In reading Max's blog post on 2/24 [1] he brings up some key points that I feel merit further discussion on helping build a strong foundation for the ambassadors.
:Begin snippet of Max's Blog post: "Part of this problem is one of localization. You can go through the process of learning to be an Fedora packager regardless of where you live, but unless you are near a place where there are already active Ambassadors organizing events, it's hard to get real experience doing an event.
Another topic of conversation was helping to delegate responsibility. If an event is going to happen, there are several roles that need to be filled. One is purely operational -- coordinating with the location, scheduling the talks, making sure that there are handouts or posters, getting swag, publicity, etc. The skill set needed to do these kinds of things is different from the skill set needed once you actually get to the event and stand at the booth or deliver a talk.
Once you're actually speaking about Fedora, now it's about the message, and I think that for a lot of Ambassadors, we need to do a better job of filtering. Freedom, choice, community model -- those are the core principles of Fedora. After that, you need to be able to say in about 30 to 60 seconds what the high points of the current release are, and what the next release will include." :End snippet of Max's Blog post:
Organizing an event does take some real work and for some it might not be their area of expertise. I do think there are several things the Ambassador project could do to help lower this hurdle and increase the number of local events Fedora has a presence at.
My thoughts are based on what I learned from helping organize the Fedora presence at the Ohio Linux Fest in 2006. While we prepared for this event we felt there must be a better way to organize for something such as this - something a little more cookie cutter to reduce the actual work load of organizing the materials and such and allow more time focusing on other areas while at the event.
I think one thing that could go very far in helping with some of the larger events is to see the Event Kit that Jack Aboutboul worked on come to realization. The page for the Event Kit [2] is blank. I think we should look at the Gnome Event Box [3] as something the Fedora Project should put in place. For those unfamiliar with the Gnome Event Box, it is a large, sturdy box that they ship to Gnome volunteers presenting at various events. It includes an LCD screen, a desktop computer, mouse, keyboard, various networking equipment, posters/banners and materials to help in hanging these things at the booth. It is close to a booth in a box. Something such as this reduces the amount of work that must be repeated each time someone from the Fedora Project attends an event.
A Fedora Event Box would allow an ambassador to request the box for a certain date and have it shipped to them. When they receive the box they will have all the basic materials needed to put together a good looking booth for Fedora and also allow them more time to focus on other aspects of an event. To me this lowers the hurdle significantly to volunteering to attend an event. The costs of such a box are filling the box with the appropriate materials and then the shipping costs from event to event. The benefits to these costs are well put together Fedora Booths and hopefully more participation in local events.
Beyond the Event Box, making sure people know the core principals of Fedora is important. For this I present the Ubuntu Marketing Flier [4] as an example of a very clean at-a-glance look into the distro. I think Fedora needs a similar brochure to promote what makes Fedora what it is. We can also state where to get Fedora, where to ask questions and where to get support from the community. We can make such a flier readily available for Ambassadors in a format that will allow ambassadors to take the file to a print shop for local production.
For Release Features in upcoming versions a clean, well formatted single page can cover the highlights of future releases. This document can get updated for each upcoming release and be readily available to ambassadors to take to their local print shop for production for the actual event.
Many ambassadors also bring DVDs, T-Shirts, stickers, etc to events for sale from the booth to help defray the costs of getting us there to begin with. Our booth at the Ohio Linux Fest had all of these and we were pretty successful at paying for most (not all) of our costs to attend the event. Having templates that are ready for production and guidelines on how to give the information to the T-shirt maker or sticker maker can also reduce the amount of repeated work. For ambassadors with their own ideas, they could certainly run with that, but for other ambassadors they can just take the templates from the web and use the guidelines provided on the site. I see this as lowering the hurdle for event planning and organization.
In summary I see the following setup as greatly helping ease the organization efforts of attending events and hopefully leading to an increase in the number of events Fedora is able to attend - simply because we have made it easier.
* Fedora Event Kit (box): This will include the basic materials to get a booth up and running. An ambassador requests and receives this and can be assured of having a near immediate professional presence at an event.
* Marketing Fliers: Two fliers, one brochure covering the core principals of Fedora - explains what Fedora is about, where to obtain Fedora and where to get support from the community. The other flier lists the features in the upcoming release - to be updated with each new release. These would be readily available on the web to allow the ambassador to locally produce the materials.
