Hi all, This is going to be a long email, so bear with me. :)
Thanks very much for discussing the different issues about the MOTU community in your last meeting. I had a look over them, and looked at some of the things we can do to improve the community, and I would like to offer some advice for things to do in this mail. I recommend you follow this advice and implement the things I suggest, and then we schedule another meeting which I will be at to discuss any other improvements that can be made. One thing is clear - MOTU has incredible potential, and with some of the right community building techniques, I am positive we can improve things. Fixing these problems basically falls into two core areas: (1) Making MOTU easier to be part of (2) Spreading the word and outchreach Fixing (1) means improving the MOTU resources and fixing (2) means babbling to the world about how cool MOTU is and getting people involved. You need to make sure (1) is fixed before moving onto (2). So, lets look at the things in (1) that need fixing first: * The MOTU Wiki pages - Looking at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MOTU it is just too difficult to figure out where to start - it is a mess of informaton. Many teams face this problem, so I have created a consistent design that can be seen at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/BuildingCommunity/SampleTeam - you should make use of this consistent design and use the same sections shown in the above link. This is what you put in the sections: - Roadmap - more on this later. - Getting Involved - write a simple guide to getting started - what are the first five things every MOTU should do? Write them into this page as a really simple guide. This is the very first thing that every new MOTU should read. - Knowledge Base - each of the guides, documentation and HOWTOs but doing MOTU things should be linked inside this section. This should be an index of MOTU knowledge - existing and new MOTUs go here to find out how to do things. - FAQ - work to make a huge and detailed FAQ answering the typical questions about MOTU that you often get on the list and IRC channel. You should grow a culture in MOTU that if something is asked that the FAQ does cover, the FAQ should be updated. This will create a definitive document that you can always point people at. :) - Contacts - in here list the mailing list and IRC channel as well as any key contacts who are happy to answer specific questions. This would be a good place to put mentors. Getting your wiki pages together is priority #1 - it will make MOTU a much easier project to approach. This design I have constructed is also being used by other Ubuntu projects on the wiki. * Define a Roadmap - You may have done this already, but the team needs to have a consistent set of doable goals that can be approached. Only you folks can know what these goals are, but they need to be clearly documented. The roadmap is essential so that the team know what needs working on and so that new MOTUs can start working on something. It can be particularly useful to identify the kind of things that new MOTUs can get started with too. * Create regular events - Right now you have a regular MOTU meeting, and it seems you sometimes have MOTU school. I would *really* recommend that you regularly have sessions that teach MOTU skills and also have a Q+A session for MOTUs. As an example, I have a monthly Community Q+A session which proves popular for people to just come along and ask what is on their mind. I recommend having a monthly Q+A session in addition to the MOTU meeting, and then having at least one tuition session each month. This creates a rich set of events that makes MOTU feel alive and kicking. Packaging is hard, so people need (1) documentation and (2) events to help them get started. So those are the bits and pieces in (1) that need sorting first, but now lets look at the outreach goals in part (2). This is *hugely* important. MOTU basically needs regular pimping - people of the world need to know it is a cool and important project to be a part of. So, you should each do the following: * Blog, blog, blog! - I very rarely see MOTU appear on Planet Ubuntu. This needs to change. If you have a blog, blog about MOTU, if you don't have a blog, get one from wordpress.com and blog about MOTU! Write about events, things you are working on, things you have learned, packages you would like to see packaged, things you need help with, amusing discussions...it doesn't matter what. I would like to see at least two posts about MOTU every day when I read Planet Ubuntu. This is *hugely* important - blogging is the way you spread the word about the project and get new people involved. * Publicise your events - A MOTU event is useless if people don't know about it. Firstly, make sure it is in the Fridge events calendar. Secondly, make sure you blog about it and talk about what the sessions is all about - you should particularly get people excited about the tuition sessions - they are awesome opportunities for people to get involved with MOTU. You should also put the events in the topic of the IRC channel, mention them on the MOTU wiki pages (see the events page in my design for the wiki pages) and push them elsewhere. * Pimp MOTU - Get yourselves interview on podcasts and websites such as linux.com, go to conferences and talk about MOTU, speak at Linux User Groups about MOTU and anything else you can do to promote the project. This is all about getting people excited and fired up about MOTU. Everyone can play a part here, but you will have natural people in the MOTU community who are good at interviews and pimping the project, and they should be encouraged to do this. So, there are some things to get started with above. I recommend you work on each of these things as a matter of urgency, with the wiki pages being the first thing to work on. :) When this is up and running we can schedule an IRC meeting. Hope this helps. Jono -- Jono Bacon Ubuntu Community Manager jono(at)ubuntu(dot)com www.ubuntu.com / www.jonobacon.org -- Ubuntu-motu mailing list [email protected] Modify settings or unsubscribe at: https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-motu
