug.org.au. (See our terms and conditions
> > ? ? <http://www.plug.org.au/resources/shell-account> for shell access.)
> > ? * Free coffee (or other drink) with a kebab at Plaka Caf? in
> > ? ? Northbridge.
> > ? * PLUG members get a 10% discount at Linux IT
> > ? ? <http://www.linuxit.com.au/>.
> > ? * You also get spiffy card with a penguin on it.
> >
> >
> > So my question is, what more could we offer as a group, for paid members,
> > that would encourage membership? It's not expensive, a year's membership
> > costs $10 (full membership) or $5 (concession). So what would stop people
> > from being paid members?
> >
> > On a technical side of things, I know with the new server, when it is
> > running, we hope to be running Xen, so we can have a number of Virtual
> > Machines available for people to play with. Is this something that would be
> > attractive to members? On the webserver currently, for less than a $1 a
> > month, you get more hosting space than most cheap hosts give you for $10 a
> > month. (Having said that, it's not an invitation to start hosting large
> > websites with lots of traffic, as all our traffic is kindly donated to us
> > and we wouldn't want to cost our host large amounts in traffic, but I think
> > WAIX traffic is generally acceptable if larger quantities than non-WAIX).
> >
> > Anyway, I just thought I'd put this out to the sleeping list, and encourage
> > some discussion about it.
> >
> > What would you want PLUG to offer paid members, that would encourage your
> > membership?
> >
> > Thanks
> >
> > Tim
> > p.s. I would love it if someone could check about the discounts we advertise
> > that you can get, with Plaka and Linux IT, to see if we can still get them.
> > Also, any other business owners/managers that want to add a discount, please
> > do!
> > _______________________________________________
> > PLUG discussion list: plug at plug.org.au
> > http://www.plug.org.au/mailman/listinfo/plug
> > Committee e-mail: committee at plug.linux.org.au
> >
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Gregory Orange
> _______________________________________________
> PLUG discussion list: plug at plug.org.au
> http://www.plug.org.au/mailman/listinfo/plug
> Committee e-mail: committee at plug.linux.org.au

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