Re: critics about our presence at LinuxTag 2004

On Thu, Jul 01, 2004 at 12:32:19AM +0200, Axel Beckert wrote:
> Hi!
>
> Altough I wasn't Debian Booth Staff this time (but Symlink Booth Staff
> :-), I would also like to comment some of the mentioned points and add
> some of my own points.
>
> Especially I'd like to show that not everything has to be perfect.
>
> General question: What was the goal of the booth? Was it to inform?
> Was it to show presence? Was it to sell merchandising stuff? (BTW: Who
> does also immediately start to think of the movie "Space Balls",
> everytime the word "merchandising" is read or heard? :-) Was it to
> meet other Debian people? Was it to let visitors see the faces of the
> people behind Debian? Was it to see what people who use Debian look
> like? Was it to show, that Sarge will be ready soon? To have fun? I
> guess, the goal was a bit of everything.

Thanks. I've been trying to get people to think about that in the past
(without much success).

I have the feeling that currently, the focus is on a specific brand of
"professionalism". Presenting Debian, presenting the distribution, selling
merchandise.

What I miss is a discussion on what the booth should present... what face
should Debian have, what face *does* it have?

Like, why is it considered bad if people are seen hacking in the booth?

> On Tue, Jun 29, 2004 at 12:23:04AM +0200, Alexander Schmehl wrote:
> > Possible solution: Threw those who aren't assigned as booth personal,
> > out of the booth. There was an internet Cafe with tables and net-access
> > in the Stadthalle. You could have worked there.
>
> IMHO any solution, which is forcing people to leave, is a bad
> solution. If it's crowded, it's crowded. And maybe the booth to small.
> Maybe a booth twice as deep could help. Front area for assigned booth
> staff, back area for others... Worked very well at Symlink, although
> we didn't have any assigments regarding booth staff. ;-)

Debian booths didn't have that in '99 and 2000. I didn't see the need
then. Some people did and do.

And yes, if it's crowded, it's crowded. Usually, that's a sign of a popular
booth. And 99% of *visitors* will take it that way. (To be clear: it's a
positive sign).

> Better solution: Get some female booth stuff next year.

s/stuff/staff/, right? ;-)

Bye, J

-- 
                            Jürgen A. Erhard
                 Invasion!  http://invasion.jerhard.org
              Linux - Free PC Unix (http://www.linux.org)
             Explicit is better than implicit -- Tim Peters

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