[LGM] Pledgie results [was: LGM-organiser meet in Madrid]

[Femke Snelting]

Hey Alexandre,

>> in my eyes the "proof" lies in how "well" the pledgie did: it has
>> been spread in more channels but no significant results.
>
> It couldn't do any better, but it has nothing to do with organizers' interest.

Also:

- Getting people to donate from Spain was tough due to crisis but also because local platforms such as GOTEO have more traction over here
- Parallel Pledgies see http://lgm2013.titanpad.com/future (line 28)

> Here's some food for thoughts.
>
> 1) Flagship projects that are big parts of LGM lost momentum. They
> don't move forward as fast as the public expects them to (except
> Blender and, recently, Krita). Teams have 3-4 times as little
> participants as they should, dev cycles for Inkscape and GIMP have
> doubled. And given their stance towards paid development people simply
> stopped feeling like giving money to teams is going to fix things (and
> rightfully so).
>
> 2) The very same flagship projects don't participate in LGM as much as
> they could or used to.

Pledgie was indeed less widely circulated by team members/on "flagship" sites than I remember from 2010.
For reference, here's a list of lgm pledgie banner powered sites in 2010 http://lgm2013.titanpad.com/pledgie (I promise to add these sprawling pages to documentation site once available).

On the up-side more new projects, artists and designers showed serious interest in LGM. Most of them paid their own travel but this is not visible from donations.

> Case in point: Inkscape hasn't had team meetings at LGM since what
> year? I'd say, 2010. Latest GIMP or Inkscape workshop was when? I'd
> say 2011.
>
> GIMP team also had nothing new to demonstrate this year. The Q/A
> session would work a lot better if it was a kind of workshop where
> people could come with laptops and ask questions about using tools or
> accomplishing various tasks they have problems with. 7 team members
> who were on stage (+ Jimmac, the 8th) would do a lot more good in a
> workshop. Instead all that attendees got were answers to a couple of
> popular questions, and two questions from audience, one of which
> didn't make any sense whatsoever.
>
> 3) The way LGM is marketed doesn't explain how exactly users would
> benefit from helping teams to meet. Best examples of getting stuff
> done for mutual benefit of teams and users, like LensFun or
> OpenRaster, are _years_ old. Stuff like the recent brushpack file
> format thing would aid that, but LGM has no track record of spreading
> the word about tangible results of the event. In fact, at some point
> in the past LGM page in Wikipedia was on the verge of deletion due to
> lack of verified information about its usefulness (there's some
> special Wikipedia lingo for that, I just can't recall it).

To me we could be more clear about this as an opportunity for users and developers to meet.

> 4) The way information about the event is spread is far, far from
> perfection. I extensively covered that in the "media planning" thread
> back in December, however I didn't do as much work as I could myself.
> Guilty as charged. I think Medialab did a nice job locally, but LGM
> was barely promoted even in major open source media.

Yes. Communication/marketing team (Hong-Phuc, Maria, Mario) will make sure this is not repeated next year. For example, no "global" press-releases was sent because it needed another type of writing than me or local team could provide.

> In fact, the "it has been spread in more channels but no significant
> results" phrase alone explains the failure of Pledgie. It's never
> about quantity. It's about quality and the context.
>
> So there are things that are out of our control, but could be worked
> around, and then there are things we certainly could do if we
> organized our work differently.
>
> OK, the bitching part is over :)
>
> What can we actually do? For this Pledgie -- not much already. For the future?
>
> 1) Keep people updated about outcomes of the event. Think about what
> you could do, how your own team benefited from participating in the
> event, find a way to share it with a bigger audience. Look-up blog
> posts about LGM from attendees and post a press-release with just
> excerpts from blog posts.
>
> Personally, I've one interview in the pipeline, one news item posted
> (today) and some more stuff in plans. I'm also quite sure that Nathan
> has something in the works.

Am working here on reports, stats for 2013 and 2010 (give me a few more days) and preparing material for a sponsoring doc to be written up with Nate. Louis is preparing a feedback form to ask for "testimonials". Some blog coverage still coming up.

> The idea is that the conference is never over until you stop talking
> about it. It's unrealistic to expect people to donate if you try
> maintaining their interest at paying time only.
>
> 2) Plan the media campaign in advance. Talk to online magazines that
> focus on open source and free software and find out if they are
> interested in a cover story.
>
> 3) Talk to online communities about the way they could promote LGM and
> ask them about workshops they would be interested in.
>
> 4) Ask attendees of LGM2013 for feedback: what was great, what sucked,
> what should've happened and was completely missed by organizers. If I
> get it right, you have emails of everyone who attended the conference
> (or, at least, intended to). You can post a poll one the website, mail
> them a link to it and ask for two minutes of their attention.
>
> I guarantee you that even if 30 people answer the questions, you will
> get a much better understanding how LGM went and what was really
> missing. It's a bit late, because things like that are best done on
> the last day of the event or at least within the next 1-2 days of it,
> but it still could work if done fast.
>
> If we end up with Montreal in 2014, we should expect lower attendance
> overall and lower percentage of users. It would be worth thinking
> about a few things:
>
> 1) Whether we should try to get more users and what we should do to
> make that happen.
>
> 2) If we absolutely cannot get more users, then how exactly we should
> market LGM to help the community understand that the event will have
> tangible outcomes for the benefit of all.
  
> That was a long read. Thanks for doing it.

Thank you Alexandre!

F