Re: [Linux-aus] Can Linux Australia survive?

[Marco Ostini <m.ostini@uq.edu.au>]

In my opinion there have been a number of good points be posted by 
Stewart & Bret.

LA is only functioning at the moment due to volunteer efforts which is 
both highly commendable of those on the Exec committee, as they do the 
dirty work for us, but also demands transparency.

There may indeed be weekly communication between the Exec committee 
members but this is not always reflected in communications of those 
meetings making it to this list.

I hope I'm missing something here & that they're documented elsewhere 
for LA members to read.

So for the average LA member, who actually *does* care about all of LA 
and not just about a linux.conf when it's geographicly near them, this 
gives an incomplete stream of information.

Is the average LA member who cared also required to set up RSS feeds to 
a number of blogs also to keep abreast with things? If so, this should 
be documented.

Although in my opinion Bret's comments & accusation regarding holding 
the next LA in NZ is nonsense, his later claim about lacking dignity is 
not altogether without substance.

So from there we need to ask (again), who is LA supposed to serve? - 
during a linux.conf and in between them. Who are it's members? If 
members have chosen not to be on this list, why?

I know of a few LA members, who are professionals & work with linux who 
don't subscribe to the list because they don't feel that the investment 
of their time is worth the effort.

Although I disagree with them, I can empathise with their point. There 
is a strong noise to signal level.

Now for a constructive suggestion;

The System Administrators Guild of Australia is an organisation that's 
similar in a number of ways to LA.

http://www.sage-au.org.au/

They have an annual Conference & ongoing support for members in between 
them. They also have employed an administrator/secretary to assist with 
their running while also employing lots of volunteer efforts on behalf 
of members.

As a member of both LA & SAGE I have found that SAGE looks after it's 
members much better between conf's than LA & It's lists have lots of 
excellent on topic information & discussion.

Their site works much better for members also. (I still get "Application 
for Membership Form" emails from LA after lots of mucking about)

It won't hurt LA at all to contact this group and find out how they 
work. Take what works, leave what doesn't, even if to find out some 
details about their administrator/secretary.

Cheers,

Marco