[Sugar-devel] calling for volunteers (was Re: SOAS 2 problems)

[Tomeu Vizoso]

On Sun, Jan 31, 2010 at 05:35, Samuel Klein <meta.sj at gmail.com> wrote:
> That news blurb was certainly bold... it's also from Fall 2008.   It's
> harder to spread FUD when a couple years of stories of XOs in
> classrooms involve Sugar.

I agree, but the situation we have right now is that people that know
what an OS is, generally think windows replaced linux. I see it when I
meet hackers from other communities, we have seen it in the
unfortunate windows7sins campaign.

Technological reporting in mainstream media is lousy and big companies
know that if the "inconvenient truth" is left in the details, it will
be eventually dropped and their main message will be amplified.

> I would like to work together on a series of blog posts about the new
> Sugar version that will be shipping on the 1.5's.  If some of the
> active develpoers (Tomeu, Chris, one or two developers of new
> activities?) want to draft their impressions and favorite aspects of
> the new release, I would be happy to edit and publish the result.

Happy to lend a hand on that, though Simon would be a better fit,
being our release manager.

Regards,

Tomeu

> SJ
>
> On Fri, Jan 29, 2010 at 5:20 AM, Tomeu Vizoso <tomeu at tomeuvizoso.net> wrote:
>> On Tue, Jan 26, 2010 at 00:21, Samuel Klein <meta.sj at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> On Fri, Jan 22, 2010 at 4:34 AM, Tomeu Vizoso <tomeu at sugarlabs.org> wrote:
>>>> On Fri, Jan 22, 2010 at 06:07, Walter Bender <walter.bender at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> I think we are looking at a great probortunity here. We have a project
>>>
>>> My mind balks at that word, but I agree with this message wholeheartedly.
>>>
>>>> If we are able to learn to make successful calls for help, we will be
>>>> able to scale up our capacity significantly. We can like it or not,
>>>> but we depend _a lot_ on volunteers and we need to accept it and
>>>> operate according to that reality.
>>>
>>> A good point.  Is there a page on the slwiki to organize calls for
>>> help for various projects?  (it's not always this sort of call for
>>> help -- sometimes there are calls for developers from outside groups
>>> trying to fund activity development as well; or calls for
>>> field-testers by a group of active developers...)
>>
>> We have http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Vacancies but that only works, as
>> it is now, for work that has associated a "position", not for
>> projects. Should we use the same? Create a different one?
>>
>> This is very related to Aleksey's proposal for a site that matches
>> needs with contributors, but I think it's better to start first with a
>> low-tech solution such as the wiki and move to more sophisticated
>> means as we learn more.
>>
>> About where to put the calls, my blog is read by GNOME hackers, I
>> think OLPC could ask Jonathan Corbet to put a call for kernel
>> developers, Greg's blog is read by Fedora contributors, what other
>> outlets we have for calling for specific volunteering opportunities?
>>
>> As mentioned before, I think it's very important how the need is
>> expressed, there's a world of difference between saying "we need you
>> to improve education" and having someone on the field describing how
>> the volunteer could make a real change on the lives of the people
>> there. Photos will also help, maybe a video from a rural school in
>> Africa, etc.
>>
>>>> And Sugar Labs cannot take this job it alone in part because most of
>>>> the general public still thinks that OLPC laptops are running Windows.
>>>
>>> We definitely need to remedy this confusion.
>>
>> I don't think that nor OLPC nor SLs can do much against MS' press machine:
>>
>> http://www.scidev.net/en/new-technologies/digital-divide/low-cost-laptops-to-change-from-linux-to-microsoft.html
>>
>> But if from time to time OLPC's press releases could briefly mention
>> Sugar, I think it could be great.
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Tomeu
>>
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