I would rather see meetups set up around Drupal topics rather than location -- maybe a Developers meetup or one for Themers, or have a meetup about Views or theming views or creating modules or discussions about CCK versus taxonomy or how to use Devel to its max potential, or my current love, mobile/Services connections.
With our traffic-challenged LA area, we could consider using GoToMeeting or an open source webinar software to create virtual meetups concerning a topic for a 2-hour meetup on a evening. Have one or two half-hour presentations about the topic at hand, and then allow an hour for any questions pertaining to the topic or presentation where anyone could answer and share Drupal knowledge. Let the virtual meetup take its own shape and direction from the participants. And these could be recorded for future reference and placed in an archive for LA users like on LADrupal.org.
In addition, have it open so anyone could put together a meetup -- no need for overall organizers or leaders -- and have an event calendar on LADrupal.org announcing the various topic meetups.
Location meetups have their uses so you can connect a face to her/his posts, and I note most of you guys like to socialize together. I want to talk Drupal, share and teach what I know about Drupal and learn as much as I can from those that are more knowledgeable.
Joyseeker (Susan)
Comments
Your requests have been met?
Hi Susan,
Welcome. In your case, welcome back again. We talked at media temple, last week.
I've heard rumors the Burbank Meetup covers theming a lot. The Old Town Pasadena meeting was last night, Inland Empire is tonight, last week was Westside/Main and LA Downtown meetups, as well as the D7 Book Study Group covering php coding for module building.
In my many years of arranging meetings, I've always found it far easier, to spend my time looking for speakers, and let them choose their fav topics. I have not advised setting the topic and finding a speaker for that one topic for over 14 years now.
Volunteer time is precious, and "speaker getters" are highly valued members. We need a half dozen now. Anyone? Is an easy gig. 1-2 hours a month and well worth your time.
My recommendation is volunteer to find speakers for the local volunteer organizer/member whose meeting location nearest you, as it's most convenient for your attendance.
Find speakers for your local meeting. Half the time the topic will be one of your druthers.
Volunteer effort is all about ROI, bang for the volunteer hour spent. Thus, reduced travel time, and finding speakers for the nearest 'current' venue is a good return on one's volunteer efforts. Try everyone!!!
Live webcasting has always been possible. Several members have enough bandwidth to mirror streams, so we could roll our own. It's far easier for a member to step up, volunteer to do the first streaming event, arrive early, get assistance with network connections, set up microphone and speakers, to a laptop (the volunteer can bring their own, or ask well ahead of time to "borrow" one).
Many meetings are recorded (screen cast with sound), and the links are available, courtesy of one of our volunteer organizers, John Romine.
We are open. That's how so many meetups formed in the last two years. Attendees saw how the LA Drupal User Group was run, over one to many years, and decided to locate a venue and have a meeting closer to them. Several are in member's work offices. No driving involved. That's convenient!
How to run a meeting? Just post your event's location, date and start time. There are many other factoids to include an event post, so using an existing announcement, and replacing the details with yours, is the best, easiest, most bang for the volunteer hour spent.
That said, I know for a fact, that every new meetup in SoCal was first coordinated, on a volunteer basis, with the oldest LA Drupal User Group "volunteer member/organizers", so all organizers would not step on anyone's toes, like two places arranging to have their first meeting, on the same evening, a few miles from each other, ... that would restrict attendance. I recommend arriving early, and talking with every organizer, and let them know you are looking for a venue, and have picked a day of the week, yes, you must have 4-5 meetings a month, now, to start a new LA meeting... NOT! You can have just one. Get your toes wet. There is no need to commit to more than one.
Have a Drupal Cafe for your first event. Why? Find out who lives near you, and solicit their aid in finding a venue, and perhaps changing the night of the month for the event. Or weekend. Be inventive. Ask for assistant organizers, counselors.
There is one area were a request of yours is not happening, "you -guys- like to socialize together" - the more the merrier!!! Every person, gal or guy, is assured their personal safety while with the group, and will never be alone going back to their car. Just ask any organizer who is that's night volunteer escort. We have many. Just ask. Leave any time, always with someone. Ask me!
I've learned more Drupal at After Darks than during meetings. Why? My questions of the week get explicit answers during these "socialize" events. Followed with listening to 4-5 other members getting answers.
Do join an After Dark. There is no 'time limit', and no food or drink requirements. No cover charge. Some come for 30 minutes, ask their questions, and leave with a smile! Be one!
Pete
Peter
LA's Open Source User Group Advocate - Volunteer at DrupalCamp LA and SCALE
I'm not getting it...
Sorry in advance if my post seems to be going in multiple directions at the same time.
I've seen some of the meetups have themes (be it module related or theme related or whatever else related) and I know some of the meetups in the past had the BoFs going at the end of the meetup so people could talk about something they wanted to learn more about with other like minded folk. Maybe its time to revisit that?
As far as doing things online, I am personally not all that big on it. I have done the online webinars, done the whole Drupal Dojo thing and frankly, I find going to the meetups 'in person' more fulfilling. But that's just me and I can't speak for the whole group. But Drupal Dojo does do things like this and it might be worthwhile to check that out.
Getting on topic, I'll agree on the presenter issue with Pete - it is hard to get a presenter (and to a larger extent, new presenters) to talk about something, let alone something specific. Personally, I feel that if you want to talk about that something specific with people, then you have to step up and do the legwork. I wanted to talk about content migration with folk. So I put it out there to the group if that was a presentation they were interested in. And I got folk to talk about it afterwards. Did I work? Absolutely! Same thing with 'hacking' core and display suite and anything else I have ever talked about.
As far as I can tell, putting up new meetups (virtual or physical - Nicole did a presentation a few months ago that was cast live via gotomeeting. There was also the git presentation last year done in the same format) also isn't difficult (or is creating events closed? I never checked). If creating the events is an issue, then creating a discussion to get an event settled on also works. I wanted to patch some things in core, so I created a discussion about it. And that seems to be working pretty well so far. The group layout facilitates everything you're asking for. Except for a being to actually step up and do something about it. I find it that if you want it, you need to lead it. If you want to talk about mobile and/or services, then lead a group meeting on it. Or lead a discussion on it. Others will follow.