Hey everyone! Team founder here, and i'm really excited to see what this team can accomplish. New members just keep pouring in! We have a LOT to talk about, but first i wanted to clear up a bit of confusion. There already exists the Debian Games Team which does packaging for games that are already actively developed but are not yet included in Debian/Ubuntu. The scope of the Ubuntu Gaming Team is entirely different and should not overlap at all with the Debian Games Team. We do not deal with requests for updating games in Ubuntu. If you can help with that, please join the Debian Games Team<http://wiki.debian.org/Games/Development>. The Debian Games Team does packaging, whereas we are a community activism/marketing effort to organize around and prioritize the biggest issues with FOSS gaming and how to address them.
The biggest concern with this team has been where it's headed. Now that we've gathered so much interest, we now have to talk about the specific things we will be doing. Basically, we can do everything as long as there is enough interest and support (but we leave packaging to the Debian Games Team). We need to discuss the biggest barriers to the development of FOSS gaming and then figure out the most effective ways to address them. For some insight on some of the biggest problems, please check out this post<http://pinstack.blogspot.com/2009/04/foss-gaming-needs-distributed-content.html>discussing, among other things, the need for content over code. There is also lots of valuable ideas on the lists, etc. Adoption doesn't seem the be a real barrier yet because of other more fundamental issues (keep reading), but for those interested in promotion, check out Spread Ubuntu<http://spreadubuntu.neomenlo.org/>. FOSS gaming seems to be in serious need of centralization for developers and content creators (an effective distributed content development solution). What is the most effective action to take to address this and what are we capable of? Should we support the blender institute, push launchpad to become better suited for content or start our own, pressure Canonical to invest in FOSS games, or maybe throw our support behind the best FOSS game we can find? It's all up for discussion at this very early stage! We can also have sub-teams for connecting gamers, and marketing/promootional<https://wiki.ubuntu.com/GamingTeam/Marketing>activities if there is enough interest for those to be self-sustaining. I'm starting this discussion here on the mailing list, but there is the option of planning a team meeting on irc (#ubuntu-gaming). Does anybody think that is necessary? Thanks everyone for expressing so much interest in this team! We really need people to be assertive and step up to the plate so if there's anything you can do that you think should be done, don't hesitate, just do it! Also, for organization and holding the team together, should we assign some people to specific core jobs? Also, some miscellaneous things to address eventually: There is no team artwork <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/GamingTeam/Toolbox/Artwork> (Launchpad logo, icon, etc), a website might be nice once we get things rolling, and an idea from mattl on irc is to have a seal like Creative Commons has<http://creativecommons.org/images/deed/seal.png>that free games (free software and free content) could proudly display. After all of this discussion, we will make a second announcement about our refined focus and specific activites to gain even more interest and support. The future of this team is in your hands! You're at the core of this project and will determine its direction-- i hope you are all as ambitious and hopeful as i am. Let the discussion begin =] .danny
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