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Local Meet: Capacity building and Marketing
Only 7-8 turned up. Much talk about marketing and an install fest, but I feel the issues are still the same. Very small active community. While the community is large, the active community isn't. Similar issues is lack of commitment and also thoughts on marketing.
Warning: Rant.. skip to capacity building and marketing if you're not Malaysian
More on commitment. I gave up a Friday night with my wife, and a UNDP reception for this, because Jason Lim aka Filex announced and organized it 2 weeks in advance. That's how things work in the rest of the world. You commit to something early, plan for it and stick with it. Not make changes at the last minute. Similarly if I had earlier events booked on that night, then I wouldn't have been able to attend this myoss meetup.
I'v seen this Malaysian attitude again and again. The last one was the RMS talk where people wrote about coming, then didn't show up. Until that changes, I personally feel, that any community activity will always be limited. We are still a community of what is somebody doing for me, not what can I do for the greater good. Even the simple act of confirming for a 2 hour social event appointment 2 weeks in advance, is too tough a task for Malaysians. Imagine if this was a larger event, where Filex might have booked a large room and refreshments and nobody turned up?
Capacity building and marketing
As for marketing and capacity building, they are partly related. For the short term, I think the lack of marketing by FOSS companies is because demand is now outstripping supply. So at the micro level, this isn't being pushed much, however as I'm removed from this situation, I don't feel that I'm qualified to talk on this too much. Somebody running a local open source business is better suited to give their views.
On a macro and long term level however, steps are being addressed. Without capacity (ie skilled workforce) it is difficult to employ FOSS solutions. This can be addressed via providing free training materials for end-users and for system administrators. Additionally SMEs need to be aware of who to hire to help support and maintain their Linux servers and software. At least there needs to be a minimum professional skills standard standard that SMEs can look forward to. Students and IT professionals also can now know the skill sets and recognized certification that they should aim for. IOSN here is working with LPI as well as the FOSS community to help provide affordable certification as well as free training materials. Look forward to more on this soon from IOSN.
