[sf-lug] Status of SF-LUG / Linux meeting(s) @ Noisebridge? & SF-LUG web site (mis?)information thereof

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Michael Paoli (Michael.Paoli at cal.berkeley.edu):

> Seen else-list:
> >To: BerkeleyLUG <berkeleylug at googlegroups.com>
> >Date: Mon, 13 May 2019 23:20:23 -0700 (PDT)
> 
> >1. I think that the one in SF's Mission District was and still is likely to
> >be the Noisebridge hackerspace https://www.noisebridge.net/
> >- According to Noisebridge's events page
> >https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/Category:Events , Noisebridge doesn't hold
> >meetups for Linux any more, even though the main SF-LUG page at
> >http://www.sf-lug.org/ somehow lists these meetup events as actually
> >occuring.
> 
> So ... if the (mis?)information on http[s]://www.sf-lug.org/
> doesn't reasonably accurately reflect what
> SF-LUG and/or Linux stuff is happening at Noisebridge (and especially
> if it says stuff is happening there and it's not - and doubly so
> if it doesn't give information about checking/confirming on/via
> Noisebridge site), then perhaps what's presented on
> http[s]://www.sf-lug.org/
> ought be suitably updated ... perhaps someone who knows the current
> situation at Noisebridge could even inform SF-LUGers (e.g. via the
> SF-LUG list), so those having access to edit the SF-LUG web page(s)
> might make suitable updates if they're not sufficiently accurate.

There was a brief period when the page's claim about a Noisebridge Linux
Discussion meeting 'usually on Wednesday evenings' at Noisebridge's
Turing classroom was kinda-sorta-maybe accurate.  I went a couple of
times -- long years ago.  The first time, I found Maestro and one other
guy poking at some tiny control-less hardware appliance utterly unknown
to me, and the first thing that happened was they both turned to me and
asked me how it worked.  The question was more than a little
dumbfounding.  (Mind you, the page says nothing at all about how to
motivate someone inside Noisebridge to buzz you into the street
entrance, so I had quite a time making a fool of myself on the Mission
Street sidewalk before I could even walk up and find the alleged
Noisebridge Linux Discussion meeting at all.)  The two guys' poking at
the device continued for maybe half an hour, but never resulted in it
doing anything, and at the end ISTR that Maestro revealed the device
being some sort of gadget that imitates and communicates with existing
wireless networks.  Notably absent from this entire session was any
Linux discussion.  Then, everyone wandered off.  As this was my first
visit to Noisebridge, I wandered around the various spaces for another
15 minutes, then went home.

On a subsequent Wednesday, I went again at just barely after 6 pm, and
there was nobody at Noisebridge in the Turing room.  Other people at
Noisebridge (only a couple on that occasion) had no knowledge of a Linux
discussion group.  So, I waited for about an hour, fortunately having
brought reading material, then went home.  I inquired when I next saw
the regulars, and Maestro said (paraphrasing very vaguely from memory)
'Oh, we met for a few minutes and left.'  Having tried twice and found,
on occasion #1, no Linux discussion, and on occasion #2, no people, I
didn't try a third time.

On Jan. 2, 2016, Jim Stockford posted to this mailing list, on a brief
thread with Subject header 'Linux Noisebridge events ... not going on':

  As I'd tho't the notices were down, and because
  the attendance had been zero or one for months, I
  saw no need to email the list or mention cessation
  to the people attending the SF-LUG meetings.

I replied (http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2016q1/011601.html):

  Well, letting BALE and the Google Calendar folks know would have been
  useful, to help them maintain accuracy.

...and immediately removed the recurring item about a Noisebridge Linux
Discussion meeting from BALE.

At the risk of indulging a joke that our excellent friend Jim doubtless
got -really- tired of, fifty-three years ago:  'It's dead, Jim.'  But
also see below.


Magic 8-Ball (http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Linux_PR/newlug.html) says:

   6. You need to make sure that meetings _happen_ as advertised,
   without fail.

   One LUG in my area fell apart largely because the president set an
   aggressive meeting schedule, and then failed to show up to unlock the
   meeting room. Would-be attendees then looked up the next meeting date on
   the Web, showed up, found a locked door, and (soon) give up on the group
   entirely. So, if possible, have multiple people arrange to show up
   early. Also, post signs/flyers near the meeting site.

