[TriLUG] Promotions for Installfests

[hayes]

These are some excellent ideas. I would also like to suggest that if you want to convince someone to use Linux, then you have to be able to actual demonstrate that they can do the same things in Linux as they can in "the other OS."  I would suggest having two machines, one with Linux and the other with "the other OS" and have the user do something in the "the other OS" and then have someone do it in Linux. This demonstrates ease of use and compatibility. If this is not feasible, then have a demo session, where users can say what they normally do with their machines and have someone demo that it can be done with Linux.  Also, I would convey to the user that Linux is "Free" and you can constantly get updates for "Free" and questions answered for "Free" via the Linux mailing list, example trilug.

People like to work with mainstream technologies and continue to save money. Linux offers both! Now, we have to somehow convey this to others.


-Travis

---------- Original Message ----------------------------------
From: "Lisa C. Boyd" <lcboyd at nc.rr.com>
Reply-To: trilug at trilug.org
Date: Wed, 15 May 2002 11:54:41 -0400

>The recent thread has been quite interesting to this newbie :)
>
>I wanted to offer up an idea for a seminar/talk for people who have no clue 
>about what Linux is or what it can do. To me there is a step of information 
>gathering before someone decided to switch to Linux. I asked a lot of basic 
>questions on the list about how to get started and everyone responded in a 
>very friendly manner. However, most people either don't know about this 
>list or don't feel comfortable asking questions. I could see a seminar 
>given at each of the campuses around to just explore the basics (very 
>basics) of Linux. Of course it doesn't have to be limited to campuses - it 
>could be different places depending on who you are trying to reach. The 
>location of talks and such will probably limit the types of people that you 
>have come to them. <No offense to anyone> If you have a meeting in Roxboro 
>you would get different type of people than if you have a meeting in the 
>heart of Raleigh.
>
>If you have speakers who demystify Linux and make people feel comfortable, 
>then you hit them with signing up for an Installfest. It would be a great 
>way to get rid of those basic questions that everyone has (like how many 
>CDs do I need to bring? do I need to bring a monitor? etc) and let the 
>people see a helpful, friendly TriLUG.
>
>Possible topics:
>	* what Linux is/is not/could be
>	* what different distributions there are
>	* differences between distributions - objective differences ;)
>	* show some of the programs - Gnome, KDE, email clients,
>	  web browsers common things that people as basic Windows
>	  users can relate to
>	* stay away from throwing out terms that may scare people off
>	  like daemons, cron, apt-get, netstat, traceroute or other
>	  UNIX type commands (can hit them later when they need help)
>	* keep the talk simple and easy to understand - if you wanted
>	  to target a Spanish-speaking community, have someone give
>	  the talk in Spanish
>
>I can help with some marketing ideas and promotional stuff for the group 
>and for these Installfests. Being a newbie though I'll wait for input from 
>the others that have been here longer :)
>
>Lisa B.
>
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