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> I didn't know that there was an Installfest this year, and I might
> have not heard about last year's either.  If people know about Linux
> Quebec and the website, then they might have seen a notice.  But
> if the idea is to get more converts, the message has to be out
> where people who know little or nothing about Linux can see it.

It used to be you'd just whisper "Hey, there's gonna be a Linux Installfest"
and the word would get around. People would print posters and word of mouth
would spread like bush fire.

Unfortunately, this cheerful enthousiam has vanished. People believed they'd
have Linux installed, go back home, and get to work. The problem is the
installation
often ended when the word "Installed" appeared on the screen. The roughest
part remaided to be accomplished: installing the fax or the CD-RW, for
instance.

The user had absolutely no notion of administration. He would forget his
password and be locked out of his computer with boot and root diskettes on
his desk. Pretty soon, messages appeared asking how to remove lilo.

Some time ago, I inquired on L-Q groups about how many people had begun
using Linux after an Installfest. I didn't get one single reply. So I don't
think the problem is publicity, but the way Installfests were run.
For now, only people who persevere are those who expect to spend hour
upon hour fiddling with Linux.

> I saw the "freenet" fail 5 years
> ago, and the people behind it gave plenty of excuses for the failure
> after 4 months, but most people had not known that it had finally
> gone online.  A second group made a second attempt, but they made
> the same mistakes, and rather than start with reaching out, they
> held plenty of meetings to discuss how they could and would reach
> out, at some point in the future.

My experience was more with Communications Accessibles Montréal (CAM). A
small group took hold of the organisation, making sure participation was
just a bogus concept. As far as they could connect, members didn't complain.
They were glad "somebody" took care of business.

But, the personnel, often friends of friends, became utterly incompetent
and, as you probably know, the users sites were washed off the server twice.
Many members then left, the majority for high speed services, and CAM, while
spending a lot on publicity and all kind of foolish projets, had not a cent
set aside for switching to high speed. Today, CAM is only the ghost of
"Montreal's pionner internet provider". (In those first days, CAM was mainly
run by Pascal Gosselin, who, fed up, later started Mlink, a very typical
capitalist company.)

And the worst is nobody seemed to care. For three years, the auditor said he
had no idea of CAM's revenues. He knew the expenses, not the revenues. I
complained to the Ministère des Institutions financières, but I was told
they couldn't care less because, since CAM was a non-lucrative association,
it didn't have to pay taxes. But how the hell did they know it wasn't
lucrative for some people, if they have no idea of the revenues? Gee! What a
bargain for tax evaders those organisations are!

The same happened in the papers. Journalists were giving me their capitalist
credo: when the almighty dollar is not there to control if things go well or
not, organisations are bound to go astray sooner or later.

So, you see, for CAM, the problem was not publicity, it was getting a
critical mass of people involved. It never happened.

I'm afraid the capitalist credo will soon apply to Linux too. What is there
to do? You say there is a problem, a bunch of boy scouts tell you there is
none until it's too late to get things back on track.

GP