<div>Hi,</div>
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<div>For me, I don't think the two should merge as both groups have different goals; Marketing is setup to evangelise OpenSolaris and its respective technologies to the rest of the 'industry' (used int he most loosest of terms) and to develop dialogue with the user community, which hopefully can then be relayed to the programmers and those who do the design, analysis and implementation - call us the intemediary between the users and the worker bee's.
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<div>What I do propose, however, is for the two to have a closer working relationship, as dialogue between the marketing and user group(s) is necessary for the 'worker bee's' to know what customers want, who current sit outside the Sun 'customer list' - the end users *could* pass long requests directly, but the better way would be for us to consolidate the issues into one voice so that there is a consist voice with a matrix of issues that concern them.
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<div>End users will also be able to help provide feed back on the effectiveness of marketing on 'the unwashed masses' - whether the right avenue's are being used to market OpenSolaris given the market demographic which we are trying to aim for - if we're trying to aim for CIO's, is it smarter to market on Slashdot or the coffee magazine which the executive has at their coffee table?
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<div>Matthew</div>
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<div><span class="gmail_quote">On 03/04/07, <b class="gmail_sendername">Bruno F. Souza</b> <<a href="mailto:Bruno.Souza@sun.com">Bruno.Souza@sun.com</a>> wrote:</span>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid"><br>On the UG community, we could include the Mkt content as a clearly<br>separated, on the top, and merge it with any general content for
<br>supporting the creation and run of UGs.<br><br>The question then becomes: if someone comes looking for OS User<br>Groups, they will know how to find. Now, if someone comes looking for<br>material to promote OS? Will they find it at the UGs Community? Will
<br>this be obvious?<br><br>Bruno.<br><br>On 03/04/2007, at 00:41, Xin-Feng Liu wrote:<br><br>> I agree on the idea.<br>> The only comment is to make sure not to lower the visibility of<br>> marketing community/contents. In the current user_group home page
<br>> (on the<br>> left side of the screen), the user group list is too long and not very<br>> easy to look up. It might be better to reorganize the content in that<br>> screen section.<br>><br>> Thanks,
<br>> Xinfeng Liu<br>> Shanghai User Group<br>><br>><br>> Jim Grisanzio wrote On 2007年04月03日 11:25,:<br>>> Hello ...<br>>><br>>> I'd like to propose that we merge the Marketing Community and the
<br>>> User<br>>> Group Community:<br>>><br>>> <a href="http://www.opensolaris.org/os/community/marketing/">http://www.opensolaris.org/os/community/marketing/</a><br>>> <a href="http://www.opensolaris.org/os/community/os_user_groups/">
http://www.opensolaris.org/os/community/os_user_groups/</a><br>>><br>>> It seems to me that both communities could benefit from a merger --<br>>> especially under the new OpenSolaris Constitution. Both<br>
>> communities have<br>>> many things in common -- they engage new people around the world via<br>>> various programs and direct meetings and conferences, their list<br>>> memberships are pretty similar, and they share some content as
<br>>> well. It<br>>> would seem to make sense that they merge to focus their resources on<br>>> some common goals and under a new name.<br>>><br>>> I'm starting this conversation here so we can flush out the issues
<br>>> and<br>>> agree (or not agree) before we go to the website team and the OGB,<br>>> both<br>>> of which will have to be involved in any merger.<br>>><br>>> So, any thoughts pro or con?
<br>>><br>>> Jim<br>><br>> _______________________________________________<br>> ug-discuss mailing list<br>> <a href="mailto:ug-discuss@opensolaris.org">ug-discuss@opensolaris.org</a><br><br>Bruno.
<br>______________________________________________________________________<br>Bruno Peres Ferreira de Souza Brazil's JavaMan<br><a href="http://www.javaman.com.br">http://www.javaman.com.br</a>
bruno at <a href="http://javaman.com.br">javaman.com.br</a><br> if I fail, if I succeed, at least I live as I believe<br><br><br><br>_______________________________________________<br>opensolaris-mktg mailing list
<br><a href="mailto:opensolaris-mktg@opensolaris.org">opensolaris-mktg@opensolaris.org</a><br></blockquote></div><br>