[Marketing] getting involved: doing us a favor

[Tomeu Vizoso]

On Thu, Jun 18, 2009 at 09:37, Sean DALY <sdaly.be at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Thanks Mel
>
> Actually I think Walter has the best handle on this - each profile
> needs a Sugar Story, one of us explaining what motivates us,
> communicating our passion and willingness to accept the challenges.

Also, I would like to see these stories explaining how each individual
came from being a lurker to get involved. If we as a collective have a
better knowledge of this process, we'll be able to involve more
people.

Regards,

Tomeu

> We've had difficulty starting this up dues to our workload (and
> perhaps also because of the risk of clubby mutual backslapping), but
> perhaps a way to get this going is to just post a quote from one of us
> under each profile? From the Real Person?
>
> I've said before that the profiles aren't ideal - there should be
> Communicator for marketing/PR/publicist, in its absence we sort of fit
> marketing into Content Writer (reductionist from a marketing POV) and
> People Person (ideal profile for manning a booth, but not really a
> description for event planning or marketing). Marketing (especially
> with ultraminimalist budget) involves first and foremost creativity,
> not tasks to do. A marketer will naturally stick her nose into other
> (non-marketing) aspects to work towards objectives and the tasks are
> done because we have our eyes on the prize. Whatever skills any of us
> lack is quickly made up for by getting someone in the community with
> the skills to help out.
>
> In the end I'm not at all sure the pigeonholes are useful. The "grid"
> seems to assign heavy workloads; there is no emotional argument or
> call to action. I think we'd be better served by communicating our
> ideals, for changing the world and bettering education and
> opportunity, then listing major objectives; under each of these, a
> line or two saying "We need someone to help us...", signed by the Real
> Person. Potential contributors will want to contact a person, not a
> "team" or an "alias"; it's key to make ourselves easily contactable I
> think.
>
> Group photos from SugarCamps could be enormously helpful, the smiles
> on our faces showing that we like working together :-)
>
> Sean
>
>
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 17, 2009 at 11:59 PM, Mel Chua<mel at melchua.com> wrote:
> > Inspired by a discussion with Caroline on IRC the other day.
> >
> > I was looking at
> > http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Sugar_Labs/Getting_Involved, and... I think
> > my biggest comment is "how can the page be designed so as to make it
> > clear that they're doing us a favor - not an imposition - by participating?"
> >
> > Several years back, I met a professor once who was writing a textbook
> > and beta-testing it with his class, who would have the homework of
> > reading it and working problems. Not unusual. The interesting thing was
> > that the assignments were phrased something like this: "I'm writing this
> > textbook, and would love reviews; your assignment is to look at this and
> > point out my mistakes, where I'm being confusing, where the problems
> > aren't teaching you the material effectively - you're the expert on what
> > makes a textbook good for you."
> >
> > He said he got far better - and far more - responses than the usual
> > "this is your homework; do these problems." The implied subtext to that,
> > especially for some newbies, is "and if you have a hard time, it's
> > because you're dumb, because We Know Stuff and our materials are Perfect."
> >
> > So how can we make it clear that beginning participation and telling us
> > about the questions and the troubles that they have in contributing
> > isn't any trouble for us - and that in fact, we really like it?
> >
> > --Mel
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> >
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