Slashdot (Was: Re: County Meeting)

Alan Dayley plug-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
Wed, 10 Jul 2002 14:22:06 -0700


I agree that the rabble can cloud things but there are, IMO, several 
benefits to getting added coverage:

- Someone that could open doors or bring the right skills or whatever needs 
to find us.  The more visible our efforts are, the easier we are to find.
- More coverage shows PLUG as a group that actually does things other than 
getting together and talking.
- A reputation as a group that does things attracts more people to us and 
Linux.
- A reputation as a group that does things makes it easier for vendors to 
take us seriously and sponsor our efforts and events.
- More coverage encourages others to try similar efforts in their areas.
- More ideas flow (granted, bad with the good) when more people hear about 
what we are doing.
- We have seen that the county considers the number of users as 
important.  We need to get the word out everywhere to get our user numbers up.

These all are worth the risk of a few "zealots" that might damage some 
things.  If the majority of the group behaves and presents professionally, 
and these "professionals" stay active, the negative side of things can be 
mitigated.

I asked the question specifically to coordinate the group response.  If 
someone was already submitting the story, I did not want to be a "rabble 
rouser" if it was already being attempted "professionally."

The info on slashdot is not always accurate, that is true.  However, as far 
as tech news goes, it is becoming THE PLACE for news to be.

Alan

At 12:15 PM 7/10/02 +0000, you wrote:
>On Wed, 10 Jul 2002, Alan Dayley wrote:
>
> > Did someone get these links posted into slashdot?
> >
>
>         Well.. why? Yes, it's gotten coverage before but to we really want
>the screaming horde interfering? Please allow me to churn up a little
>history as explanation.
>
>         A bit over a year ago, I was news and content editor for a
>gaming/game review site. During that time, an article hit Slashdot about a
>couple of students from Kent State getting raided by police for 'making
>death threats'. Even though a Slashdot editor had called to get some
>information, from someone involved, he/she still got it all wrong.
>The original post is here:
>http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/02/06/1744205&mode=nested&tid=127
>Take some time to peruse the comments.
>
>         Having journalistic experience, and it being newsworthy for what I
>was doing, I started making calls, and actually wrote a followup. There's
>a short blurb about it in a SlashBack:
>http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/02/13/2153202&mode=nested&tid=99
>but the link to the article no longer works. I spoke with the Kent State
>Police Chief, and he was just shocked at some of the calls he got. Because
>of the misrepresentation on Slashdot, people were calling and just being
>asses because it was presented as a suppression of free speech.
>
>         Long and short, I don't trust Slashdot to get it right, and we
>don't need the horde involved in this. The wrong elements will kick apart
>the whole thing. I gave up my zealotry and can present myself as fairly
>respectable on the issues at hand. Can you say that for Slashdot?
>
>- billn
>
>
>
> >
> > At 09:38 AM 7/10/02 -0400, you wrote:
> > >And at Harvard's Greplaw:
> > >http://grep.law.harvard.edu/article.pl?sid=02/07/10/0619211
> > >
> > >On Wed, 10 Jul 2002, Alan Dayley wrote:
> > >
> > > > The meeting is on the front page a newsforge.net this morning.
> > > >
> > > > Alan
> > > >
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> > |Alan Dayley             www.adtron.com
> > |Software Engineer       602-735-0300 x331
> > |ADayley@adtron.com
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-
/------------------------------------------
|Alan Dayley             www.adtron.com
|Software Engineer       602-735-0300 x331
|ADayley@adtron.com
|
|Adtron Corporation
|3710 E. University Drive, Suite 5
|Phoenix, AZ  85034
\-------------------------------------------