Free stuff for the group

[hoosfoos]

I saw this the other night somewhere,
The O'Reilly User Group & Professional Association Program supports the good work of user and professional groups by providing:

* review copies of O'Reilly products
* donations of books and other promo items
* UG member discount on all O'Reilly books and conferences
* bi-weekly newsletter
* O'Reilly speakers
The website is, http://ug.oreilly.com/

I don't know who our current leader is but it seemed to have changed hands at one time, but I'm not sure. Anyways only the leader can sign up for this, but I think the whole group would benefit. If you don't know O'Reilly, you should because they have tons of cool books and other resources on everything technology wise.

[uberushaximus]

I'm sorry for the confusion, I thought that at a time we were going to give most of the leadership to Ek0nomik, but I've not talked to him in quite a time. I've personally been quite busy with school lately, if there is any large concern on this issue however I do really owe you guys a meeting, which I'm quite sorry about neglecting over and over again. I do hope there's no hard feelings.

[rowanrook]

Hey, thanks for the info! It's definitely worth following up on. I wonder what qualifies as a user group?

[tonyyarusso]

An Ubuntu LoCo is most definitely eligible. I signed up Minnesota recently. Note that Apress also has a similar deal. :)

[lifewithryan]

no hard feelings with letting things slide. its hard when you are in school.

Hell, I'm NOT in school and would have a hard time doing anything in a leadership role. However, the fault isn't yours anyway...as a whole, the group hasn't come up with anything "concrete" that would require a meeting anyway. There have been a few "ideas" but nothing solid. So there hasn't been much to lead anyway :)

I personally would love to be more active, but active doing what?!? There's the question.

[Ek0nomik]

I can sign us up for this if other people want part in it.

I haven't been around the Wisconsin LoCo much because I was putting a lot of effort in the group originally, but there didn't seem to be much desire to take on any demonstrations, etc. So, I have been putting my time elsewhere.

Anywho, I will gladly sign us up if someone still wants in.

[lifewithryan]

Outside of all my other projects going on...(I got mouths to feed man...) I too haven't been around much because there just doesn't seem to be a whole lot of interest.

I think as a group, if we want to even consider ourselves a group that is, need to come up with some sort of "reason" for our existence. (I know that sounds deep, but hear me out). Having a "group" for the sake of having a group makes little sense to me. Sure we can all spread the word, but currently there are so few of use that any sort of "get togethers" are limited to those with few family/school/work committments which brings our numbers down even lower.

That leaves us all with our respective Linux User Groups in our own areas.

What I think is needed is some solid, concrete event for us to either host or participate in. So far I think there have been two events mentioned, one of which cost money which is something the group didn't/doesn't currently have.

The other was a demo that was supposed to take place at a school, but somewhere I lost what the status of that was. (I think it was a bit far for me to go to anyway, but I digress).

I think what we're feeling hear is the pain of small numbers and long distances. I think first efforts should be recruiting new members from our areas. However, having said that, what benefit is it to new-recruits if there's really "nothing to do."

Its sort of a catch-22 -- we need people, but we need to have/attend/host an event to get some people, but doing that, takes people....*sigh*

I've had some ideas, but they're so vague that I haven't begun exploring the details yet.

I know eKonomik has a website up for us, but since there's nothing really happening here, there's nothing to do on the site...its a vicious circle.

I guess the questions we need to ask are:
1) what is the main purpose of having a Wisconsin Ubuntu Users group?
2) what benefit is there for people to join?
3) how do we organize an event, on the cheap?
3a) without people, how do we publicize the event?
3b) ...what would said event entail?

Sorry, long post, alot of questions, no answers...about PAR for the course for me... ;)