Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

Actually, my math is wrong: 800 people x C$20 will make this happen! We're so
close, I can smell it!


horrido wrote
> It's been one full month since the GoFundMe campaign began. We've raised
> C$3,080 from 25 generous contributors. It's a good start, but we're still
> a
> long way off. In order to make the goal more attainable, I've lowered the
> funding goal again, this time, to C$20,000. And for the last time. You
> see,
> C$20,000 is necessary for the MVC (not Model-View-Controller, but Minimum
> Viable Competition). Anything less and we don't have an impactful
> marketing
> event.
> 
> Please spread the word on social media. Please make use of your email
> contacts. Let's reach as many people as we can. I will bet dollars to
> doughnuts that not every Smalltalk fan in the world is aware of this
> campaign and programming competition. It only takes about 1,000 people
> giving a paltry $20 each to make this happen. How hard can it be?
> 
> 
> 
> horrido wrote
>> So far, we've raised CA$2,400 from 18 generous contributors. Not bad for
>> the
>> first two weeks of the GoFundMe campaign:
>> https://www.gofundme.com/smalltalk-programming-competition
>> 
>> I've lowered the funding goal to $25,000. So we're now about 10% of the
>> way
>> to the target.
>> 
>> Meanwhile, I've been busy preparing for the competition. Here is the
>> competition website, currently rigged as a demo:
>> http://smalltalkrenaissance.pythonanywhere.com/JRMPC/default/index
>> 
>> When it goes live, the proper sponsors will be displayed, and the
>> database
>> will be scrubbed clean.
>> 
>> I've also design T-shirts (swag) for the competition. Here's the main
>> design:  http://forum.world.st/file/t128560/T-shirt-x.png; 
>> 
>> Here's the alternate design: 
>> http://forum.world.st/file/t128560/Hot-Air-Balloon-x.png; 
>> 
>> Everything is lining up, ready to go.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html





--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

It's been one full month since the GoFundMe campaign began. We've raised
C$3,080 from 25 generous contributors. It's a good start, but we're still a
long way off. In order to make the goal more attainable, I've lowered the
funding goal again, this time, to C$20,000. And for the last time. You see,
C$20,000 is necessary for the MVC (not Model-View-Controller, but Minimum
Viable Competition). Anything less and we don't have an impactful marketing
event.

Please spread the word on social media. Please make use of your email
contacts. Let's reach as many people as we can. I will bet dollars to
doughnuts that not every Smalltalk fan in the world is aware of this
campaign and programming competition. It only takes about 1,000 people
giving a paltry $20 each to make this happen. How hard can it be?



horrido wrote
> So far, we've raised CA$2,400 from 18 generous contributors. Not bad for
> the
> first two weeks of the GoFundMe campaign:
> https://www.gofundme.com/smalltalk-programming-competition
> 
> I've lowered the funding goal to $25,000. So we're now about 10% of the
> way
> to the target.
> 
> Meanwhile, I've been busy preparing for the competition. Here is the
> competition website, currently rigged as a demo:
> http://smalltalkrenaissance.pythonanywhere.com/JRMPC/default/index
> 
> When it goes live, the proper sponsors will be displayed, and the database
> will be scrubbed clean.
> 
> I've also design T-shirts (swag) for the competition. Here's the main
> design:  http://forum.world.st/file/t128560/T-shirt-x.png; 
> 
> Here's the alternate design: 
> http://forum.world.st/file/t128560/Hot-Air-Balloon-x.png; 
> 
> Everything is lining up, ready to go.
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html





--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

So far, we've raised CA$2,400 from 18 generous contributors. Not bad for the
first two weeks of the GoFundMe campaign:
https://www.gofundme.com/smalltalk-programming-competition

I've lowered the funding goal to $25,000. So we're now about 10% of the way
to the target.

Meanwhile, I've been busy preparing for the competition. Here is the
competition website, currently rigged as a demo:
http://smalltalkrenaissance.pythonanywhere.com/JRMPC/default/index

When it goes live, the proper sponsors will be displayed, and the database
will be scrubbed clean.

I've also design T-shirts (swag) for the competition. Here's the main
design:   

Here's the alternate design: 
 

Everything is lining up, ready to go.



--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

Today, GemTalk Systems donated $1,000!!! Wow!

We now have CA$1,970 from 12 generous contributors in 10 days. Le'ts make
this happen!

I've just completed the web application for the competition website. I will
deploy it as soon as it appears the competition is a go.

Still a lot of work ahead, but I'm pumped.



--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Tim Mackinnon]

Nice - now you’ve really got to work out the details of the competition and how 
your going to judge it.



Sent from my iPhone

> On 23 Jun 2018, at 11:07, horrido  wrote:
> 
> Alan Kay contributed to my campaign! This is so frickin' amazing!
> 
> Can we spell S-T-A-R P-O-W-E-R, boys and girls?
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
> 

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

Alan Kay contributed to my campaign! This is so frickin' amazing!

Can we spell S-T-A-R P-O-W-E-R, boys and girls?



--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Tim Mackinnon]

Stay pumped - we’re a tricky crowd of deep thinkers, but everyone’s heart is in 
the right place!

Tim

Sent from my iPhone

> On 22 Jun 2018, at 15:29, horrido  wrote:
> 
> Yes, I was totally pumped about Kent Beck's support! With a few more
> contributors like him, I am certain the campaign would take off. Star power.
> (Cross my fingers.)
> 
> 
> 
> Tim Mackinnon wrote
>> Hey guys - lets just try and give this some support - I’d like to see
>> something useful come out of it that hopefully can be applied to other
>> countries. I’d really like to see some kids enjoy programming.
>> 
>> I once met one of the original participants of the Parc experiments who
>> was ~14 at the time (he was much older when I met him). I commented that
>> it must have been amazing, and he was a bit reflective and interestingly
>> said that it almost ruined his life because while it was cool at the time
>> - when they had to take it all away, he couldn’t code in the way he had
>> enjoyed for a further 10 years….
>> 
>> Of course now we have an amazing environment, that not enough people
>> actually know about, or take seriously enough - even though its produced
>> most of what they take for granted today, AND is still busily pushing on
>> things they will take for granted in another 1 years.
>> 
>> Richard - give it a shot and inspire some kids (and inspire me with some
>> interesting problems or setups that you think might work)
>> 
>> I also notice that Kent Beck gave some support  - thats pretty cool!
>> 
>> Tim
>> 
>>> On 22 Jun 2018, at 14:38, horrido 
> 
>> horrido.hobbies@
> 
>>  wrote:
>>> 
>>> I do not diminish the efforts of open source contributors. I applaud
>>> them.
>>> 
>>> My point was that, as a Smalltalk advocate, I worked on average 8 hours a
>>> day, every day of the year, for nearly 4 years. That is a tremendous burn
>>> rate, and I can tell you I am totally exhausted.
>>> 
>>> Imagine if I had a *real*, full-time job. This effort would've literally
>>> killed me. And this is exactly why no one else can do the job.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
 I hear what you're saying. Here's my rationale...
 
