Re: About a list for India

["Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay" <sankarshan hotpop com>]

hi,
jeff wrote::

> This is precisely what we're doing. :-) My question to the Indian guys
is
> how we can do it best *in India*. It's going to be different
everywhere.

i believe that there are 2 aspects to the movement ::

[1] Advocacy - this part is well handled by the various UGs as well as
L10n teams who cannot just stop talking about Gnome among other things.
the more you talk the more the community takes notice of the Gnome
'thing'

[2] Marketing - this i feel is a different kettle of fish and thus more
of a specialised function. while marketing is related to commercial
exuberance regarding Gnome it is also primarily a strategy towards
promotion of Gnome through the standard means available.

in the latter case, UGs and L10n groups can act in synergy to create a
cohesive platform.

> > It's just like LUG, but replace Linux with GNOME.
> > We just do marketing

sort of what i seem should be quite easily accomplished

> > if we want to avoid conflict with l10n Team, just suggest the
> > translation team to have their user mailing list as our per language
> > marketing tool.

i do not see the reason for conflict (although Cross posts are the
different issue) as the core objectives are different. and more
importantly L10n guys will also be involved, i am part of an L10n team
and i also desire to take the interest in Gnome to the next level.

> Sure, but each country will do it differently. For instance, I don't
want
> gnome-au-list to have questions and answers on it - it should be for
event
> planning, advocacy and the occasional chit-chat. People from Australia
can
> quite easily go to their local users groups or to one of the GNOME
lists to
> get help. *However* it is very important in some countries that users
who
> don't speak English can get help (such as in Spain, China, and many
others).

i agree with your point.

> So, each group will operate somewhat differently, but the important
points
> remain: They are locally relevant groups, affiliated or communicating
with
> the GNOME marketing project.
>
> Which brings us back to the questions about India. I am wondering what
the
> best strategy is for that country, considering language issues, and
the
> existance of a number of groups already. :-)

i think that given the number of groups we in India interplay with on a
daily basis (i can speak for myself, i interact with people from at
least 5 different local language groups), hindi forms the colloquial
verbal volley while English is the lingua franca. at places where
hindi/english fails to arouse enthusiasm and admiration, the L10n
experience comes in handy.

from a purely strategic viewpoint, i think that it is best to follow a
conventional structure (as is done for other countries with respect to
Gnome-marketing). this helps in confusing people a little less and also
focus on the core objectives of this list. then the
Gnome-country-marketing list might end interacting and interfacing more
tightly with UGs and other stakeholders than i can ever visualise.

regards
sankarshan
sankarshan at bengalinux dot org