Ubuntu Marketing resurrection and SpreadUbuntu, Karmic Release in Norway, Ubuntu Open Week in Spanish – Update

Ubuntu Marketing Team revival and SpreadUbuntu

The Ubuntu Marketing team has existed for ages but has been a little unstructured, lacked a vision with a path of action and thus its potential has not been reached this far. Some good project have been created there (The Fridge and the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter being the greatest examples) but it’s been a long time since some palpable progress has been made. And that’s just sad, because we can make this team suck less and produce more.

Now, as the Ubuntu Community matures, the team seems to be gaining traction again and people, oldies and newcomers, are all excited about it! As a person that has been part of the team exactly since one year after its creation (October th 20th, 2005)  I have to add myself to the excitement!

As a sign of frustration with the lack of productivity of the team I decided to put my time, sweat and tears where my mouth is and took upon myself making a reality one of the oldest projects the Marketing team has had in mind: Spread Ubuntu. But in this, as with everything in life, wishes are not enough and my lack of time, technical know-how and Drupal/PHP knowledge could not take me that far. I had to get some hardcore web guru to join me. And lucky, and sometimes too vocal and loud, as I am I got some people interested. One of them, my man echowarp, aka now Ubuntu Member Evan Boldt, got really into the idea of Spread Ubuntu. His Drupal ability, technical insight and innovative self made in the end the Spread Ubuntu site a reality. Evan, you really are my Ubuntu Community Hero®! I will never get tired of saying that!

With the raise of SpreadUbuntu as a Marketing Team project and its potential as a central marketing tool for LoCos and newcomers alike the marketing team seems to finally have aligned itself with the spirit of the global Ubuntu community and has now gained a place in its awareness 🙂 Things are moving along fast this time and ideas, contributions and initiatives are flourishing like they never before have!

So, if you are interested in fixing Ubuntu’s bug #1 reported by Mark Shuttleworth or have a deep desire to see the whole planet (as in Earth and the SpreadUbuntu logo) Ubuntized here and now is the time to get yourself involved and get things rolling!

To stay updated join the Marketing Team list and the SpreadUbuntu team and mailist. You can read more about the team reorganization (sign yourself up to the list) and come to our meeting starting the 12th of November at 2400 UTC (1900 EST), follow the Marketing Team Round Table under the Lucid UDS and join the meeting the week after (Date and time TBD).

These are exciting times!

Karmic Release in Norway

The Ubuntu 9.10 release got so much attention in the Norwegian IT media that I must say the phenomenon is unprecedented!

See a compilation of media links in the wiki of the Norwegian LoCo team.

As if that was not enough: Ubunter@s in Norway are starting to get involved in the development of the team like never before and we are right now working on a reorganization of the Team itself and also revamping our web presence! Which really is for me a dream that comes true! We are talking about an Ubuntu Jam before Christhmas and what not!

To follow the development of these discussions join the Norwegina LoCo forum, our mailing list and/or our chat on #ubuntu-no @ the FreeNode IRC network.

Besides those new I have to say that I am impressed by the speed of the CD delivery to our LoCo team this time around. We received the Ubuntu 9.10 – Karmic Koala CDs 5 days after the release! Thanks Canonical! 🙂

Ubuntu Open Week in Spanish

Just to round up the Spanish-speaking Ubuntu community has managed to keep an alternative UOW for those that can’t speaking English but still want to learn more about our favorite distro and its community.

Many people have stepped up and held sessions all week. I, for one, have talked about Launchpad (Wednesday), Gnome (Thursday) and will hold a talk on SpreadUbuntu today for the Spanish community!

If you want to join please come to our chat rooms @ FreeNode or visit our page on the Ubuntu Wiki.

Special thanks go to Leandro Gómez and the whole Ubuntu CentroAmérica gang. Thanks for taking a hands on approach to this and just making it happen!

I Am Happy

I am so happy and excited about being involved in all of this that I just had to share it with the world! Thank you everyone for being part of this great Ubuntu Community.

We rock!®

And besides that I am very happy and excited about my new job too. It’s just great working with nice and competent people! 🙂

It’s Friday! Life couldn’t be better!

~ by huayra on 2009 November 6.