 #1. As far as I know, I'm the only person on the planet who has worked
 full-time and without pay as a programming language advocate for nearly
 four
 years. Did I mention full-time and without pay? So I think you can trust
 me
 to deliver, come hell or high water.
 
>>> 
>>> I applaud your commitment, but there are many people giving free time to
>>> Pharo
>>> (although more technical oriented than pure advocacy)
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> --
>>> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>>> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
> 

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

Yes, I was totally pumped about Kent Beck's support! With a few more
contributors like him, I am certain the campaign would take off. Star power.
(Cross my fingers.)



Tim Mackinnon wrote
> Hey guys - lets just try and give this some support - I’d like to see
> something useful come out of it that hopefully can be applied to other
> countries. I’d really like to see some kids enjoy programming.
> 
> I once met one of the original participants of the Parc experiments who
> was ~14 at the time (he was much older when I met him). I commented that
> it must have been amazing, and he was a bit reflective and interestingly
> said that it almost ruined his life because while it was cool at the time
> - when they had to take it all away, he couldn’t code in the way he had
> enjoyed for a further 10 years….
> 
> Of course now we have an amazing environment, that not enough people
> actually know about, or take seriously enough - even though its produced
> most of what they take for granted today, AND is still busily pushing on
> things they will take for granted in another 1 years.
> 
> Richard - give it a shot and inspire some kids (and inspire me with some
> interesting problems or setups that you think might work)
> 
> I also notice that Kent Beck gave some support  - thats pretty cool!
> 
> Tim
> 
>> On 22 Jun 2018, at 14:38, horrido 

> horrido.hobbies@

>  wrote:
>> 
>> I do not diminish the efforts of open source contributors. I applaud
>> them.
>> 
>> My point was that, as a Smalltalk advocate, I worked on average 8 hours a
>> day, every day of the year, for nearly 4 years. That is a tremendous burn
>> rate, and I can tell you I am totally exhausted.
>> 
>> Imagine if I had a *real*, full-time job. This effort would've literally
>> killed me. And this is exactly why no one else can do the job.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>> I hear what you're saying. Here's my rationale...
>>> 
>>> #1. As far as I know, I'm the only person on the planet who has worked
>>> full-time and without pay as a programming language advocate for nearly
>>> four
>>> years. Did I mention full-time and without pay? So I think you can trust
>>> me
>>> to deliver, come hell or high water.
>>> 
>> 
>> I applaud your commitment, but there are many people giving free time to
>> Pharo
>> (although more technical oriented than pure advocacy)
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>>





--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Tim Mackinnon]

Hey guys - lets just try and give this some support - I’d like to see something 
useful come out of it that hopefully can be applied to other countries. I’d 
really like to see some kids enjoy programming.

I once met one of the original participants of the Parc experiments who was ~14 
at the time (he was much older when I met him). I commented that it must have 
been amazing, and he was a bit reflective and interestingly said that it almost 
ruined his life because while it was cool at the time - when they had to take 
it all away, he couldn’t code in the way he had enjoyed for a further 10 years….

Of course now we have an amazing environment, that not enough people actually 
know about, or take seriously enough - even though its produced most of what 
they take for granted today, AND is still busily pushing on things they will 
take for granted in another 1 years.

Richard - give it a shot and inspire some kids (and inspire me with some 
interesting problems or setups that you think might work)

I also notice that Kent Beck gave some support  - thats pretty cool!

Tim

> On 22 Jun 2018, at 14:38, horrido  wrote:
> 
> I do not diminish the efforts of open source contributors. I applaud them.
> 
> My point was that, as a Smalltalk advocate, I worked on average 8 hours a
> day, every day of the year, for nearly 4 years. That is a tremendous burn
> rate, and I can tell you I am totally exhausted.
> 
> Imagine if I had a *real*, full-time job. This effort would've literally
> killed me. And this is exactly why no one else can do the job.
> 
> 
> 
>> I hear what you're saying. Here's my rationale...
>> 
>> #1. As far as I know, I'm the only person on the planet who has worked
>> full-time and without pay as a programming language advocate for nearly
>> four
>> years. Did I mention full-time and without pay? So I think you can trust
>> me
>> to deliver, come hell or high water.
>> 
> 
> I applaud your commitment, but there are many people giving free time to
> Pharo
> (although more technical oriented than pure advocacy)
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
> 

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

I do not diminish the efforts of open source contributors. I applaud them.

My point was that, as a Smalltalk advocate, I worked on average 8 hours a
day, every day of the year, for nearly 4 years. That is a tremendous burn
rate, and I can tell you I am totally exhausted.

Imagine if I had a *real*, full-time job. This effort would've literally
killed me. And this is exactly why no one else can do the job.



> I hear what you're saying. Here's my rationale...
>
> #1. As far as I know, I'm the only person on the planet who has worked
> full-time and without pay as a programming language advocate for nearly
> four
> years. Did I mention full-time and without pay? So I think you can trust
> me
> to deliver, come hell or high water.
>

I applaud your commitment, but there are many people giving free time to
Pharo
(although more technical oriented than pure advocacy)




--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

Thanks, Ben! I did not know about CoderDojo. Yes, you have an excellent
suggestion for a different strategy. It is certainly one that is worthy of
adoption by another evangelist, and hopefully somebody will consider it.

There are three concerns. First, CoderDojo seems to be heavily invested in
Scratch, Python, and JavaScript. Whether I could convince them to include
Smalltalk as a key technology in their curriculum is up for question. If
it's only an optional, ancillary, or secondary technology, then it won't get
the breadth of coverage that I'm hoping for.

Second, CoderDojo is already well-established. There is little marketing
potential here. My campaign has always been, from the very start, heavily
marketing-oriented. My goal has always been to reach as many people as I
can, in the shortest period of time, with the greatest impact. That's
practically the definition of marketing.

Third, the JRM competition is my last hurrah. After this, I shall no longer
be a Smalltalk evangelist. I've worked very, very hard for four years and
it's time for me to take a well-deserved rest.

CoderDojo requires a longer-term commitment than I have energy for at this
time. I estimate that I can just complete the competition within the next
8-12 months.

Regarding the scholarship, yes, CA$2,000 is fairly rich, but
college/university tuition is very, very expensive here in North America (I
don't know about Australia). Much less than $2,000 and the competition
wouldn't be much of a public draw (again, from a marketing perspective). I'm
thinking of the world-renowned Waterloo math competitions with prizes
ranging from $200 (most common) to a high of $500. That doesn't exactly
tickle my nuts.

