[Chicago] Community/Social Alliance Help

[Brian Curtin]

On Wed, Feb 5, 2014 at 1:49 PM, Brian Ray <brianhray at gmail.com> wrote:
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> On Wed, Feb 5, 2014 at 12:41 PM, Brian Curtin <brian at python.org> wrote:
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>> I really dislike a lot of things about this email.
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> Please take a second look at our mission. Constructive criticism is accepted; however, how many outside observers (those who do not attend meetings regularly) should dictate how this group operates.

Is there an explicit mission statement page somewhere? I re-read the
chunk of text at the top of http://www.chipy.org/ which says things
like "focused on Python" and "open to all levels", and the
http://www.chipy.org/about/ page reiterates the same things, and says,
"open to all of all proficiency and experience levels."

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>> While I completely understand and appreciate point B, point A goes against what a user group is typically there for: to be a group for people who use a certain thing. I've never heard of anyone not sharing their announcements with other groups because "we didn't need it." Who is the "we" in "a group of Python using people located in Chicago" that didn't need it?
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> We did not need it because we already had a community outreach into areas like Universities because we would tell them about meeting. We would have department heads in CS groups mention the user groups and students would attend. They do not attend as often now as they once did. This is only one example of something we would like to have the Community manager fix.
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> The other reason we did not need it is we started to see someone was doing it already for us. Our outreach needs improvement. We have a loyal core; however, there are several times you will meet someone using Python in someone interesting areas in Chicago who had no clue ChiPy even exists.
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>> I agree that that ChiPy should take a swing at wider dissemination of news again, but "quality over quantity" is again missing the point. Plus, what does that even mean? What is a quality group versus a non-quality group? Why does it matter what one person thinks about the quality of the group with respect to them showing up and watching or speaking at a meeting? Is there a reason why you wouldn't send news to a group you deem to be more of a quantity than a quality?
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> We do not agree in filling chairs with people just for the sake of it.

People want to learn so why not let them sit in a chair? Is there
something special about this group that you should have to be more
than just a seat filler in order to come?

FWIW, I've come to plenty of meetings just for the sake of it. I had
nothing else going on, I was completely uninterested in the topics of
the night, and I figured "eh, I guess I could go to ChiPy." Should I
have stayed home?

> We still are waiting for the day someone brings a snake to our Python Meetup.

A snake enthusiast once showed up to a meetup either in Ireland or
Italy if I remember correctly.

> We like being a bit of an insider group.

Who is "we"? I certainly don't like this. It's very "old boys
club"-ish, something I haven't seen from any other user group.

> More than half of the attendees to our meeting are there without knowing any Python, then we run into a chance of becoming too novice to be interesting to advanced users.  In turn, if we don't bring in new users, we become so advanced you need a PhD in Computer Science just to follow the presentations or discussions. We need to remain diverse.

So we're going to remain diverse by being an insider group? That
doesn't make much sense to me.

PyCon has to solve this same issue each year, of making sure it's a
big meetup that everyone can attend and get something out of. The only
hard limit is that we can't seat more than about 2,000 people before
it becomes a fire hazard and the conference center fines us...but
other than that, if you want to go, you can go, and you can learn from
it. There's a balance of beginner/intermediate/advanced topics, and we
steer that from the stage, not from the audience or who we email about
it. It's one of those "if you build it, they will come" type things.

I've long thought ChiPy has had an organizational problem, but *most
user groups do as well* -- this isn't intended to be a knock on Brian
or anyone else involved. I'm one of the PyCon organizers and we have
plenty of problems as well. It's a largely thankless volunteer task
taken on by one or a few people, but as someone who follows every
possible user group mailing list, Google Group, and Meetup group that
is in some way related to Python, they all need more input from more
people, and they could probably use more hours in the day as well.

If we need to remain diverse, one of the best ways I've seen to build
that is to reach out to more speakers. Without speakers, you don't
have attendees. This is something not only a Community Leader can do,
it's something every single person on this list can do. Are you using
Python? Yes - you can speak at ChiPy. Is your friend using Python? Yes
- they can speak at ChiPy. Did you learn Python yesterday? You're
probably excited about learning something new, and I'll be damned if
you don't have something cool to share with us - you can speak at
ChiPy. Right now this list has probably 200 talks lined up and we just
don't know it.

If this is going to move forward, I think it really has to move
forward more openly. For a monthly group, what does it matter if its
heavy on beginners for a while? If that actually matters to someone,
it'll eventually balance out in a few months when some of them become
intermediates. Isn't this what people are showing up for in the first
place? To learn and share?

What does the mission statement say about that?