Re: [Staffslug] March 2010 Meeting (Monday 8th March)

On Thu, 2010-02-18 at 15:32 +0000, SonniesEdge wrote: > I'd make the bold assertaition that there are a lot of people in the same > situation as me. If they're going to have to travel then they're going to > travel to a large group in one of the major cities, where the things on > offer make travelling worth it. The Lichfield and Cannock crowd probably > head south to Brum and us Stokies head north to Manchester. That or they > just don't bother at all, thinking that no-one near them is even vaugely > interested in Linux. I'm sorry, what? When was the last time that MANLUG had a proper meeting? Do they have regular meetings every month? They certainly do not. There are Rusholme-based "currybeer" socials, for which the MANLUG subscribers are invited to by said group, and indeed the surrounding LUGs (SheffLUG/Liverpool LUG) post invitations to surrounding LUG lists, but really there's only been one official meeting arranged in the ~8 months that I've lived in Manchester and that is... This weekend? I've been here since June! Since (and before) that time, Staffs LUG have had regular meetings, for what must be almost a year now, monthly. Therefore, if you're at all interested in attending a LUG meeting, driving 20 minutes to Stafford once a month would historically be of more benefit to you than driving the ~30 minutes to Manchester. An attitude such as this; that there's nothing worth visiting the meetings for, are counter-intuitive. You go to chime in, meet the other members, talk about Linux and eventually help to make the LUG activities more interesting _to you_ (which should hopefully translate to making it interesting for others in the process!) I'm afraid this begins with people making effort, not the other way around. Thankfully about a year ago, the squabbling about areas, sizes and which LUG covers which part of Staffordshire eventually subsided when someone said, 'Hey, we're meeting in Stafford - come if you want'. More people have since joined them, the IRC channel is busier, the site has much more content than before (and it's better organised - though I could be biased there) and ideas keep coming out of the meetings. Funnily enough, I actually made a few new friends - worse things have happened to me whilst sat in a pub, talking about Linux... That's for sure. Putting prior judgements to one side - if anyone, with a genuine interest in Linux, UNIX, FOSS (beer?) can attend the next meeting (within sensible constraints on your time/family life of course) then please give it a try and help improve what is quite obviously a growing Linux Users Group, simply by joining-in and sharing your ideas. I wish I still lived within a sensible distance to go!  (Though if mzje is ever working from Salford, I might get a lift!) Tom _______________________________________________ Staffslug mailing list Staffslug(a)staffslug.org.uk http://lists.staffslug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/staffslug