Depending on the level of funding, I am prepared to scale back a bit from
$2,000. If the contest is too chintzy, I won't be able to get local media
interested.



Ben Coman wrote
>>
>>
>> SergeStinckwich wrote
>> > Ok, the subject is completely different and maybe his topic is sensible
>> > for a lot of people but the concerns are the same. At the end, you need
>> to
>> > convince people to give you money.
>> >
>> > What is your budget ? what kind of competition you will organize ? how
>> you
>> > will convince schools/university to participate ?
>> > How you will reward people for their participation ?
>> >
>> > Sorry to say, people will not give money just because you wrote a
>> > half-page statement.
>>
> 
> 
> On 21 June 2018 at 23:52, horrido 

> horrido.hobbies@

>  wrote:
> 
>> I hear what you're saying. Here's my rationale...
>>
>> #1. As far as I know, I'm the only person on the planet who has worked
>> full-time and without pay as a programming language advocate for nearly
>> four
>> years. Did I mention full-time and without pay? So I think you can trust
>> me
>> to deliver, come hell or high water.
>>
> 
> I applaud your commitment, but there are many people giving free time to
> Pharo
> (although more technical oriented than pure advocacy)
> 
> 
> 
>> #2. For the past four years, I've shown my marketing skills in promoting
>> Smalltalk. If you believe I've done a good job, then you can trust me to
>> convince schools and the media to stand behind the competition. If you
>> don't
>> believe, then ignore me; I cannot convince you otherwise.
>>
> 
> Its not just marketing skills that are important here, but logistics.
> 
> 
> #3. It is not my style to plan everything in advance and in detail. I do
>> things by the seat of my pants, relying on my organizational skills,
>> communication skills, and intuition. (That's how I develop software,
>> too.)
>> I
>> can picture the whole competition in my mind and I trust my vision. I'm
>> asking others to trust it, as well. If they don't, then this whole thing
>> dies with me.
>>
> 
> But that vision is just in *your* head. So its easy for you to trust your
> plan,
> while we don't get an opportunity to trust your plan, we only get the
> choice to trust you,
> and while I don't doubt your intent, I'm not clear on your ability to
> deliver.
> You've got no *demonstrated* experience in this area of geographically
> dispersed competitions with kids,
> so naturally that affects people's confidence in your ability to deliver.
> 
> Now if you could team up with an organisation like CoderDojo
> and leverage their proven experience running the logistics to motivate
> kids
> to program
> and also their existing network of kid programming teams and mentors,
> I'd be much more interested.
> 
> My assessment comes down to direct personal experience (the ultimate root
> of trust)
> where in my town of just 5000 people (Collie) two hours south of
> the most remote capital city in the world (Perth, measured as distance to
> next closest capital city)
> there is a CoderDojo group that my kids got involved with for a while
> (before work took me away from home a lot).
> Typically about 30 kids at a session each week.
> 
> I think you'll have more success tapping such a domain specific market
> than
> 

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Ben Coman]

>
>
> SergeStinckwich wrote
> > Ok, the subject is completely different and maybe his topic is sensible
> > for a lot of people but the concerns are the same. At the end, you need
> to
> > convince people to give you money.
> >
> > What is your budget ? what kind of competition you will organize ? how
> you
> > will convince schools/university to participate ?
> > How you will reward people for their participation ?
> >
> > Sorry to say, people will not give money just because you wrote a
> > half-page statement.
>


On 21 June 2018 at 23:52, horrido  wrote:

> I hear what you're saying. Here's my rationale...
>
> #1. As far as I know, I'm the only person on the planet who has worked
> full-time and without pay as a programming language advocate for nearly
> four
> years. Did I mention full-time and without pay? So I think you can trust me
> to deliver, come hell or high water.
>

I applaud your commitment, but there are many people giving free time to
Pharo
(although more technical oriented than pure advocacy)



> #2. For the past four years, I've shown my marketing skills in promoting
> Smalltalk. If you believe I've done a good job, then you can trust me to
> convince schools and the media to stand behind the competition. If you
> don't
> believe, then ignore me; I cannot convince you otherwise.
>

Its not just marketing skills that are important here, but logistics.


#3. It is not my style to plan everything in advance and in detail. I do
> things by the seat of my pants, relying on my organizational skills,
> communication skills, and intuition. (That's how I develop software, too.)
> I
> can picture the whole competition in my mind and I trust my vision. I'm
> asking others to trust it, as well. If they don't, then this whole thing
> dies with me.
>

But that vision is just in *your* head. So its easy for you to trust your
plan,
while we don't get an opportunity to trust your plan, we only get the
choice to trust you,
and while I don't doubt your intent, I'm not clear on your ability to
deliver.
You've got no *demonstrated* experience in this area of geographically
dispersed competitions with kids,
so naturally that affects people's confidence in your ability to deliver.

Now if you could team up with an organisation like CoderDojo
and leverage their proven experience running the logistics to motivate kids
to program
and also their existing network of kid programming teams and mentors,
I'd be much more interested.

My assessment comes down to direct personal experience (the ultimate root
of trust)
where in my town of just 5000 people (Collie) two hours south of
the most remote capital city in the world (Perth, measured as distance to
next closest capital city)
there is a CoderDojo group that my kids got involved with for a while
(before work took me away from home a lot).
Typically about 30 kids at a session each week.

I think you'll have more success tapping such a domain specific market than
generic high schools.
>From their 2017 annual report, they have 1542 active dojos in 92 countries,
regularly engaging 55000 young people with 8000 champions and mentors.
http://kata.coderdojo.com/images/b/bc/CD_Annual_Report_2018_%28Digital%29.pdf

Coderdojo has a well established governance structure and "proven"
reliability dealing with donated money.
One or two teams from each dojo could make a very successful competition.
In such a case I don't think it need to be as much as $2000 prize for an
individual (indeed that seems quite rich to me).
These kids are already programming "just for fun" and probably care less
about which language.
A good approach would be half the prize going to the winning team and half
to their dojo.
A secondary benefit is that the dojo mentors get exposed to Pharo, many of
whom are IT professionals.
The ultimate result would be Coderdojo picking up Pharo as one of their
regular languages.

The downside of Coderdojo would be the average age of kids being late
primary school level,
might not match your vision (but 10 is the the age I taught myself Basic
from books).
Such a sponsored competition could entice back past members who faded out
after "popularity" hit at high school.
Coderdojo could advise.

Now since the younger kids program in Scratch, perhaps there could be
synergy with a junior prize using Phratch,
particularly if its paired with the IoT activity with Pharo - maybe
creating some kind of dynamic art installation.
And some mentors might contribute to Phratch and come to Pharo through that
path.