   If you need to cancel or reschedule an event that you've already been
   advertising as "upcoming", don't simply remove the original listing on
   your Web pages: Continue to list it, _prominently marked_ as 
   cancelled/rescheduled.

That was CCSF LUG, by the way, whose president I politely advised that 
advertising a _weekly_ LUG schedule seemed risky and should be
reconsidered.  She didn't, and the group pretty much immediately fell
apart because people kept showing up and finding nobody, which convinced
them that CCSF LUG maybe _used_ to exist but no longer did, at which
point it became nearly impossible to overcome that impression which
became a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Flash-forward to Feb. 2, 2016.  In an SF-LUG posting around that day, 
Subject header 'SF-LUG Linux Discussion Group at Noisebridge', Joseph
Puig posted:

  I am here at Noisebridge, having arrived at 5:00 p.m.  The
  SF-LUG meeting begins at 6:00 p.m.  The Turing room is available 
  until 8:00 p.m., and I will stay here until that time.

Over super-slow/spotty satellite Internet from a small island 
nine hundred miles south of Hawaii[1], I replied:

  Joseph --

  It's great news that you guys are keeping the Noisebridge Linux
  Discussion Group going.  I hope that a weekly schedule won't prove too
  frequent to keep active and healthy, and too frequent to ensure that
  someone is always there to lead it every Wednesday without omissions,
  and with someone always there for the full two hours.

  If that ever starts becoming infeasible, then please consider switching
  to, say, twice a month.

  (Greetings from Fanning Island.)

(I was with my wife on a long ocean cruise from San Francisco to Sydney,
at the time.  Suffice to say, I was only rarely doing any Internet
access at all.)



I see no sign in the archives that Joseph ever replied to or
acknowleged this advice (not that he was obliged), but the archives show
that he kept the faith for one additional month, and then I _think_ the
one-time Noisebridge Linux Discussion Group dropped off the face of the
planet with no announcement or any other disclosure, explanation, or
anything else.

It's a little bit difficult to tell, because the various online
references to the Noisegroup thing (I mean, mostly, on this mailing
list) were woefully inconsistent about its name.  Some postings about it
mentioned 'Noisebrige' in the Subject header; others did not.  Some
postings' Subject headers referred to it as 'discussion group'; others
referred to it as 'Linux group'.  Which made it difficult to spot as a
group with any defined and consistent name, and equally difficult to
determine for certain whether or not it evaporated.

There are lessons there, too.  {hint, hint}


[1] Fanning Island, now officially Tabuaeran, is a small and sparely
populated, low-lying atoll in the Line Islands, part of the Republic of
Kiribati that encompasses much of Micronesia in the central Pacific.
Fanning's entire existence is now in peril because of sea-level rise,
and its already shaky economy took a huge hit in 2007 because the one
cruise line regularly stopping there, Norwegian Cruise Line (NCL),
ceased doing so.

The reason may be of interest:  Prior to 2007, NCL used a port it
constructed at Fanning/Tabuaeran for tactical economic reasons (a ploy to 
deal with the 'cabotage' laws imposed on non-US-flagged ships).  Quoting 
Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabuaeran#Cruising):

  Tabuaeran was a weekly port of call for Norwegian Cruise Line, who had
  ships based in Honolulu. Due to US federal regulations requiring
  foreign-flagged ships to call in a foreign port, the ships cruised to
  Tabuaeran. It was also more cost effective for the cruise line to visit
  a foreign country than to pay port charges as a consequence of the U.S.
  Passenger Vessel Services Act of 1886.

In 2007, NCL made some changes to its ship lineup and locations so that 
only two ships serving Hawaii remained and both were US flagged, so
their Hawaii cruises no longer needed a 900-mile dogleg to a foreign
port to be profitable, so Fanning ceased to get any NCL business.

More at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabotage#In_shipping