The magazine of the Melbourne PC User Group Editorial Ash Nallawalla ash@melbpc.org.au |
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This month I am looking for your input, not just for our user group, but for user groups around the world. I am also the Vice President of the Association of Personal Computer User Groups (APCUG) of which our group is an early member. Its members are user groups, not individuals, and its charter is to help user group leaders to run their groups better. Last December I commissioned a survey for user group leaders and reminded them once in the new year, but just nine user groups responded out of almost 400 member groups.
There is insufficient data to make any conclusions but nearly half the groups are concerned about their future. They have insufficient volunteers who actually deliver, insufficient articles for their newsletters, insufficient vendors willing to speak at their meetings and so on.
I am not asking for help regarding other user groups, but we are continuing our own strategic planning processes and have noted some warning signs that we need to guard against. Any input about our own group may be relevant to help other groups later on.
Well-meaning members sometimes contact us and make suggestions. Sometimes it is just a suggestion and sometimes it is phrased aggressively, eg. "Why don't you do [something]?" or "What kind of an idiot designed this leaflet?" In cases where we can discuss the issue with the member, the answer is usually to find a volunteer to do it. It is hard enough to find these phantom volunteers, let alone to check if they are idiots or not.
Now for some specifics where you can give your input:
- Can you put us in touch with a school or university that would be interested
in working with Melb PC on an ongoing basis to benefit their students and
indirectly give us exposure to future members? I am not looking for names of
schools or IT teachers, but for introductions where you have already discussed
Melb PC with the teacher or Principal and they are indeed interested in
exploring ideas with us. Many of the Committee members have day jobs and it is
not easy to perform Group business during the day, hence e-mail contact is best.
Please ask such institutions to write to for my attention.
- Are you able and willing to write for your magazine? PC Update needs both
reviewers and feature writers. The SIGs need reporters if they don't already
have one. Our blog needs reporters to write one or two descriptive paragraphs
every day about what happened at a meeting the previous day. Contact any one of
us to offer your help.
- If you have any way to help the group get more members or younger members and have specifics, please contact me. Don't feel slighted if I say that we don't need bright ideas - the group needs your time and voluntary labour to champion some of these bright ideas.
Please do not send Letters to the Editor on paper, but thanks to everyone who writes. Nobody has the time to transcribe hand written letters to disk and print them. Paul Berger alerts readers to two freeware offerings: A PDF creator named Primo PDF from www.primopdf.com and a screen grabber named MWSNAP from www.mirekw.com.
Affiliate Marketing (AM) SIG Now Official
Yes, we had 45 people roll up to the unofficial meeting, where we needed to get just 10 signatures to become official. This is now a formality, so we will continue to meet at Chadstone on the second Saturday of each month from 10 am until noon. The next meeting on 14 May will continue to look at the basics, particularly choosing domain names, Web hosting, and a How-To on building compact HTML pages that are searchengine and AM friendly.
Some attendees seemed to think that AM is like multilevel marketing (MLM). No, we do not buy anything or sell anything. We place links to merchants on our pages. The visitors click the links but buy from the merchants. We just facilitate this contact and take a commission. The other day I made my highest-ever single commission of US$915, being 10 percent of the item purchased. AM can get addictive.
Proposed Web Site Design SIG
Such was the interest at the AM SIG in learning how to build a Web site, that nearly half the members presented voted to form a new SIG dedicated to Web site development. Barry Andrews has offered to lead this SIG and so an inaugural meeting will be held at Chadstone on Tuesday 24 May from 10.00 am until noon. This SIG will look at building Web sites for all purposes - not just for AM, so it will appeal to many groups of members.
Reprinted from the May 2005 issue of PC Update, the magazine of Melbourne PC User Group, Australia
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