> In the final analysis, all I can do is my very best. I am who I am.


I'm sure you will give your best.  But success needs much more than intent.
A big question is... what is the "challenge".  I would imaging that is a
very important
component of a successful hackthon.

Perhaps another way to achieve similar results with less risk is to
piggyback
a series of existing hackathons.  Offer smaller sub-prizes for the best
solution using Pharo.
Then you don't need to provide a 

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Travis Ayres]

It will be the most exciting $200 programming competition ever.

On Thu, Jun 21, 2018, 4:41 PM horrido  wrote:

> Indeed, these have been the main goals of my marketing campaign:
>
> - spread the word through social media (word of mouth)
> - try to make Smalltalk look "cool" and fascinating (pop-cultured)
> - emphasize that Smalltalk is web-ready, since the whole world seems to be
> going ga-ga over the web (popular practices)
> - restore the lustre of OOP, since there has been a growing anti-OOP
> sentiment for years now
> - present success stories, even if most of these are from staid
> corporations
> and government
>
> Believe me, I've incorporated elements of these in many, many of my
> articles, blog posts, tweets, Facebook posts, etc.
>
> And I firmly believe the JRM competition will add to the excitement and
> cool
> factor, if it's done right.
>
>
>
> Esteban A. Maringolo wrote
> > On 21/06/2018 07:23, horrido wrote:
> >> I'm disappointed in the response. Only two contributors of $100 each.
> >> This is
> >> extremely tepid.
> >>
> >> There must be thousands of Smalltalkers around the world. How to reach
> >> out
> >> to them? It can't be that hard to fund this contest. I mean, there are
> >> many
> >> stupid causes on GoFundMe that have raised tens of thousands of dollars!
> >> This Smalltalk programming competition is anything but stupid.
> >>
> >> If only 1500 Smalltalkers each contributed a paltry $20, the contest
> >> would
> >> be fully funded. It would only take 300 contributors of $100 each.
> > I think that money is the wrong incentive to get people involved.
> >
> > You can't pay students to get them converted. Massive propagation of
> > ideas these days are horizontal rather than vertical. It is, breadth
> > first, word of mouth, instead of authoritative articles, this kind of
> > competition, etc. Your articles did a good job of rising awareness, but
> > there is a lot missing.
> >
> > If you want to get MORE (quantity) people involved, you need to make
> > Pharo more "pop cultured" as many mainstream tools are seen, and that
> > itself means becoming more mainstream or follow certain practices, which
> > also means having success stories people would like to imitate, etc.
> >
> > Even if we get people like Kent Beck, Martin Fowler, any other
> > "influencer" aware of the benefits of Smalltalk to recommend it, the
> > downloads would spike, but I bet one leg the users will bounce as fast
> > as they download it.
> >
> > IMO if we don't understand that as a community, Pharo will still have
> > it's niche user base. Not that I dislike it, but I would be more
> > comfortable as a niche but with a bigger user base.
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > --
> > Esteban A. Maringolo
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>
>

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

Indeed, these have been the main goals of my marketing campaign:

- spread the word through social media (word of mouth)
- try to make Smalltalk look "cool" and fascinating (pop-cultured)
- emphasize that Smalltalk is web-ready, since the whole world seems to be
going ga-ga over the web (popular practices)
- restore the lustre of OOP, since there has been a growing anti-OOP
sentiment for years now
- present success stories, even if most of these are from staid corporations
and government

Believe me, I've incorporated elements of these in many, many of my
articles, blog posts, tweets, Facebook posts, etc.

And I firmly believe the JRM competition will add to the excitement and cool
factor, if it's done right.



Esteban A. Maringolo wrote
> On 21/06/2018 07:23, horrido wrote:
>> I'm disappointed in the response. Only two contributors of $100 each.
>> This is
>> extremely tepid.
>> 
>> There must be thousands of Smalltalkers around the world. How to reach
>> out
>> to them? It can't be that hard to fund this contest. I mean, there are
>> many
>> stupid causes on GoFundMe that have raised tens of thousands of dollars!
>> This Smalltalk programming competition is anything but stupid.
>> 
>> If only 1500 Smalltalkers each contributed a paltry $20, the contest
>> would
>> be fully funded. It would only take 300 contributors of $100 each.
> I think that money is the wrong incentive to get people involved.
> 
> You can't pay students to get them converted. Massive propagation of
> ideas these days are horizontal rather than vertical. It is, breadth
> first, word of mouth, instead of authoritative articles, this kind of
> competition, etc. Your articles did a good job of rising awareness, but
> there is a lot missing.
> 
> If you want to get MORE (quantity) people involved, you need to make
> Pharo more "pop cultured" as many mainstream tools are seen, and that
> itself means becoming more mainstream or follow certain practices, which
> also means having success stories people would like to imitate, etc.
> 
> Even if we get people like Kent Beck, Martin Fowler, any other
> "influencer" aware of the benefits of Smalltalk to recommend it, the
> downloads would spike, but I bet one leg the users will bounce as fast
> as they download it.
> 
> IMO if we don't understand that as a community, Pharo will still have
> it's niche user base. Not that I dislike it, but I would be more
> comfortable as a niche but with a bigger user base.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> -- 
> Esteban A. Maringolo





--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Esteban A. Maringolo]

On 21/06/2018 07:23, horrido wrote:
> I'm disappointed in the response. Only two contributors of $100 each. This is
> extremely tepid.
> 
> There must be thousands of Smalltalkers around the world. How to reach out
> to them? It can't be that hard to fund this contest. I mean, there are many
> stupid causes on GoFundMe that have raised tens of thousands of dollars!
> This Smalltalk programming competition is anything but stupid.
> 
> If only 1500 Smalltalkers each contributed a paltry $20, the contest would
> be fully funded. It would only take 300 contributors of $100 each.
I think that money is the wrong incentive to get people involved.

You can't pay students to get them converted. Massive propagation of
ideas these days are horizontal rather than vertical. It is, breadth
first, word of mouth, instead of authoritative articles, this kind of
competition, etc. Your articles did a good job of rising awareness, but
there is a lot missing.

If you want to get MORE (quantity) people involved, you need to make
Pharo more "pop cultured" as many mainstream tools are seen, and that
itself means becoming more mainstream or follow certain practices, which
also means having success stories people would like to imitate, etc.

Even if we get people like Kent Beck, Martin Fowler, any other
"influencer" aware of the benefits of Smalltalk to recommend it, the
downloads would spike, but I bet one leg the users will bounce as fast
as they download it.

