Hello, There are (at least) two methods of attacking any computer audience: Horizontally and Vertically Horizontally means going to "computer" trade shows and events like Linuxworld, the old Comdex, MACWorld, etc. You write for blogs that are oriented toward computers, magazines that are oriented toward computers, etc. The further away from your core technology you are, the harder it is to get recognized, but the easier it is to reach the "unwashed". Vertically means going to events like EDUCAUSE and speaking with those educational types that make policies for Universities, or attending any of the educational conferences that go on. You can find out more about EDUCAUSE at http://www.educause.edu/ For the past thirteen years I have been going around and speaking about FOSS in a horizontal method, but which often heavily included education. I was a former college professor for eight years (3.5 full time, and 4.5 part time), so I understand what FOSS would mean to education and research. The problem is that from a horizontal perspective, there is so much about FOSS that it is impossible to talk about all of it in a 45 minute "keynote". Therefore often the educational part of FOSS takes a back seat to government and commerce. Lately I have been purposely requesting that the conference people that pay my travel expenses (note, I do not often require an honorarium for my speaking, and never ask for one from Universities) to also line up speaking sessions at local Universities. This happened in Oman recently, and I addressed the CS staff of the University of Oman (their ONLY public university) for about an hour on the benefits of FOSS in teaching. In a tour of their labs I showed them how they could teach two more effective courses using FOSS. I think my speech had a deep impact on their thought processes. They are currently completely a Microsoft shop other than one professor who is "FOSS". But again, this is only one university. Unfortunately to attack something like EDUCAUSE it takes almost a full time (or at least half-time) job. Their membership is only made up of academic institutions and corporations in the "educational domain". Microsoft is a member (Platinum) and Novell is a member (Bronze). EDUCAUSE has no individual memberships. EDUCAUSE has an "Open Source" panel at their upcoming conference in Washington D.C. (which overlaps with Linuxworld Canada, where I will be), but no listing of who is on the panel. And that is just EDUCAUSE. There are many other "Educational" events, magazines and groups in the world. >That's a good example. We need something like Linux (in schools) >International. Well, it actually should be "FOSS (in schools) International". :-) There is a third method of reaching the audience that you are talking about and one that I am executing with Linux International. That is of the "grass roots" method. Don't catch fish, but teach thousands of people how to fish. LI will have a "Special Interest Group" devoted to Education. With LI as the "corporate umbrella" they will have access to groups like EDUCAUSE as well as others. LI will supply them with the materials necessary to convince people at all levels of education that FOSS is better than closed source, proprietary code. I note, by the way, that your email list is "fedora-education-list@xxxxxxxxxx" This is a recipe for failure. It is the same philosophy that killed Unix. It should be "FOSS-education-list", or better yet "FOSS-education-list@some-neutral-body". That way groups from Novell, Ubuntu, Debian, Slackware and others can join you. Grow the pie, then cut it up. Warmest regards, maddog -- Jon "maddog" Hall Executive Director Linux International(R) email: maddog@xxxxxx 80 Amherst St. Voice: +1.603.672.4557 Amherst, N.H. 03031-3032 U.S.A. WWW: http://www.li.org Board Member: Uniforum Association, USENIX Association (R)Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in several countries. (R)Linux International is a registered trademark in the USA used pursuant to a license from Linux Mark Institute, authorized licensor of Linus Torvalds, owner of the Linux trademark on a worldwide basis (R)UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the USA and other countries.
