Agenda for Sunday's Meeting (June 24th) at Phillipes

Events happening in the community are now at Drupal community events on www.drupal.org.
schavester's picture
Posted by schavester on June 22, 2007 at 1:28am

Gus is going to head up the meeting, as I am going to be away in honor of my first wedding anniversary.

It will be a scaled back meeting again. Gus will very casually head up a round table discussion of the following points:

1) Taking on new web/consulting business

Does a team of local(qualified) developers exist? If so, how to organize them.

2) Developing, utilizing, providing local/media-centric tools and solutions -

Are there sound business model(s)? Although some of the development of the community site requires bootstrapping, the products/solutions/consulting could be be offered to clients immediately.

I think these are two great points to chew on for a few hours.

richard

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Comments

Random outline

Posted by gusaus on June 24, 2007 at 10:09pm
gusaus's picture

This meeting will be very freeform - here are a few topics for discussion - we'll see where things go after that -

Based on this post regarding working with other developers/firms on new and existing projects...

  • already some good response from a few developers
  • was contacted by a San Diego based firm, Achieve Internet, about
    • they're looking for qualified developers who wouldn't mind working out of San Diego
    • they have a constant stream of small to mid level jobs that they could refer to qualified independents
  • think there are several other Drupal firms who would refer work to qualified individuals
  • ever increasing demand for Drupal development in general

Having said that, it would be advantageous to form an alliance/develop working relationships with local developers/designers/project managers.

  • The ability to work in close proximity would provide a more hands-on working/learning environment.
  • Target LA centric industries such as record companies, film companies, production houses and other entertainment/media.
  • Become more involved in the diverse communities that Los Angeles has to offer (building a community site(s) as a group project could provide great learning, promote the group/involved individuals and generate additional work).

Could members of this group form some sort of alliance?
Are there enough interested, available, and/or qualified individuals.
If not, could we provide training to developers and designers? Possibly testing and job placement (akin to firms like Aquent)?
How would this be organized? Who could do what?

Will re-organize/fill in the blanks after the meet.

Gus Austin
PepperAlley Productions

Gus Austin

Random show notes

Posted by gusaus on June 27, 2007 at 6:32pm
gusaus's picture

Sunday's meeting was indeeed a roundtable disussion (well, actually rectangular). We had a nice group of regulars as well as some new Drupalers and folks from related fields.

  • Main points of conversation revolved around the 'business/forming working relationships' agenda outlined above.
  • Developing working relationships seemed to be a good idea
  • Finding qualified individuals and training up new talent is essential
  • Crystal has started the planning stages of coordinating DrupalCampLa (early September)
  • Discussed transitioning LADrupal.org into more of a showcase for local Drupal activity
    • spotlight clients/companies using Drupal; showcase Drupal developers and firms; list upcoming Drupal (and other related geek events).
    • job board for people/firms looking for talent
    • a place for developers/designers to list/showcase their skills; match up with other specialists; list their interests, desired fields, and availabilities

So, all in all, it was a very productive meeting. Think we have some solid projects/agendas that anyone interested could get behind. Hopefully we can see some continued/more focused activity between our monthly meetups.

Would be great to get some additonal details/thoughts/feedback/ideas from others who attended the meeting and others who'd like to make Los Angeles more of a Drupal paradise.

Gus Austin
PepperAlley Productions

Gus Austin

collaboration

Posted by steve008 on June 27, 2007 at 6:55pm
steve008's picture

thnx to gus for his efforts. this is the meeting i didn't want to miss but out of town.

i talked a bit at the previous meeting that seemed to bring up some of these business/partner/resource thoughts so would like to stay involved as someone learning drupal and wanting to use it for start up sites that will try to stay afloat and pay its bills. if folks want to hone their skills or work with a team building something please let me know and depending on skill set i am saving some money to compensate where i can. let me know via email if anyone wants to be contacted as projects come up like one i have now whether a pro or newbie like me. and yes yes to DrupalCampLa! thnx, steve

DrupalCampLa

Posted by Chris Charlton on July 9, 2007 at 6:09pm
Chris Charlton's picture

I can ask if we could have DrupalCampLa held at our RMI (Rich Media Institute) facility, in Venice. www.richmediainstitute.com - thoughts?

Also, I suggest we post all events on Upcoming.org, EVDB, and Google Calendar - only to gain more exposure. Then we get iCal/RSS feeds we can consume and pass around.

Chris Charlton, Author & Drupal Community Leader, Enterprise Level Consultant

I teach you how to build Drupal Themes http://tinyurl.com/theme-drupal and provide add-on software at http://xtnd.us