IMO if we don't understand that as a community, Pharo will still have
it's niche user base. Not that I dislike it, but I would be more
comfortable as a niche but with a bigger user base.

Regards,

-- 
Esteban A. Maringolo

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

#1. Who would pay me??? No company nor organization (even Smalltalk-related)
cares enough about Smalltalk to hire a full-time advocate.

And even if they did, I have no track record at all in marketing and
advocacy. They're buying a pig in a poke.

#2. It I didn't step up, no one would. There is no other person on this
planet who has the time nor inclination to take on this huge, thankless
task.

Smalltalk deserves a better fate than to languish in obscurity. It is so sad
and pitiful to see where it is today, especially when it was once the most
popular OO language in the world after C++. Smalltalk just barely made it
onto the Top 100 at TIOBE this year. Just barely.

#3. I believe in Smalltalk. More importantly, I believe that the language
has the power to transform the software industry. If it can double the
world's software development productivity – on average – imagine the impact
on the global economy. I'm not spewing bullsh*t here.

So this is my personal belief at work.

#4. I saw a unique opportunity. Of all the less-than-major programming
languages in the world (Clojure, Crystal, Dart, Elixir, Elm, F#, Go,
Haskell, Haxe, Julia, Kotlin, Nim, Racket, Red, Rust, etc.), Smalltalk is
the easiest one to advocate for. It's the one with the best chances of
success. Why?

- its historical legacy
- its actual popularity in the 1990s
- its commercial track record
- its technical merits like simplicity, conciseness, live coding, etc.
- its scientifically proven productivity, thanks to Namcook Analytics

All of this allows me to tell a good story. A damn good story. And that's
absolutely key in any marketing campaign.

I could've devoted my time and energy to Elixir or Go or Nim. But it
wouldn't have been nearly as satisfying. I saw an opportunity, and I took
it. And I haven't looked back.



Travis Ayres wrote
> You worked without pay? ...why?
> 
> On Thu, Jun 21, 2018, 8:53 AM horrido 

> horrido.hobbies@

>  wrote:
> 
>> I hear what you're saying. Here's my rationale...
>>
>> #1. As far as I know, I'm the only person on the planet who has worked
>> full-time and without pay as a programming language advocate for nearly
>> four
>> years. Did I mention full-time and without pay? So I think you can trust
>> me
>> to deliver, come hell or high water.
>>
>> #2. For the past four years, I've shown my marketing skills in promoting
>> Smalltalk. If you believe I've done a good job, then you can trust me to
>> convince schools and the media to stand behind the competition. If you
>> don't
>> believe, then ignore me; I cannot convince you otherwise.
>>
>> #3. It is not my style to plan everything in advance and in detail. I do
>> things by the seat of my pants, relying on my organizational skills,
>> communication skills, and intuition. (That's how I develop software,
>> too.)
>> I
>> can picture the whole competition in my mind and I trust my vision. I'm
>> asking others to trust it, as well. If they don't, then this whole thing
>> dies with me.
>>
>> In the final analysis, all I can do is my very best. I am who I am. If
>> you
>> don't believe in me, that's okay.
>>
>>
>> SergeStinckwich wrote
>> > Ok, the subject is completely different and maybe his topic is sensible
>> > for
>> > a lot of people but the concerns are the same. At the end, you need to
>> > convince people to give you money.
>> >
>> > What is your budget ? what kind of competition you will organize ? how
>> you
>> > will convince schools/university to participate ?
>> > How you will reward people for their participation ?
>> >
>> > Sorry to say, people will not give money just because you wrote a
>> > half-page
>> > statement.
>> >
>> > Best,
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>>
>>





--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Hilaire]

It will be far more fun for the kids if we had PyGame (itself based on 
SDL) like package on Pharo.


Hilaire


Le 21/06/2018 à 17:52, horrido a écrit :

I hear what you're saying. Here's my rationale...

#1. As far as I know, I'm the only person on the planet who has worked
full-time and without pay as a programming language advocate for nearly four
years. Did I mention full-time and without pay? So I think you can trust me
to deliver, come hell or high water.

#2. For the past four years, I've shown my marketing skills in promoting
Smalltalk. If you believe I've done a good job, then you can trust me to
convince schools and the media to stand behind the competition. If you don't
believe, then ignore me; I cannot convince you otherwise.

#3. It is not my style to plan everything in advance and in detail. I do
things by the seat of my pants, relying on my organizational skills,
communication skills, and intuition. (That's how I develop software, too.) I
can picture the whole competition in my mind and I trust my vision. I'm
asking others to trust it, as well. If they don't, then this whole thing
dies with me.

In the final analysis, all I can do is my very best. I am who I am. If you
don't believe in me, that's okay.



--
Dr. Geo
http://drgeo.eu

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Travis Ayres]

You worked without pay? ...why?

On Thu, Jun 21, 2018, 8:53 AM horrido  wrote:

> I hear what you're saying. Here's my rationale...
>
> #1. As far as I know, I'm the only person on the planet who has worked
> full-time and without pay as a programming language advocate for nearly
> four
> years. Did I mention full-time and without pay? So I think you can trust me
> to deliver, come hell or high water.
>
> #2. For the past four years, I've shown my marketing skills in promoting
> Smalltalk. If you believe I've done a good job, then you can trust me to
> convince schools and the media to stand behind the competition. If you
> don't
> believe, then ignore me; I cannot convince you otherwise.
>
> #3. It is not my style to plan everything in advance and in detail. I do
> things by the seat of my pants, relying on my organizational skills,
> communication skills, and intuition. (That's how I develop software, too.)
> I
> can picture the whole competition in my mind and I trust my vision. I'm
> asking others to trust it, as well. If they don't, then this whole thing
> dies with me.
>
> In the final analysis, all I can do is my very best. I am who I am. If you
> don't believe in me, that's okay.
>
>
> SergeStinckwich wrote
> > Ok, the subject is completely different and maybe his topic is sensible
> > for
> > a lot of people but the concerns are the same. At the end, you need to
> > convince people to give you money.
> >
> > What is your budget ? what kind of competition you will organize ? how
> you
> > will convince schools/university to participate ?
> > How you will reward people for their participation ?
> >
> > Sorry to say, people will not give money just because you wrote a
> > half-page
> > statement.
> >
> > Best,
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>
>

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

I hear what you're saying. Here's my rationale...

#1. As far as I know, I'm the only person on the planet who has worked
full-time and without pay as a programming language advocate for nearly four
years. Did I mention full-time and without pay? So I think you can trust me
to deliver, come hell or high water.

#2. For the past four years, I've shown my marketing skills in promoting
Smalltalk. If you believe I've done a good job, then you can trust me to
convince schools and the media to stand behind the competition. If you don't
believe, then ignore me; I cannot convince you otherwise.