* Schwag. Readily available (or at least clear steps on how to obtain the necessary high resolution images) images and templates for use with T-Shirt and Sticker logos. Also guidelines on what to tell a T-Shirt or sticker producer to make sure you get the materials you want.
By laying these ideas out clearly on wiki I think the hurdles to organizing events can be reduced greatly. This will either allow a person to simply request the materials and have access to the brochures to have a good presence at an event with minimal effort or free up valuable time for people who organize the Fedora Booth at events to focus on lining up speakers, prepping a birds of a feather session, etc, etc. I know if there had been these elements in place for the Ohio Linux Fest we would have had a much easier time of getting everything organized.
And finally, when I helped organize the Fedora Booth at the Ohio Linux Fest I was assigned a "mentor". This was a single contact that if I ran into trouble along they way or had questions in general I could easily email and he would either answer the questions I had, get me in contact with the correct person or get the answers for me. I think we should continue this. Let those of us that have organized events previously volunteer to be a mentor. Most likely those of us that volunteer to mentor will be familiar enough with the Ambassadors and people within the Fedora Project itself to help get answers and help guide new event organizers as needed to insure a successful Fedora presence at events. We would just be a friendly ear to help keep folks from getting overwhelmed.
--Jeffrey
[1] http://spevack.livejournal.com/9394.html
[2] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Ambassadors/EventKit
[3] http://live.gnome.org/GnomeEventsBox
[4] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DIYMarketing?action=AttachFile&do=get&target...
Jeffrey,
+5 for your mail ...
you're talking and writing out of my heart and my soul.
We (European Ambassadors) asked lot of times for the "Fedora Ambassadors Kit" which you give you now a different role as it was in the first time we thought about; but you're more right than the core idea was ... As far as I remember we mentioned that the Ambassador Kit was a Kit for every new Ambassador to help him(self) to get in touch with the Fedora Organisation and getting him(self) involved what he has/should do as Ambassador ...
maybe we miss this also ...
Your idea with the Event Box is imho one step in the right way; regional, filled with what you need to build up a "Fedora Presentation" regardless chairs, tables, walls and so on ...
Why not set up an wiki-page and collect what other Ambassadors, attendees of booth think what is needed and usefull?!
Regards
Gerold
Am Sonntag, den 25.02.2007, 13:19 -0500 schrieb Jeffrey Tadlock:
In reading Max's blog post on 2/24 [1] he brings up some key points that I feel merit further discussion on helping build a strong foundation for the ambassadors.
:Begin snippet of Max's Blog post: "Part of this problem is one of localization. You can go through the process of learning to be an Fedora packager regardless of where you live, but unless you are near a place where there are already active Ambassadors organizing events, it's hard to get real experience doing an event.
Another topic of conversation was helping to delegate responsibility. If an event is going to happen, there are several roles that need to be filled. One is purely operational -- coordinating with the location, scheduling the talks, making sure that there are handouts or posters, getting swag, publicity, etc. The skill set needed to do these kinds of things is different from the skill set needed once you actually get to the event and stand at the booth or deliver a talk.
Once you're actually speaking about Fedora, now it's about the message, and I think that for a lot of Ambassadors, we need to do a better job of filtering. Freedom, choice, community model -- those are the core principles of Fedora. After that, you need to be able to say in about 30 to 60 seconds what the high points of the current release are, and what the next release will include." :End snippet of Max's Blog post:
Organizing an event does take some real work and for some it might not be their area of expertise. I do think there are several things the Ambassador project could do to help lower this hurdle and increase the number of local events Fedora has a presence at.
My thoughts are based on what I learned from helping organize the Fedora presence at the Ohio Linux Fest in 2006. While we prepared for this event we felt there must be a better way to organize for something such as this - something a little more cookie cutter to reduce the actual work load of organizing the materials and such and allow more time focusing on other areas while at the event.
I think one thing that could go very far in helping with some of the larger events is to see the Event Kit that Jack Aboutboul worked on come to realization. The page for the Event Kit [2] is blank. I think we should look at the Gnome Event Box [3] as something the Fedora Project should put in place. For those unfamiliar with the Gnome Event Box, it is a large, sturdy box that they ship to Gnome volunteers presenting at various events. It includes an LCD screen, a desktop computer, mouse, keyboard, various networking equipment, posters/banners and materials to help in hanging these things at the booth. It is close to a booth in a box. Something such as this reduces the amount of work that must be repeated each time someone from the Fedora Project attends an event.
