[NTLUG:Discuss] Study Group...

[cbbrowne@godel.brownes.org]

On Mon, 27 Sep 1999 23:42:58 CDT, the world broke into rejoicing as
newsseeker <person at hex.net>  said:
> cbbrowne at godel.brownes.org wrote:
> 
> > <snip>
> > Part of the 'problem' right now is that NTLUG just got incorporated, and
> > lots of little things are in process of being slightly more formalized.
> 
> Sorry, I have resevations about the incorporation.  The good news is indeed t
hat
> NTLUG is incorporated.  The bad news is also that NTLUG is incorporated.  I'm
 not
> elaborating any more than that.

Being incorporated makes some things possible that would be impractical
without a formal organization.  That's as much elaboration as needs be
here now.

> > Give a couple of months and it can start to make sense to look into ways
> > of "making NTLUG feel a bit smaller."

>I'm not really sure NTLUG needs to feel smaller.  I think it is great
>that the turnout was at an all time high as I understand (Sudden Job
>Demands kept me from attending).  As far as I am concerned NTLUG has a
>lot of potential, and if NTLUG is indeed the largest group in the US,
>maybe we can entice some of these Linux shows and people to come here
>to the Dallas area.  Now's the time since they wouldn't have to see the
>very Hot Texas Summer (somehow I don't think our summers help tourism).

Numbers are good when this allows some highly concentrated "learning"
to take place, where one speaker may enlighten many people at once.

Numbers are bad when things get overly crowded, and if this discourages
individual participation.

In terms of "shows," care will have to be taken.  
a) It is *guaranteed* that a "big show" will mandate some people doing
a *vast* amount of work.
b) Some possible arrangements for "big shows" have the potential to be
mucho expensive to the participants, and might not really be in the
interests of NTLUG as a whole.

> OTOH, I don't think there should be any problem with a small group in
> addition to NTLUG.  In fact, if we get enough people in it, we just
> might be able to develop something later that NTLUG could use.

There is, already, a LUG at UTD.  There is, already, a DFW "Unix Users
Group."  There's a local "Perl Mongers" group, as well as a TCL group,
and, I believe, a Java group.

Where life gets a bit complicated is in assessing to what degree such
SIGs can/should be affiliated together.

Too much codependence can result in deadlocks as the interdependent
organizations try to figure out how to simply schedule meetings that
won't conflict *too* much.  And too little cooperation is bad too, as
there are opportunities for cooperative efforts.

In all cases, whatever happens occurs as a result of people volunteering
and actually helping out to make things happen...
--
"I don't know why, but first C  programs tend to look a lot worse than
first programs  in any other  language (maybe except for  FORTRAN, but
then I suspect all FORTRAN programs look like `firsts')" -- Olaf Kirch
cbbrowne at hex.net- <http://www.ntlug.org/~cbbrowne/lsf.html>