Hamfest in Ubuntu News; Local Community team ?

[Ben Scott]

On Wed, Apr 30, 2008 at 12:41 AM, Bill Ricker <bill.n1vux at gmail.com> wrote:
> Will GNHLUG be at NEARFEST this weekend ?

  There's nothing official planned, but other than our bored^W Board
meetings, GNHLUG doesn't really have *anything* official.  (Yet.
We're working on that.  But that's a topic for another thread.)
Anyhow, to the best of my knowledge, nobody's bought a table for the
purpose of flying the GNHLUG banner.  If someone wants to, yell, and
you can borrow the GNHLUG banner.  (We actually do have one.  It's
purty.)

  After Hosstraders dissolved, the people who usually volunteered for
hamfest talked it over, and scoped out NEAR-Fest, and reached the
conclusion that as far as brining Linux to hamfest, it was "Mission
Accomplished".  It seemed like everyone we talked to had heard of
Linux, and most people who were interested were already running it,
and most people had high-speed Internet and CD recorders, so
hand-carrying discs wasn't needed so much any more.  With the higher
table fees NEAR-Fest charges (and their non-charity status), we
decided it wasn't worth it anymore.

  It was also reported that the NEAR-Fest organizers seemed to be less
receptive to the computer stuff, wanting to focus more on traditional
radio stuff.  But it's also been reported that they may be coming
around on that score.  I wasn't involved in that last part, maybe
someone who was can speak to it.

  Of course, if you someone wants to show up and spread the word
anyway, that's perfectly fine.  Indeed, more power to you!  :)  There
are prolly still a few attendees who would benefit; we just decided
there weren't enough to be worth it anymore.

  One note: We discovered that if you advertise anything for "free" at
hamfest, you will get cleaned out by people taking seven of everything
just because it's "free".  They might not even own a computer; they
don't care, they see it as a moral imperative to take free stuff.  If
you try to limit to one per person, they'll come around seven times.
We solved this problem by loudly advertising the $1 fee for the discs
we were burning, and keeping the "free" status of the pre-made discs
quiet.

-- Ben