#3. It is not my style to plan everything in advance and in detail. I do
things by the seat of my pants, relying on my organizational skills,
communication skills, and intuition. (That's how I develop software, too.) I
can picture the whole competition in my mind and I trust my vision. I'm
asking others to trust it, as well. If they don't, then this whole thing
dies with me.

In the final analysis, all I can do is my very best. I am who I am. If you
don't believe in me, that's okay.


SergeStinckwich wrote
> Ok, the subject is completely different and maybe his topic is sensible
> for
> a lot of people but the concerns are the same. At the end, you need to
> convince people to give you money.
> 
> What is your budget ? what kind of competition you will organize ? how you
> will convince schools/university to participate ?
> How you will reward people for their participation ?
> 
> Sorry to say, people will not give money just because you wrote a
> half-page
> statement.
> 
> Best,





--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

The first attempt at a competition was a Kickstarter campaign. No money was
collected, because Kickstarter is an all-or-nothing affair. (In other words,
you didn't actually lose any money.)

Cincom had pledged $5,000, but because it was all-or-nothing, they wriggled
out of it. Otherwise, we could've run a downscaled competition. I've learned
from that mistake and chosen to use GoFundMe.

If necessary, I shall run a downscaled competition, assuming that I get
reasonable funding. The last thing I want to do is run a chintzy peanuts
contest; it would do absolutely nothing for Smalltalk.


Tim Mackinnon wrote
> I noticed that your gofundme update email went into my spam mail box - so
> I wasn’t aware it had gone live.
> 
> Are you able to apply the funds from your previous campaign (The Ultimate
> Smalltalk Tutorial) to this one? As a contributor to that last one - which
> unfortunately didn’t manage to deliver like you hoped, I am a little
> hesitant… I think this is often the way, we need to feel like its
> something that has gathered enough moment to  succeed otherwise what
> happens to the money collected?
> 
> Don’t get me wrong, I am a fan of your tutorials (it reignited my
> interested a few years back) - so don’t count me out yet.
> 
> Tim
> 
>> On 21 Jun 2018, at 11:23, horrido 

> horrido.hobbies@

>  wrote:
>> 
>> I'm disappointed in the response. Only two contributors of $100 each.
>> This is
>> extremely tepid.
>> 
>> There must be thousands of Smalltalkers around the world. How to reach
>> out
>> to them? It can't be that hard to fund this contest. I mean, there are
>> many
>> stupid causes on GoFundMe that have raised tens of thousands of dollars!
>> This Smalltalk programming competition is anything but stupid.
>> 
>> If only 1500 Smalltalkers each contributed a paltry $20, the contest
>> would
>> be fully funded. It would only take 300 contributors of $100 each.
>> 
>> The question is: How much do we care about the future of Smalltalk?
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>>





--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

This is a proof of concept video. With full funding, I shall produce a
version without Powtoon branding and in HD (720p) format. It's for marketing
the competition:

https://youtu.be/OCWBERJmrss


SergeStinckwich wrote
> hi Horrido,
> 
> I would like to thank you for your effort to organize this competition.
> 
> But for the amount you are asking (30K USD), I don't expect that much
> people to participate if you don't give them
> more feedback and information on your project. You have too look how
> successful crowdfunding campaigns are working.
> Recently, one of my friend Gael Duval organize a crowd campaign to fund a
> a
> new mobile OS that is privacy-enable and ask 25K Euros (less than you, but
> receive 95K Euros at the end) and put a lot of energy and info during
> several months too convince people:
> https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/290746744/eelo-a-mobile-os-and-web-services-in-the-public-in
> 
> Ok, the subject is completely different and maybe his topic is sensible
> for
> a lot of people but the concerns are the same. At the end, you need to
> convince people to give you money.
> 
> What is your budget ? what kind of competition you will organize ? how you
> will convince schools/university to participate ?
> How you will reward people for their participation ?
> 
> Sorry to say, people will not give money just because you wrote a
> half-page
> statement.
> 
> Best,
> 
> On Thu, Jun 21, 2018 at 11:23 AM horrido 

> horrido.hobbies@

>  wrote:
> 
>> I'm disappointed in the response. Only two contributors of $100 each.
>> This
>> is
>> extremely tepid.
>>
>> There must be thousands of Smalltalkers around the world. How to reach
>> out
>> to them? It can't be that hard to fund this contest. I mean, there are
>> many
>> stupid causes on GoFundMe that have raised tens of thousands of dollars!
>> This Smalltalk programming competition is anything but stupid.
>>
>> If only 1500 Smalltalkers each contributed a paltry $20, the contest
>> would
>> be fully funded. It would only take 300 contributors of $100 each.
>>
>> The question is: How much do we care about the future of Smalltalk?
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>>
>>
> 
> -- 
> Serge Stinckwich
> UMI UMMISCO 209 (SU/IRD/UY1)
> "Programs must be written for people to read, and only incidentally for
> machines to execute."http://www.doesnotunderstand.org/





--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

One small correction: it's CA$30,000, not US$30,000. Given the exchange rate,
it's actually considerably LESS money!


SergeStinckwich wrote
> hi Horrido,
> 
> I would like to thank you for your effort to organize this competition.
> 
> But for the amount you are asking (30K USD), I don't expect that much
> people to participate if you don't give them
> more feedback and information on your project. You have too look how
> successful crowdfunding campaigns are working.
> Recently, one of my friend Gael Duval organize a crowd campaign to fund a
> a
> new mobile OS that is privacy-enable and ask 25K Euros (less than you, but
> receive 95K Euros at the end) and put a lot of energy and info during
> several months too convince people:
> https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/290746744/eelo-a-mobile-os-and-web-services-in-the-public-in
> 
> Ok, the subject is completely different and maybe his topic is sensible
> for
> a lot of people but the concerns are the same. At the end, you need to
> convince people to give you money.
> 
> What is your budget ? what kind of competition you will organize ? how you
> will convince schools/university to participate ?
> How you will reward people for their participation ?
> 
> Sorry to say, people will not give money just because you wrote a
> half-page
> statement.
> 
> Best,
> 
> On Thu, Jun 21, 2018 at 11:23 AM horrido 

> horrido.hobbies@

>  wrote:
> 
>> I'm disappointed in the response. Only two contributors of $100 each.
>> This
>> is
>> extremely tepid.
>>
>> There must be thousands of Smalltalkers around the world. How to reach
>> out
>> to them? It can't be that hard to fund this contest. I mean, there are
>> many
>> stupid causes on GoFundMe that have raised tens of thousands of dollars!
>> This Smalltalk programming competition is anything but stupid.
>>
>> If only 1500 Smalltalkers each contributed a paltry $20, the contest
>> would
>> be fully funded. It would only take 300 contributors of $100 each.
>>
>> The question is: How much do we care about the future of Smalltalk?
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>>
>>
> 
> -- 
> Serge Stinckwich
> UMI UMMISCO 209 (SU/IRD/UY1)
> "Programs must be written for people to read, and only incidentally for
> machines to execute."http://www.doesnotunderstand.org/





--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Richard O'Keefe]

Programming languages used in high-schools here include
Scratch, Javascript, and Python.
Myself, I've always had a fondness for StarLogo/NetLogo.


