NewTLUG @ LinuxWorld report

[Evan Leibovitch]

As promised, today I met with Plum Communications, organizers of the
LinuxWorld show April 2006 at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. The
intent was to confirm some community activities at the show, and to
clarify some issues in their document regarding non-profit groups.

Despite Colin's email to the organizers attempting to "warn" them about
me, the meeting went well. (As I said earlier, I have a successful track
record for working with trade shows that pre-dates LinuxWorld.) Here is
a summary of what was discussed:

1) There will be a NewTLUG meeting Tuesday April 25 at the MTCC,
coinciding with the show and on the regular day of the month scheduled
for NewTLUG meetings. The show organizers will help to publicize of this
along with their usual conference materials.

2) There will be discounted LPI exams given at the show, as usual.

3) It is confirmed that CLUE will have a booth at the show, as CLUE has
no objections to the current criteria for community groups getting
no-cost space. In addition to promoting its own activities and programs,
CLUE will offer its facilities to any other LUG in the region that needs
a place at the show. (The only one I have spoken to so far is Hamilton,
which will likely have at least a partial presence.)

4) Just as I did not (and never did) claim to represent GTALUG, it is
also the case that GTALUG does not have (and has never had) the
authority to speak or act on behalf of NewTLUG. (This position was
confirmed by consensus at last Tuesday's NewTLUG meeting.) NewTLUG will
have a display at the show, either at a GTALUG booth or (if that is not
available) at CLUE's booth. NewTLUG has already started discussing some
community initiatives which should be fully developed by the time of the
show.

5) As I suspected, the criteria for community groups prohibiting
exhibition of individual member "work" is not designed to prevent
showing of non-commercial projects by LUG members. The main intent is to
prevent commercial activity at community booths which would compete with
vendors who are paying for booth space -- an intent which I fully
support. The organizers are prepared to commit this clarification to
writing if it will help solve any problems.

6) The issue of providing snail-mail addresses was raised. The
organizers pointed out that they were aware of the privacy regulations,
which according to their awareness apply to email and telephone
communications but not printed mail. In any case, they understand that
the Toronto community probably has a very small list of mail addresses
collected, and the lack of such a list is not a deal breaker from their
end for any group.

7) CLUE will probably be participating in the LinuxWorld "roadshow"
which will take a limited version of the show to Montreal, Ottawa,
Calgary and Vancouver during May. The nature of this participation is
yet to be determined.

Anyway, that's it for now.

- Evan

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