A Fedora Event Box would allow an ambassador to request the box for a certain date and have it shipped to them. When they receive the box they will have all the basic materials needed to put together a good looking booth for Fedora and also allow them more time to focus on other aspects of an event. To me this lowers the hurdle significantly to volunteering to attend an event. The costs of such a box are filling the box with the appropriate materials and then the shipping costs from event to event. The benefits to these costs are well put together Fedora Booths and hopefully more participation in local events.
Beyond the Event Box, making sure people know the core principals of Fedora is important. For this I present the Ubuntu Marketing Flier [4] as an example of a very clean at-a-glance look into the distro. I think Fedora needs a similar brochure to promote what makes Fedora what it is. We can also state where to get Fedora, where to ask questions and where to get support from the community. We can make such a flier readily available for Ambassadors in a format that will allow ambassadors to take the file to a print shop for local production.
For Release Features in upcoming versions a clean, well formatted single page can cover the highlights of future releases. This document can get updated for each upcoming release and be readily available to ambassadors to take to their local print shop for production for the actual event.
Many ambassadors also bring DVDs, T-Shirts, stickers, etc to events for sale from the booth to help defray the costs of getting us there to begin with. Our booth at the Ohio Linux Fest had all of these and we were pretty successful at paying for most (not all) of our costs to attend the event. Having templates that are ready for production and guidelines on how to give the information to the T-shirt maker or sticker maker can also reduce the amount of repeated work. For ambassadors with their own ideas, they could certainly run with that, but for other ambassadors they can just take the templates from the web and use the guidelines provided on the site. I see this as lowering the hurdle for event planning and organization.
In summary I see the following setup as greatly helping ease the organization efforts of attending events and hopefully leading to an increase in the number of events Fedora is able to attend - simply because we have made it easier.
- Fedora Event Kit (box):
This will include the basic materials to get a booth up and running. An ambassador requests and receives this and can be assured of having a near immediate professional presence at an event.
- Marketing Fliers:
Two fliers, one brochure covering the core principals of Fedora - explains what Fedora is about, where to obtain Fedora and where to get support from the community. The other flier lists the features in the upcoming release - to be updated with each new release. These would be readily available on the web to allow the ambassador to locally produce the materials.
- Schwag. Readily available (or at least clear steps on how to obtain
the necessary high resolution images) images and templates for use with T-Shirt and Sticker logos. Also guidelines on what to tell a T-Shirt or sticker producer to make sure you get the materials you want.
By laying these ideas out clearly on wiki I think the hurdles to organizing events can be reduced greatly. This will either allow a person to simply request the materials and have access to the brochures to have a good presence at an event with minimal effort or free up valuable time for people who organize the Fedora Booth at events to focus on lining up speakers, prepping a birds of a feather session, etc, etc. I know if there had been these elements in place for the Ohio Linux Fest we would have had a much easier time of getting everything organized.
And finally, when I helped organize the Fedora Booth at the Ohio Linux Fest I was assigned a "mentor". This was a single contact that if I ran into trouble along they way or had questions in general I could easily email and he would either answer the questions I had, get me in contact with the correct person or get the answers for me. I think we should continue this. Let those of us that have organized events previously volunteer to be a mentor. Most likely those of us that volunteer to mentor will be familiar enough with the Ambassadors and people within the Fedora Project itself to help get answers and help guide new event organizers as needed to insure a successful Fedora presence at events. We would just be a friendly ear to help keep folks from getting overwhelmed.
--Jeffrey
[1] http://spevack.livejournal.com/9394.html
[2] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Ambassadors/EventKit
[3] http://live.gnome.org/GnomeEventsBox
[4] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DIYMarketing?action=AttachFile&do=get&target...
-- Fedora-ambassadors-list mailing list Fedora-ambassadors-list@redhat.com https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-ambassadors-list
Gerold Kassube wrote:
We (European Ambassadors) asked lot of times for the "Fedora Ambassadors Kit" which you give you now a different role as it was in the first time we thought about; but you're more right than the core idea was ... As far as I remember we mentioned that the Ambassador Kit was a Kit for every new Ambassador to help him(self) to get in touch with the Fedora Organisation and getting him(self) involved what he has/should do as Ambassador ...
Yes, it does sound like we are talking about two things. I think both are closely related towards keeping the hurdle low for attending an event on Fedora's behalf. New ambassadors need a quick way to familiarize themselves with the options and resources available to them (more of the Kit concept). While the Event Box is more of a tool to make sure ambassadors (new or old) can readily get the basic materials needed to host a booth and also have the information necessary to locally produce printed brochures, handouts, T-shirts, etc.