On 19 June 2018 at 15:08, horrido  wrote:

> I appreciate what you're saying, and certainly the things you want to see
> funded are worthwhile. However, the goals for my programming competition
> are
> quite different, for example:
>
> #1 – raise the public profile of Smalltalk across a broad swath of the
> population in Canada and other countries. Word of mouth about the
> competition will spread beyond Canada, esp. after the winners of the
> competition gain some local media coverage.
>
> #2 – generate excitement and interest in kids, esp. at the high school
> level. There's nothing better than a sports-like competition to achieve
> this.
>
> #3 – by generating interest in kids, we seed the next generation of
> programmers with knowledge and experience in Smalltalk. This is not unlike
> the way interest in Linux grew from students in colleges and universities
> throughout recent decades.
>
> #4 – convince educators to include Smalltalk in their curriculums. I don't
> know what programming languages are being taught in high schools, but I
> know
> it's not Smalltalk. I tried reaching out to local school boards, but they
> showed no interest.
>
> In colleges and universities, the most commonly taught languages are Python
> and Java. At least, that's the case in North America, I don't know about
> Europe. I hope to open their eyes to Smalltalk.
>
> This is a decidedly marketing-based approach, something that I don't
> believe
> any other programming language has tried. It's a worthwhile experiment, and
> that's why I hope Smalltalkers everywhere will stand behind it.
>
>
> Offray Vladimir Luna Cárdenas-2 wrote
> > H :-),
> >
> >
> > On 16/06/18 18:12, horrido wrote:
> >> FYI, I am trying to jumpstart a Smalltalk programming competition.  Read
> >> all
> >> about it here.
> >> https://medium.com/@richardeng/smalltalk-programming-competition-
> 2be77cab0e75
> >>
> >> My plan is to use Pharo for this competition, even if it makes companies
> >> like Cincom and Instantiations unhappy.
> >>
> >> Any support this competition can receive would be greatly appreciated.
> >
> > I just tweeted about it.
> >
> > I'm not into a competition spirit, so I would like to think in other
> > possibilities to fund Pharo, even in the main goal is not reached (USD $
> > 30k). For example, I remember Mozilla thinking in Mozilla Spaces (kind
> > of hacker/maker spaces for Open Web learning by doing in a community
> > mindset). Our local hackerspaces cost something like USD $6.5K a year
> > and it has been a good Pharo Space for almost three years of continuous
> > activities and several outputs and prototypes as detailed at [1]. I'm
> > not telling that you should invest in us particularly, but that even
> > from and alternative perspective that is not related with funding
> > individuals but communities, the same money that allows only 3
> > scholarships of individuals after competing each other, would make 4 or
> > 5 communities sustainable in the Global South for a year, related with
> > Pharo and other activities and here we have the advantage of not having
> > a lot of technical debt with popular languages well spread in all
> > population, like happens in the Global North.
> >
> > [1]
> > http://mutabit.com/repos.fossil/grafoscopio/doc/tip/
> Docs/En/success-story.md
> >
> > Maybe these ideas could help in some way when combined with yours and
> > allow you a model for flexible funding, like the one of Indie GoGo, so
> > instead of a all or nothing funding for the competence, you could have a
> > modular approach that allow you to fund several Pharospaces across the
> > world, for each USD 6.5k you get, starting with those located in the
> > Global South (which can be more potent, more agile and cheaper).
> >
> > Just my two pesos.
> >
> > Cheers,
> >
> > Offray
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>
>

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Tim Mackinnon]

I noticed that your gofundme update email went into my spam mail box - so I 
wasn’t aware it had gone live.

Are you able to apply the funds from your previous campaign (The Ultimate 
Smalltalk Tutorial) to this one? As a contributor to that last one - which 
unfortunately didn’t manage to deliver like you hoped, I am a little hesitant… 
I think this is often the way, we need to feel like its something that has 
gathered enough moment to  succeed otherwise what happens to the money 
collected?

Don’t get me wrong, I am a fan of your tutorials (it reignited my interested a 
few years back) - so don’t count me out yet.

Tim

> On 21 Jun 2018, at 11:23, horrido  wrote:
> 
> I'm disappointed in the response. Only two contributors of $100 each. This is
> extremely tepid.
> 
> There must be thousands of Smalltalkers around the world. How to reach out
> to them? It can't be that hard to fund this contest. I mean, there are many
> stupid causes on GoFundMe that have raised tens of thousands of dollars!
> This Smalltalk programming competition is anything but stupid.
> 
> If only 1500 Smalltalkers each contributed a paltry $20, the contest would
> be fully funded. It would only take 300 contributors of $100 each.
> 
> The question is: How much do we care about the future of Smalltalk?
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
> 

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Serge Stinckwich]

hi Horrido,

I would like to thank you for your effort to organize this competition.

But for the amount you are asking (30K USD), I don't expect that much
people to participate if you don't give them
more feedback and information on your project. You have too look how
successful crowdfunding campaigns are working.
Recently, one of my friend Gael Duval organize a crowd campaign to fund a a
new mobile OS that is privacy-enable and ask 25K Euros (less than you, but
receive 95K Euros at the end) and put a lot of energy and info during
several months too convince people:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/290746744/eelo-a-mobile-os-and-web-services-in-the-public-in

Ok, the subject is completely different and maybe his topic is sensible for
a lot of people but the concerns are the same. At the end, you need to
convince people to give you money.

What is your budget ? what kind of competition you will organize ? how you
will convince schools/university to participate ?
How you will reward people for their participation ?

Sorry to say, people will not give money just because you wrote a half-page
statement.

Best,

On Thu, Jun 21, 2018 at 11:23 AM horrido  wrote:

> I'm disappointed in the response. Only two contributors of $100 each. This
> is
> extremely tepid.
>
> There must be thousands of Smalltalkers around the world. How to reach out
> to them? It can't be that hard to fund this contest. I mean, there are many
> stupid causes on GoFundMe that have raised tens of thousands of dollars!
> This Smalltalk programming competition is anything but stupid.
>
> If only 1500 Smalltalkers each contributed a paltry $20, the contest would
> be fully funded. It would only take 300 contributors of $100 each.
>
> The question is: How much do we care about the future of Smalltalk?
>
>
>
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>
>

-- 
Serge Stinckwich
UMI UMMISCO 209 (SU/IRD/UY1)
"Programs must be written for people to read, and only incidentally for
machines to execute."http://www.doesnotunderstand.org/

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

I'm disappointed in the response. Only two contributors of $100 each. This is
extremely tepid.

