[Marketing] sugaronastick.com (was Re: [Sugar-devel] Beta Test of Sugar on a Stick Backup Service.)

[Tomeu Vizoso]

Sorry about top posting, but I agree with most of what you said below,
and I'm not yet particularly worried about the content of the site
itself for now.

I really think that your initiative has big future and understand that
it's still in an early stage. I also think that something like that
could help SLs greatly.

But what I was referring to is that there's a community of people
working on a project called "sugar on a stick" and one individual has
launched a site with that same name talking about a derivative of it.

Whatever is done with the name "sugar on a stick" will be attributed
to the project with that name, and I don't think it's fair to that
community that one individual unilaterally starts a different
initiative with the same name.

I'm not talking about trademarks here, just voicing a concern that
about how the name of the project is being used without involving the
community. "sugar on a stick" has been used to name what a community
of people had been doing, but now it also refers to a private
initiative, isn't this confusing?

I think that, going forward, one of these would be good to happen:

- http://sugaronastick.com/ points to a community controlled site (a
section of the SLs wiki?)

- the community agrees with you using http://sugaronastick.com/ for a
specific purpose or even for whatever you want

- "sugar on a stick" becomes the name for your personal initiative and
the community project gets a new name.

These are the only ways I see to avoid confusion, but may be others,
please suggest.

