🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Dec21.192821.5210@tin.monsanto.com>, lesnyd@monsanto.com (Larry
E. Snyder) writes:
>As a Decus member (true, I have a DCS account, but, gosh, I think I'm still
>_in touch_ as the saying goes) my major concern is _What does DECUS provide
>me that is of value_? 

Good article. Larry presents the point of view of a particular DECUS member. As
a counterpoint to his concerns, I'll present some of my own. The differences
will illustrate just how hard a job it is to satisfy the broad base of
membership of DECUS. Perhaps it will also serve to make a few of the points I've
been hammering on: 1) we need better communication at all levels of DECUS to
hope to address such diverse concerns, and 2) there is no single solution that
fits everybody, so instead of trying to find it, we should address multiple
solutions towards varied groups of users and let them participate however works
best for them.

>I'll be honest, DECUS representation on standards
>committees is NOT one of the benefits of the organization. [...]

Personally, I consider standards the way of the future in this industry, or at
least the part of it I expect to inhabit. I enjoyed the standards reports, in
that they tended to tell me more than the trade press. I'd like to have had more
input, but that again is a communications issue. Having talked to several of the
standards reps, I know they were very open to input, and actively sought it out
at symposia. The standards process itself is part of the communication problem,
since you can't post many standards documents to the net, or put them on
DECUServe, or include them in newsletters (and they are way to large for that
anyway).

>I don't believe DECUS can afford to send people all over North America and
>the world any more. 

You mean like to woods meetings? :-)

>DECUS, like DEC itself, got fat during the boom years,
>but now someone has to pay the piper. 

A serious issue, of course, and one that bears some discussion. Personally, I
don't know what else money gets spent on. I suspect (and it is only that) that
the money to be saved could be saved on things that I, personally, would
consider less important than standards. For instance, even when I do go to
symposia I don't go to the fancy reception, so we could kill that. I have
serious doubts about all those woods meetings. But again, that's just one
person's opinion.

>Let's look at what I as Joe Member get
>from DECUS:
>
>1. As a normal member, I can attend LUG meetings and get information there.
>   That's where the majority of information should be, since many of the
>   people at a LUG meeting can never attend a symposium. From what I've
>   seen, LUGs are left to fend for themselves, and many don't do well at it.

My nearest "local" user's group is 125 miles from me. I'm reasonably sure there
aren't enough DEC users in my area to create a LUG (I think I'm the only one in
town, the only other one in the area I know about is a military base.)
Logistically, to attend a LUG meeting I have to leave work early, drive 4 hours
round trip, and I don't get to bet till midnight or 1am. I've gone to a few, but
it is just way to much hassle unless the program is particularly interesting
(I'm on 2 LUG mailing lists, 125 miles away (KC) and 150 miles away (Wichita)).

On the other hand, I'm fully plugged into the net, so _I_ think that that's
where the majority of the information should be. There's no better way of
spanning geographical boundaries.

>2. As a normal member, I can attend the national symposia. Trouble is, 
>   registration is now well over $600, and symposia are at high-dollar
>   hotels in high-dollar cities. Please forego the arguments about
>accomodating
>   a zillion attendees, negotiated rates, etc. It's a simple fact that a
>   symposium now runs about $1600 to attend. This explains why attendance
>   is going down. There is good information at a symposium, and the DEC
>   presence has always made it worthwhile. But it's expensive.

I have no trouble at all convincing my employer that symposia are worth the
money. Unfortunately, I can't always afford the week off, due to scheduling, but
I've never been denied going for any other reason. And yes, $1600 is in line
with what I've paid (or a little low). 

>3. Hmmm. Can't think of anything else I get out of DECUS. DECUServe, I guess.
>   And I can buy cute novelty items with the DECUS logo.

I don't use DECUServe, and can't conveniently do so. For that reason, I can't
honestly justify to my management to pay for it. A similar service based on news
and available over the net, or even dial-up uucp, I could justify and pay for.

>I believe that DECUS needs to have regional symposia, complete with DEC
>representation, at a substantially reduced cost. Some way of facilitating
>information exchange without the enormous scale of a national symposium.

Unfortunately, the size of a symposium is one of its major benefits. The more
people you have, the more information exchange there is. If we had 2 symposia
instead of one, and provide all the same sessions at each, you double the
expense to both DECUS and DEC. Even if you could get DECUS to do this, DEC
wouldn't. So what would happen is that each would have fewer sessions, thus
reducing their value. 

Because of logistics, they probably wouldn't be simultaneous. Since sessions are
given by volunteers, each regional symposium would have different (and fewer)
sessions, so to get all the content you get from one national symposium, you'd
have to attend several regional symposia, and it would cost more, not less. Of
course, few people could actually attend several, so you'd gain less. Besides,
what do you really save by having regional symposia? Just part of the airfare.
Granted, that's a big part of the cost, but not the majority. You gain less for
less cost. That's a judgement call that different people will make differently.

There are already regional symposia (I get mailings from the Rocky Mountain Vax
LUG). They offer considerably smaller programs than a national symposia. Such
regional symposia will not replace a national symposia.
--
Terry Poot <tp@mccall.com>                   The McCall Pattern Company
(uucp: ...!rutgers!depot!mccall!tp)          615 McCall Road
(800)255-2762, in KS (913)776-4041           Manhattan, KS 66502, USA