There must be thousands of Smalltalkers around the world. How to reach out
to them? It can't be that hard to fund this contest. I mean, there are many
stupid causes on GoFundMe that have raised tens of thousands of dollars!
This Smalltalk programming competition is anything but stupid.

If only 1500 Smalltalkers each contributed a paltry $20, the contest would
be fully funded. It would only take 300 contributors of $100 each.

The question is: How much do we care about the future of Smalltalk?



--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

I've finalized the name of the competition: The James Robertson Memorial
Programming Competition. The late James Robertson was a tireless advocate
for Smalltalk. He gave many presentations, wrote blogs and produced videos.
This competition honours him and his body of work.

 



--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[horrido]

I appreciate what you're saying, and certainly the things you want to see
funded are worthwhile. However, the goals for my programming competition are
quite different, for example:

#1 – raise the public profile of Smalltalk across a broad swath of the
population in Canada and other countries. Word of mouth about the
competition will spread beyond Canada, esp. after the winners of the
competition gain some local media coverage.

#2 – generate excitement and interest in kids, esp. at the high school
level. There's nothing better than a sports-like competition to achieve
this.

#3 – by generating interest in kids, we seed the next generation of
programmers with knowledge and experience in Smalltalk. This is not unlike
the way interest in Linux grew from students in colleges and universities
throughout recent decades.

#4 – convince educators to include Smalltalk in their curriculums. I don't
know what programming languages are being taught in high schools, but I know
it's not Smalltalk. I tried reaching out to local school boards, but they
showed no interest.

In colleges and universities, the most commonly taught languages are Python
and Java. At least, that's the case in North America, I don't know about
Europe. I hope to open their eyes to Smalltalk.

This is a decidedly marketing-based approach, something that I don't believe
any other programming language has tried. It's a worthwhile experiment, and
that's why I hope Smalltalkers everywhere will stand behind it.


Offray Vladimir Luna Cárdenas-2 wrote
> H :-),
> 
> 
> On 16/06/18 18:12, horrido wrote:
>> FYI, I am trying to jumpstart a Smalltalk programming competition.  Read
>> all
>> about it here.
>> https://medium.com/@richardeng/smalltalk-programming-competition-2be77cab0e75;
>>   
>>
>> My plan is to use Pharo for this competition, even if it makes companies
>> like Cincom and Instantiations unhappy.
>>
>> Any support this competition can receive would be greatly appreciated.
> 
> I just tweeted about it.
> 
> I'm not into a competition spirit, so I would like to think in other
> possibilities to fund Pharo, even in the main goal is not reached (USD $
> 30k). For example, I remember Mozilla thinking in Mozilla Spaces (kind
> of hacker/maker spaces for Open Web learning by doing in a community
> mindset). Our local hackerspaces cost something like USD $6.5K a year
> and it has been a good Pharo Space for almost three years of continuous
> activities and several outputs and prototypes as detailed at [1]. I'm
> not telling that you should invest in us particularly, but that even
> from and alternative perspective that is not related with funding
> individuals but communities, the same money that allows only 3
> scholarships of individuals after competing each other, would make 4 or
> 5 communities sustainable in the Global South for a year, related with
> Pharo and other activities and here we have the advantage of not having
> a lot of technical debt with popular languages well spread in all
> population, like happens in the Global North.
> 
> [1]
> http://mutabit.com/repos.fossil/grafoscopio/doc/tip/Docs/En/success-story.md
> 
> Maybe these ideas could help in some way when combined with yours and
> allow you a model for flexible funding, like the one of Indie GoGo, so
> instead of a all or nothing funding for the competence, you could have a
> modular approach that allow you to fund several Pharospaces across the
> world, for each USD 6.5k you get, starting with those located in the
> Global South (which can be more potent, more agile and cheaper).
> 
> Just my two pesos.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Offray





--
Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Offray Vladimir Luna Cárdenas]

H :-),


On 16/06/18 18:12, horrido wrote:
> FYI, I am trying to jumpstart a Smalltalk programming competition.  Read all
> about it here.
> 
>   
>
> My plan is to use Pharo for this competition, even if it makes companies
> like Cincom and Instantiations unhappy.
>
> Any support this competition can receive would be greatly appreciated.

I just tweeted about it.

I'm not into a competition spirit, so I would like to think in other
possibilities to fund Pharo, even in the main goal is not reached (USD $
30k). For example, I remember Mozilla thinking in Mozilla Spaces (kind
of hacker/maker spaces for Open Web learning by doing in a community
mindset). Our local hackerspaces cost something like USD $6.5K a year
and it has been a good Pharo Space for almost three years of continuous
activities and several outputs and prototypes as detailed at [1]. I'm
not telling that you should invest in us particularly, but that even
from and alternative perspective that is not related with funding
individuals but communities, the same money that allows only 3
scholarships of individuals after competing each other, would make 4 or
5 communities sustainable in the Global South for a year, related with
Pharo and other activities and here we have the advantage of not having
a lot of technical debt with popular languages well spread in all
population, like happens in the Global North.

[1]
http://mutabit.com/repos.fossil/grafoscopio/doc/tip/Docs/En/success-story.md

Maybe these ideas could help in some way when combined with yours and
allow you a model for flexible funding, like the one of Indie GoGo, so
instead of a all or nothing funding for the competence, you could have a
modular approach that allow you to fund several Pharospaces across the
world, for each USD 6.5k you get, starting with those located in the
Global South (which can be more potent, more agile and cheaper).

Just my two pesos.

Cheers,

Offray

Re: [Pharo-users] Smalltalk Programming Competition

[Tim Mackinnon]

I don’t think it would make Cincom and instantiations unhappy - they recognise 
how Pharo and Oss feed an interesting pipeline - if you need more support or 
just commercial backing, they can offer that (not that Pharo can’t - but it’s a 
handy symbiotic relationship that seems to work well)

Tim 

Sent from my iPhone

> On 17 Jun 2018, at 00:12, horrido  wrote:
> 
> FYI, I am trying to jumpstart a Smalltalk programming competition.  Read all
> about it here.
> 
>   
> 
> My plan is to use Pharo for this competition, even if it makes companies
> like Cincom and Instantiations unhappy.
> 
> Any support this competition can receive would be greatly appreciated.
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Sent from: http://forum.world.st/Pharo-Smalltalk-Users-f1310670.html
>