Regards,

Tomeu

On Wed, Sep 16, 2009 at 16:05, Caroline Meeks
<caroline at solutiongrove.com> wrote:
> Hi,
> I don't consider sugaronastick.com launched yet. We don't have the ability
> to take money and there is very little text on the site.  The url
> sugaronastick.com has pointed to a site for probably 6 months. We have
> reskinned it and moved to WordPress.  The people who's artwork is on the
> site did get advanced notice before I switched the url. (Sean, Mike Lee).
>  In addition Sebastian and Walter both knew about it before it sugar-devel
> did because I talk to them about future plans regularly. Also at least Anne
> Gentle saw it, as we did a blog post that was syndicated on Planet and she
> commented.
> I have been focusing on getting the backup working because we really need
> that for GPA and this is the same code and I have not been focusing on the
> text for the site or "launching". I'm sorry. The text is bad, incomplete and
> does not reflect my full intent. I didn't think about. I just thought about
> wanting help testing the backup and the GPA spin and in my head had doing
> the text for a few weeks from now. I would like the communities input on how
> to link back to Sugar Labs and give Sugar Labs credit.
> First some words about intent.
> I of course dream of millions of parents buying backup service for their
> children's
> sugar Sticks, but I don't actually think its going to be a money maker. Could be. Everyone
> keep your fingers crossed! I'm doing it for a few reasons.
> 1. We need to do all the technical work anyway to support SoaS in schools.
> 2. I need to find a way to make a living and this is worth a try.
> 3. We need to make it easier and friendlier for parents to try Sugar.  We can't scale backup and collaboration for free.
>  So I think offering this as a service is important to Sugar on a Stick's
> growth.
> 4. My theory is that parents will first want to try it with their kids then they will volunteer to bring it to their school. I want to make it easier for more people to start down that path.
> 5. Might work as a profitable business.  Could happen. :)
> 6. It may attract the attention of funders who are looking to fund "Social
> Entrepreneurship". These people need to see a business model as well as
> social good.
> So I do very much intentionally want this to tie people back to Sugar Labs and the educational mission and to bringing Sugar into schools. I think the current text on the site
> does not reflect that. I'm sorry, its cause I haven't actually, in my mind,
> written anything, what I have up in brain storming.  I certainly get how it
> doesn't look that way and I'm sorry.
> I do want the site to have a comfortable commercial feel. I want it to be
> different from the official sugarlabs site in feel. I want parents to feel
> they are getting something their kids can have fun with and learn.  This
> site will be completely parent focused. I have also bought Sugar4Schools.com
> to offer services to schools.
> I do want to link back to Sugar Labs, which I haven't yet, and I'm sorry. I
> just got focused on making backup work and hadn't thought about the text
> yet.
> I do want to give a portion of the profits to Sugar Labs should profits
> actually exist.  I also want to reinvest profits in promoting Sugar in
> general.
> I do want all of my marketing to raise awareness of Sugar, to increase the
> odds that someone volunteers for Sugar Labs and to increase the odds that
> they will work to put Sugar into their school. This is the PRIMARY goal for
> me.  SugaronaStick.com is a way to do that sustainably and to do it with a
> different, less stuffy and academic voice, that I hope will reach a
> different audience then the official SugarLabs site.  I want Sugar in
> schools.
> Note I am not charging for Sugar, I am going to charge for web based XS
> services.  My hope is that you could download the official Sugar and change
> the network setting and use our services.  But I don't want to make parents
> do that, I want it to be easy. Also that won't happen until at least
> Blueberry because the code to connect to the server is new.
> So clearly the site needs to link back and give credit to Sugar Labs more
> and better.  I'd like the community's advice on how to do that.
> Thanks!
> Caroline
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Tomeu Vizoso <tomeu at sugarlabs.org>
> Date: Wed, Sep 16, 2009 at 9:04 AM
> Subject: sugaronastick.com (was Re: [Sugar-devel] Beta Test of Sugar on a
> Stick Backup Service.)
> To: Caroline Meeks <caroline at solutiongrove.com>
> Cc: Sugar Devel <sugar-devel at lists.sugarlabs.org>
>
>
> On Mon, Sep 14, 2009 at 20:04, Caroline Meeks
> <caroline at solutiongrove.com> wrote:
>> I'd like to announce to just the sugar development list at this point.
>> We are ready for the first tests of backup and restore on a Sugar Stick.
>>  We
>> will be using this code for both Sugaronastick.com and the GPA but each
>> will
>> point to a different XS server so we can have GPA XS be school people
>> only.
>
> So you are going to distribute a derivative of a SoaS release from a
> site named sugaronastick.com ? As someone involved in SoaS I'm
> concerned that this will get really messy quickly. I have asked other
> people involved in SoaS and they also didn't knew about it before it
> was live and announced.
>
> To avoid misunderstandings, I think that what you are doing is great,
> I hope your business goes awesomely and I will help as I can from
> upstream.
>
> I just don't understand why you are using the name of your upstream to
> market your derivative before discussing it with the community.
>
> Regards,
>
> Tomeu
>
>> To test click "Get Sugar" at www.sugaronastick.com
>> We have named this Spin "Strawberry Tree" as its done by Solution Grove
>> based on the Strawberry Release.  If your curious there is such a thing as
>> a
>> Strawberry Tree - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strawberry_Tree
>> Beta Testers who are also on the Sugar Devel list will get free services
>> from sugaronastick.com for the life of the service and 5 coupon codes for
>> a
>> year of free service to give to your friends once we start charging and
>> have
>> implemented coupon process.
>> We are restricting the beta to Sugar Devel people for now because the
>> instructions are probably still too rough and this is our first tests.
>> Please email your feedback!
>> Thank you!
>>
>>
>> --
>> Caroline Meeks
>> Solution Grove
>> Caroline at SolutionGrove.com
>>
>> 617-500-3488 - Office
>> 505-213-3268 - Fax
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Sugar-devel mailing list
>> Sugar-devel at lists.sugarlabs.org
>> http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel
>>
>>
>
>
>
> --
> «Sugar Labs is anyone who participates in improving and using Sugar.
> What Sugar Labs does is determined by the participants.» - David
> Farning
>
>
>
> --
> Caroline Meeks
> Solution Grove
> Caroline at SolutionGrove.com
>
> 617-500-3488 - Office
> 505-213-3268 - Fax
>



-- 
«Sugar Labs is anyone who participates in improving and using Sugar.
What Sugar Labs does is determined by the participants.» - David
Farning