[UbuntuWomen] #Ubuntu-Women Meeting Notes from 11 February, 15:00 UTC

[Elizabeth Bevilacqua]

The log and following notes are available on the wiki:
http://wiki.ubuntu-women.org/Meetings/20070211

= Ubuntu-Women IRC Meeting February 11th 15:00 UTC 2007 =

Meeting began with the usual introductions, attendees were: dinda,
pleia2, ubuntu_newgal, bapoumba, Susana, !NurseGirl

dinda began the meeting asking if anyone was going to
[https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuCon UbuCon] which is being held in NYC on
Friday February 16th.

 * No one else in attendance is able to make it, but dinda will be
  there, and said "It's an "unconference" format but I've offered to 
  lead a BOF session or answer questions about UW or other topics"

 * bapoumba mentioned that there will be an
  [https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuWeeklyNewsletter UWN] announcement
  about it.


Numbers of women in FLOSS were discussed.

 * Has there been a poll since the [http://flosspols.org/ FLOSSPOLS]
  results last year? We do not believe there has been, the official
  number we are standing by is 1.5% of contributers to FLOSS are women,
  slightly higher (around 2%) for Ubuntu specifically.


ubuntu_newgal asked about how she could get involved with Ubuntu
 * pleia2 posted two helpful links on getting involved with Ubuntu
  * [http://www.ubuntu.com/community/participate]
  * [https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ContributeToUbuntu]


dinda is thinking of trying to build something about Women in
FLOSS/Ubuntu-Women for [http://www.ubuntulive.com/ Ubuntu Live] in July

 * dinda mentioned that some of the discussions lately on the
  [http://www.linuxchix.org LinuxChix] mailing lists have offered some
  valuable insights into issues women are facing and how to handle them

 * pleia2 asked "what exactly would your focus be? A general women in
  FOSS? Something more specific about how to help get more
  involvement?"

 * dinda replied "I think I'm looking for more Ubuntu specific ideas"

 * One of the most commonly asked questions regarding projects like
  Ubuntu-Women is why we exist, dinda felt that beginning her
  discussion by answering this would be helpful, pleia2 suggested using
  copy from the [http://ubuntu-women.org Ubuntu-Women.org homepage]

 * dinda suggested "perhaps, one presentation could be a general, "Why
  is there an Ubuntu Women's Project" or similar ...  Short paper or
  presentation on some of the issues the project hopes to address"

 * dinda said "and then the other question that always comes up is, "Are
  men welcome too?"" - some discussions on [http://linuxchix.org
  LinuxChix] of late have also can help with this.

 * Many women have had negative experiences withing FLOSS, dinda asked
  "how can use these experiences to present information to the greater
  community?" her suggestion was to spend a few months collecting
  stories.

   * pleia2 believes that real examples would be important to any
    presentation as it may be hard to "get" the problem without such
    examples

   * bapoumba said it would be helpful to have stories for developers AND
    non-developers

   * !NurseGirl said "I wonder whether there would be a way to compare
    women's experiences in the Ubuntu community with experiences in
    other tech communities"

   * dinda: "Real Women, Real World Experiences in FLOSS/Ubuntu?"

 * dinda: "So if I propose two topics for the Ubuntu Live conference, I
  can count on you folks to help gather materials/stories?"

   * Several in attendance agreed to help out

   * A wiki page will be created in order to gather material/stories


bapoumba brought up the U-W forums.

 * Ubuntu-Women does have a forum outlet:
  [http://ubuntuforums.org/forumdisplay.php?f=76]

 * bapoumba was recently made a mod on this forum - hooray!

 * There was some discussion about general and U-W forum history and
  leadership. Today Ubuntu-Women on the forums and the official
  Ubuntu-Women group have merged and work closely together.


pleia2 brought up the need for Administrative access to the website

 * In the last meeting it was believed that both Robin and Vid had
  access, pleia2 contacted both of them and discovered that Robin no
  longer has access and she has not heard back from Vid

 * both dinda and pleia2 contacted the Community manager at Canonical
  and he suggested the issue be brought to the Community Council

 * It was agreed to bring it up at the next CC meeting, Tuesday February
  13th, dinda added a note about this to
  [https://wiki.ubuntu.com/CommunityCouncilAgenda the CC Agenda],

 * pleia2 said she'd try to make the meeting and ubuntu_newgal was also
  interested in attending.

 * pleia2 will contact the list admins listed on the Ubuntu-Women
  website to make sure they are active as well.

It was decided that the next meeting will be held on Sunday February
25th at 15:00 UTC - this is the same time as this Feb 11th meeting,
please email the mailing list if you have other meeting time
suggestions.

- Lyz/pleia2

-- 
Elizabeth Bevilacqua // Lyz at PrincessLeia.com
http://www.princessleia.com