[activities] Re: [CTTE] Volunteer to organize social meets for SLUG?

Here's a version to consider:


***********************************************************
SHOTGUN RULES FOR BAD MEETINGS

RULE 1: Each month, the BAD meeting will be on the TO BE DETERMINED BY SLUG of
     the month

RULE 2: Determination for the location for the BAD meeting
     is like calling shotgun for the front passenger seat of a
     car. Whoever calls the location first, wins, and that's where BAD is
     going to be, period. In case of close calls, "first" is determined by
     date received by the list server machine, and ties go to the I
HAVE NO IDEA - SLUG DECISION.

RULE 3: A meeting announcement must be posted by email to the
activities list with
     BAD ANNOUNCEMENT in the Subject header. It must define a time, a location
(with address and/or directions
     by car and public transportation), and use the declarative voice
     ("We are going to..." not "Would you guys like to go to...?"). It
     should not be sent before the previous month's meeting has happened
     (or should have happened).

RULE 4: If you make the announcement, you have to go, you have to be
     on time and preferably early, and you have to make a little sign
     that says "BAD" so people know where they're supposed to sit.

RULE 5: If no one makes an announcement, the meeting will not
     happen. If nobody cares enough to take responsibility and make an
     announcement, and everyone minces around with do-you-think's and
     what-about-this's, we are weak and cowardly and do not deserve a
     lovely meeting together.

RULE 6: Nobody is making you go to BAD meetings. Your
     dialysis machine is not at the BAD meeting. You are not a robot of
     the future who will be stuck in our dimension forever if you don't
     attend the BAD meeting.

     If, for some reason, you cannot make it to the BAD meeting, or you
     don't like where it's being held, or Chinese food gives you an upset
     tummy, then Don't Go, and make a note in your calendar to yourself
     to take some initiative and make the next month's announcement.

RULE 7: In case of SEVERE HAZARD -- for example, the originally chosen
     venue has burnt to the ground or is on fire at the scheduled time
     for the meeting, etc. -- the original organiser should post a new
     announcement according to rule 3, mentioning prominently that it
     is a change.

     The organiser MUST put a sign and/or a human runner at the original
     venue to send people who missed the revised announcement to the
     new location.

That's it. 7 simple rules. The Date Rule, the Shotgun Rule, the Email
Rule, the Organiser Rule, the Have a Spine Rule, the Too Bad For
YouRule, and the System Crash Rule.

Now, as another reminder, here's the non-binding part.

* Good locations for a BAD meeting will have:

     * Food
     * Cheap food
     * Good food
     * Alcoholic beverages
     * Non-alcoholic beverages
     * Access for minors
     * Separate bills
     * Seats for 10-30 people
     * Room to push tables together, or pull them apart
     * Forgiveness for people coming and leaving at will
     * Something for vegetarians to eat
     * Something for carnivores to eat
     * Enough quiet that we can talk
     * Enough loudness that we're not a big distraction
     * Enough light that we can see the network diagrams we're drawing
       on the backs of napkins
     * Access by public transportation
     * Access by car
     * Nearby parking
     * Easy directions

  Obviously, there's no requirement that every location have all these
  things, and most locations won't. And you are the sole determiner of
  where everyone goes: you can call the meeting for a XXX movie
  theater or your own home or a cardboard box under the freeway. But
  it'd be nice to meet these goals.

* Restaurants and cafes that have been historically supportive of our
  cause deserve our business and dollars.

* A good time for meeting is A) late enough that people can get off
  work and drive or ride from their location to the location of the
meeting, and B) not so late that the place is going to close, or
  people have to go home for sleep. Think 7-8PM.

* If you think you know a good place to go, announce it. If you don't,
  shut up. When people post do-you-think's and what-about-this's, it
  clouds the waters and everyone gets confused. So don't do that.

* If for some reason you are far outside the preferred region of the
  meeting, you should think about starting an offshoot group and
  having separate meetings.

* A good meeting attendee will bring money for their share of food and
  drink if they can. If they can't, they will keep their grubby mitts
  off the food and drink. If they share from common food or drink
  (such as pizzas or chips or jug of beer), they will get up, organise
and pay for their round whatever when the current one runs out.  They
will chip in for what they ate, and pay for what they ordered.

* A sample announcement email would look like this:

  ---8<---
  From: Evan Prodromou <[email protected]>
  To: [email protected]
  Subject: ANNOUNCEMENT: B.A.D. Meeting For April 2002
  Date: 24 Mar 2002 08:31:11 -0800

  The B.A.D. meeting for this month will be held at Bar Italia on 10
April  2010 at 2006 Norton Street in Leichhardt Berkeley at
  7:30PM.

  Bar Italia at the corner of Norton and Caeser on the
  Number 17 bus route. It is a 2 block walk from the Inner West Ghost
Tram line station.

  I will be organizing a PGP key-signing. If you want to participate,
  please send me your OpenPGP public key by noon on April 10th.

  See you there,

  ~ESP
  ---8<---

  Note that this message projects authority, it has all important
  information, and it does not use a question mark anywhere in the
  message or subject line.

* There is no shame in announcing the meeting for someplace that
  BAD has already been before. Heck: if it was good enough
  before, it's probably good enough now.

* If you make an announcement, it's entirely possible that NO ONE will
  come. This is the risk you run. You have put yourself on the line,
  and it's within the realm of likelihood that you will spend the
  night lonely and afraid, standing naked in the rain while mutant,
zombie Koalas eat your brains and all of the people you
  have ever had told you had a crushe on point at you and laugh and laugh.

  In short, it will be the worst night of your entire life, bar
  none. If you are prepared for this, any other outcome will be icing
  on the cake.

  If you are not prepared for this, and you send a vituperative and
  bitter email to the BAD list on the Day After, you will look like a
dick, and you will have capped your disastrous event with a bitter and
ugly conclusion. This is not smart, so don't do
  that.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Original by Evan Prodromou 2002
Copyright (c)  2002  Evan Prodromou.

Variation by Patrick Elliott-Brennan 2010.

Distributed under same licence.

Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or
any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no
Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with the Back-Cover
Texts being this copyright notice. A copy of the license is available
at http://www.gnu.org/licenses/fdl.txt.


**************************************************************

>
> On 26 August 2010 08:55, Melissa Draper <[email protected]> wrote:
>> On Tue, 2010-08-24 at 21:32 +1000, James Polley wrote:
>> Might I suggest that interested parties take a gander at
>> http://bad.debian.net/shotgun_rules.txt which I came across recently. It
>> may useful for things lik e'criteria' and 'but I don't want to do it
>> every month!'
>>
>> --
>> Melissa Draper

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