Dear All: Based on a couple of email conversations that I had with Rick Moen last week (both on the balug_admin list and privately), I'd like to touch base with the rest of the group regarding the use of other LUG's mailing lists for BALUG announcements. As such I'm not going to do a reminder email blast of other LUG's lists for tomorrows event. The basic concern is some people on specific LUG lists don't like other LUGs posting their events. The rational is "If I wanted BALUG announcements, I'd subscribe to the BALUG announce list." I have personally only heard this complaint from Rick, and my gut tells me that his in the minority, but I don't want to be naive to the fact that others may share his sentiment so advice/opinions here would definitely be appreciated. The problem is that other LUGs mailing lists are a great way for BALUG to get the word out and abandoning them will make it quit difficult to let folks know about all of the great speakers we have lined up for 2008. My proposed solution, that I believe Rick supports, is to contact the organizations individually and ask them how to handle their lists. Thoughts? -Andrew ---------------------------------------- Andrew Fife Untangle - Open Source Security Gateway download.untangle.com 650.425.3327 (O) 415.806.6028 (C) afife@untangle.com
Quoting Andrew Fife (afife@untangle.com):
The problem is that other LUGs mailing lists are a great way for BALUG to get the word out and abandoning them will make it quit difficult to let folks know about all of the great speakers we have lined up for 2008.
What I suggested, specifically, is (1) doing a one-time posting calling LUG members' attention to BALUG's currently exceptional slate of upcoming speakers. And then, from that point forward, (2) post to other LUGs' mailing lists "About BALUG" reminders no more than _quarterly_, suggesting signup at BALUG's very-low-traffic, announce mailing list, via http://lists.balug.org/listinfo.cgi/balug-announce-balug.org , to receive timely meeting announcements + other BALUG news. If people know of BALUG's existence, of balug-announce's ease of signup, and of the latter's very low traffic, and choose not to subscribe, then blitzing their LUG mailing lists anyway because it's a "great way to get the word out" is rude. And remains that way even where LUG leaders give their OK.
That's an excellent proposal, I completely agree with it, and I do share Rick's annoyance with postings from other groups, while I may be subscribed to them already. On Nov 19, 2007 8:41 PM, Rick Moen <rick@linuxmafia.com> wrote:
Quoting Andrew Fife (afife@untangle.com):
The problem is that other LUGs mailing lists are a great way for BALUG to get the word out and abandoning them will make it quit difficult to let folks know about all of the great speakers we have lined up for 2008.
What I suggested, specifically, is (1) doing a one-time posting calling LUG members' attention to BALUG's currently exceptional slate of upcoming speakers.
And then, from that point forward, (2) post to other LUGs' mailing lists "About BALUG" reminders no more than _quarterly_, suggesting signup at BALUG's very-low-traffic, announce mailing list, via http://lists.balug.org/listinfo.cgi/balug-announce-balug.org , to receive timely meeting announcements + other BALUG news.
If people know of BALUG's existence, of balug-announce's ease of signup, and of the latter's very low traffic, and choose not to subscribe, then blitzing their LUG mailing lists anyway because it's a "great way to get the word out" is rude.
And remains that way even where LUG leaders give their OK.
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Dear All: An impromptu BALUG steering committee was held after the last BALUG including myself, Dick, Michael P., Jim Stockford and Tom Belote. Jesse Z. was also there but wasn't involved in this part of the discussion. We made the following decision on how to use other LUG's mailing lists for making BALUG announcements: -Default to sending 1 BALUG announcement email per month but be sure to include a note at the bottom of the message about how list members can give feedback -Adjust announcements according to feedback -Adjust plan for any other LUG mailing lists that we already know 1 message per month is not optimal, like Conspire, where it is too much and SFLUG where reminders are okay On a side note, we are also going to encourage people to sign up for the low volume Balug announce list whenever announcing on other LUGs lists. I will probably do two announcements -Andrew ---------------------------------------- Andrew Fife Untangle - Open Source Security Gateway download.untangle.com 650.425.3327 (O) 415.806.6028 (C) afife@untangle.com
Or, to perhaps put at least part of what came of that discussion another way, "Know your audience"(/list/forum/...) I.e. know the communication channel to which one puts the information, and try to be optimally suitable for that communication channel (e.g. not too much or too often, nor to little or too seldom). Also know when/how they like/prefer their information/announcements, what they're more - or less - likely to be interested in, etc., and tailor things accordingly (at least as much as feasible). We should probably note some of these details (at least to the extent we know/learn them) on our event communications wiki page (presently located at: http://www.sf-lug.com/wiki/doku.php?id=event_communications ) Quoting Andrew Fife <afife@untangle.com>:
Dear All:
An impromptu BALUG steering committee was held after the last BALUG including myself, Dick, Michael P., Jim Stockford and Tom Belote. Jesse Z. was also there but wasn't involved in this part of the discussion.
We made the following decision on how to use other LUG's mailing lists for making BALUG announcements:
-Default to sending 1 BALUG announcement email per month but be sure to include a note at the bottom of the message about how list members can give feedback -Adjust announcements according to feedback -Adjust plan for any other LUG mailing lists that we already know 1 message per month is not optimal, like Conspire, where it is too much and SFLUG where reminders are okay
On a side note, we are also going to encourage people to sign up for the low volume Balug announce list whenever announcing on other LUGs lists.
I will probably do two announcements
participants (4)
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Andrew Fife
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Andrey Kuznetsov
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Michael Paoli
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Rick Moen