[UbuntuWomen] On becoming an Ubuntu Member

[Alan Bell]

interesting graphs, personally I am unsure of what the long term target
should be, or how long would be appropriate to get there. I do think
that short term targets should be achievable and set by the group. The
modal duration from creating a launchpad profile to becoming a member
appears to be 450 days. Putting efforts in place to reduce this to
something like 6 months might have a beneficial effect. (much less than
a full release cycle would probably cause more churn of members than is
desirable). I think we can assume all members counted are active,
membership does expire if not renewed and that process is in place and
we should use it rather than invent a new definition of what an active
member is. Avoiding loss is a good strategy - efforts to reengage with
those approaching expiry might be a worthwhile activity for the group to
consider.

I am unconvinced that an open letter or loud discussion of bad behavior
will be a positive contribution towards any of the objectives that I
want the group to achieve. I think it is best to praise loudly and
criticise quietly. Other opinions are available.

I suspect slightly accelerated gradualism is the way forward, but the
specifics of it are for the group to decide upon. As luck would have it
there is a meeting in just over two hours in #ubuntu-meeting. The bits
at the top of the agenda and the discussion of the matters arising from
UDS are the important parts of the meeting but if time permits then this
topic may get some discussion at the end, if not, then perhaps at the
next meeting.

Alan.

Jonathan Niehof wrote:
> I've jumped off from Alan's analysis on the wiki with plots of where
> we might go with some seemingly reasonable growth targets.
> http://wiki.ubuntu-women.org/UbuntuMembers#line-43
>
> My inferences:
> -Gradualism will not do the job in a reasonable timeframe. (although
> the sorts of strategies that would feed a gradual increase may be
> useful for sustaining after a crash-growth project.)
>
> -Even if it were otherwise desirable to treat this as a "problem for
> women," the sheer weight of numbers means a significant fraction of
> men need to be involved. Further extrapolating: those of us men who
> already believe this is an important issue need not only to encourage
> women and discourage bad behaviour from men, but also convince other
> men to do the same. (Would Yet Another Open Letter have any effect?)
>
> I guess none of that is particularly surprising.
>
> Are there reasonable numbers on what fraction of members remain
> active? (Maybe based on last login to LP?) I've experienced a couple
> of projects where focus on new participants resulted in a serious loss
> at the other end, as long-term contributors felt less valuable.
> Avoiding that loss is another "growth" strategy.
>
>