Re: [Fsfe-uk] Membership

[ian]

On Wed, 2003-05-21 at 17:24, Ramanan Selvaratnam wrote:
> ian wrote:
> 
> >[...] Associate members would be sort of sleeping supporters. Bit
> >like signing a petition but would remain members until they decided to
> >resign. ie unless they make the effort to opt out they are in and stay
> >in. This means we don't have to have complicated systems of renewal.
> >
> If we were to build up an  electronic system to scale for the many 
> number of users Ian is talking about then a lot of  new possibilities 
> can be explored.

We have a MySQL database just being finished off for theINGOTs
certification. We could probably adapt a copy of it for this but others
here might be able to do it better.

> I have not had a chance to become a MandrakeClub member, yet.
> They operate a nice model ....club members vote for new software within 
> the Mandrake software repository.

I'm a Mandrake Club member, but I don't get much time to use the system.
The on-line tutorial is good though. To start with we can just keep
things simple and just record all the names of the members with a
contact address. If we could at least get all the people in places such
as Schoolforge and uk.schools-it to join it would be a start. 

> Now, if we could get something like this done and complement it with any 
> expertise that we might have in helping  schools customise software, 
> then the  message of  free software systems will spread very fast and 
> accurately.

I thought perhaps a directory of expertise. eg who had what knowledge
and where they were located. If Free software keeps developing at the
current rate there is going to be a time where the limit is that the
demand from schools simply can't be met. We need to be organised so that
never happens. There is much greater awareness of free software in
schools now than 2 years ago and many have a genuine desire to escape
from M$, they just don't know how to do it.I see 3 phases. The first is
the early adopters and getting the first systems in and working. This
has already happened now. The next is demonstrating the advantages of
these "show" sites and generating widespread unsolicited demand. The
final phase is when software developers start porting wholesale. We are
in the latter half of phase one with one or two promising signs that
phase 2 is beginning.  There will be employment opportunities for people
with GNU/Linux knowledge and skills and even things like moving from MS
Office to OO.org etc.

> 
> Mozilla also has a voting system for feature requests.
> 
> If we can hone the security with the best trust metics available , who 
> knows we will be runnig the next general elections too ;-)

Woa, steady. You'll be suggesting every family will be able to afford a
networked PC next :-)

> (Seriously electronic voting is coming and it is a seperate plus point 
> for free software in government)

Absolutely right. I'm sure it won't be long before we have a school
where every family has a PC and all routing communications between
school and home are done electronically. Thing is if I know where the
expertise is when these projects pop up at random I can commandeer
people to help in their locality.

> Regards,
> 
> Ramanan
-- 
ian <address@hidden>