Why not set up an wiki-page and collect what other Ambassadors, attendees of booth think what is needed and usefull?!
I hope to get a Wiki page up this week to start listing out ideas of what an event box should contain.
Thanks! Jeffrey
On Mon, 26 Feb 2007, Jeffrey Tadlock wrote:
While the Event Box is more of a tool to make sure ambassadors (new or old) can readily get the basic materials needed to host a booth and also have the information necessary to locally produce printed brochures, handouts, T-shirts, etc.
I think this is a great idea. I manned the FSF booth at the last Ohio Linuxfest for a bit and they had everything there one would need (I believe I even met you there, manning the Fedora booth). =)
Gerold Kassube wrote:
Why not set up an wiki-page and collect what other Ambassadors, attendees of booth think what is needed and usefull?!
I have setup a wiki page [1] for the Event Box proposal. This project is only early in the proposal stage, but I encourage other Ambassadors to add items to the page or comment on the list about the proposal.
--Jeffrey
On Fri, 2 Mar 2007, Jeffrey Tadlock wrote:
Gerold Kassube wrote:
Why not set up an wiki-page and collect what other Ambassadors, attendees of booth think what is needed and usefull?!
I have setup a wiki page [1] for the Event Box proposal. This project is only early in the proposal stage, but I encourage other Ambassadors to add items to the page or comment on the list about the proposal.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that we could probably fund the creation of this event box. The biggest open questions have to do with customs fees and such like that -- but if it's one event box, I think we could manage this.
We'll also need an efficient handoff mechanism, but I think the wiki could accomplish that nicely.
--g
------------------------------------------------------------- Greg DeKoenigsberg || Fedora Project || fedoraproject.org Be an Ambassador || http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Ambassadors -------------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey Tadlock ha scritto:
In reading Max's blog post on 2/24 [1] he brings up some key points that I feel merit further discussion on helping build a strong foundation for the ambassadors.
:Begin snippet of Max's Blog post: "Part of this problem is one of localization. You can go through the process of learning to be an Fedora packager regardless of where you live, but unless you are near a place where there are already active Ambassadors organizing events, it's hard to get real experience doing an event.
Another topic of conversation was helping to delegate responsibility. If an event is going to happen, there are several roles that need to be filled. One is purely operational -- coordinating with the location, scheduling the talks, making sure that there are handouts or posters, getting swag, publicity, etc. The skill set needed to do these kinds of things is different from the skill set needed once you actually get to the event and stand at the booth or deliver a talk.
Once you're actually speaking about Fedora, now it's about the message, and I think that for a lot of Ambassadors, we need to do a better job of filtering. Freedom, choice, community model -- those are the core principles of Fedora. After that, you need to be able to say in about 30 to 60 seconds what the high points of the current release are, and what the next release will include." :End snippet of Max's Blog post:
Organizing an event does take some real work and for some it might not be their area of expertise. I do think there are several things the Ambassador project could do to help lower this hurdle and increase the number of local events Fedora has a presence at.
My thoughts are based on what I learned from helping organize the Fedora presence at the Ohio Linux Fest in 2006. While we prepared for this event we felt there must be a better way to organize for something such as this - something a little more cookie cutter to reduce the actual work load of organizing the materials and such and allow more time focusing on other areas while at the event.
I think one thing that could go very far in helping with some of the larger events is to see the Event Kit that Jack Aboutboul worked on come to realization. The page for the Event Kit [2] is blank. I think we should look at the Gnome Event Box [3] as something the Fedora Project should put in place. For those unfamiliar with the Gnome Event Box, it is a large, sturdy box that they ship to Gnome volunteers presenting at various events. It includes an LCD screen, a desktop computer, mouse, keyboard, various networking equipment, posters/banners and materials to help in hanging these things at the booth. It is close to a booth in a box. Something such as this reduces the amount of work that must be repeated each time someone from the Fedora Project attends an event.
A Fedora Event Box would allow an ambassador to request the box for a certain date and have it shipped to them. When they receive the box they will have all the basic materials needed to put together a good looking booth for Fedora and also allow them more time to focus on other aspects of an event. To me this lowers the hurdle significantly to volunteering to attend an event. The costs of such a box are filling the box with the appropriate materials and then the shipping costs from event to event. The benefits to these costs are well put together Fedora Booths and hopefully more participation in local events.
Beyond the Event Box, making sure people know the core principals of Fedora is important. For this I present the Ubuntu Marketing Flier [4] as an example of a very clean at-a-glance look into the distro. I think Fedora needs a similar brochure to promote what makes Fedora what it is. We can also state where to get Fedora, where to ask questions and where to get support from the community. We can make such a flier readily available for Ambassadors in a format that will allow ambassadors to take the file to a print shop for local production.
For Release Features in upcoming versions a clean, well formatted single page can cover the highlights of future releases. This document can get updated for each upcoming release and be readily available to ambassadors to take to their local print shop for production for the actual event.
Many ambassadors also bring DVDs, T-Shirts, stickers, etc to events for sale from the booth to help defray the costs of getting us there to begin with. Our booth at the Ohio Linux Fest had all of these and we were pretty successful at paying for most (not all) of our costs to attend the event. Having templates that are ready for production and guidelines on how to give the information to the T-shirt maker or sticker maker can also reduce the amount of repeated work. For ambassadors with their own ideas, they could certainly run with that, but for other ambassadors they can just take the templates from the web and use the guidelines provided on the site. I see this as lowering the hurdle for event planning and organization.
In summary I see the following setup as greatly helping ease the organization efforts of attending events and hopefully leading to an increase in the number of events Fedora is able to attend - simply because we have made it easier.
- Fedora Event Kit (box):
This will include the basic materials to get a booth up and running. An ambassador requests and receives this and can be assured of having a near immediate professional presence at an event.
- Marketing Fliers:
Two fliers, one brochure covering the core principals of Fedora - explains what Fedora is about, where to obtain Fedora and where to get support from the community. The other flier lists the features in the upcoming release - to be updated with each new release. These would be readily available on the web to allow the ambassador to locally produce the materials.
- Schwag. Readily available (or at least clear steps on how to obtain
the necessary high resolution images) images and templates for use with T-Shirt and Sticker logos. Also guidelines on what to tell a T-Shirt or sticker producer to make sure you get the materials you want.
By laying these ideas out clearly on wiki I think the hurdles to organizing events can be reduced greatly. This will either allow a person to simply request the materials and have access to the brochures to have a good presence at an event with minimal effort or free up valuable time for people who organize the Fedora Booth at events to focus on lining up speakers, prepping a birds of a feather session, etc, etc. I know if there had been these elements in place for the Ohio Linux Fest we would have had a much easier time of getting everything organized.
And finally, when I helped organize the Fedora Booth at the Ohio Linux Fest I was assigned a "mentor". This was a single contact that if I ran into trouble along they way or had questions in general I could easily email and he would either answer the questions I had, get me in contact with the correct person or get the answers for me. I think we should continue this. Let those of us that have organized events previously volunteer to be a mentor. Most likely those of us that volunteer to mentor will be familiar enough with the Ambassadors and people within the Fedora Project itself to help get answers and help guide new event organizers as needed to insure a successful Fedora presence at events. We would just be a friendly ear to help keep folks from getting overwhelmed.
--Jeffrey
[1] http://spevack.livejournal.com/9394.html
[2] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Ambassadors/EventKit
[3] http://live.gnome.org/GnomeEventsBox
[4] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DIYMarketing?action=AttachFile&do=get&target...
-- Fedora-ambassadors-list mailing list Fedora-ambassadors-list@redhat.com https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-ambassadors-list
+++++
I, also, think that it's necessary to have first a good localization and then all event kit, as you know if you are not living in USA you have to wait up to 2 week to receive the package and it cost a lot more that build localized event (ambassador) kit. So i think we have, first of all, to work on localization.
That's my opinion
Regards
Francesco Ugolini
p.s. I want to remember all that Ambassador Award Nominations are open until 28th February. And thank to all Ambassador who shared with me the grateful experience of FOSDEM.
Francesco Ugolini wrote:
I, also, think that it's necessary to have first a good localization and then all event kit, as you know if you are not living in USA you have to wait up to 2 week to receive the package and it cost a lot more that build localized event (ambassador) kit. So i think we have, first of all, to work on localization.
The global scope of the Fedora community does make some concepts and ideas harder to apply worldwide. But on the same thought, things have to start somewhere and hopefully upon their successes spread to other regions.
You are correct that shipping an Event Box between continents can be time consuming and expensive. Perhaps an event box for Europe and North America would be good for a starting point. Then, if those are proven successful the idea can grow to encompass other continents as well.
--Jeffrey
ambassadors@lists.fedoraproject.org