[MeeGo-community] Nudging the Community Device Program

[Quim Gil]

On Wed, 2010-12-08 at 11:35 +0100, ext Dave Neary wrote:
> My least favourite methods (because lowest ROI as far as I can tell) are
> giveaways where either (a) all attendees at a conference/session get a
> device

Same here. This has been an interesting approach for a while but it is
not sustainable. Some reasons:

- It creates an expectation around events, making a % of people to
register only to see if they get a cool new device for free. A potential
remedy for that is to set registration filters (e.g. a fee) but the
'solution' only brings new problems.

- It distorts the event itself, since distributing new devices for all
attendees is not simple, and many of them pay more attention to the new
toy than the event activities.

- It discriminates the vendors that can't afford such marketing budget.

- Of course it discriminates those not able to attend the event.

- Also, what happens when the MeeGo platform is successful and you have
several vendors with new products every quarter?


On the other hand it is convenient to take some advantage from events,
since in one go they can save a lot of boring shipping logistics and
there is some marketing potential that a company has when being able to
address the recipients face to face in a session, a booth, etc. And vice
versa, the recipients also have a chance to ask questions and provide
direct feedback to the generous donor of that interesting hardware.

Relating devices with training sessions makes sense. Competitions are
also a way to proof who has the skills and the interest to create
something. Then for platform development you have maintainers and
contributors that can be identified through the project structure and
tools. Testing, L10n etc also have tools allowing to map who is actually
making a useful contribution and where.

The Community Device Program can be of big help not only bringing the
right devices to the right contributors, but also keeping the MeeGo
events clean from this increasing gadget desire pollution.

--
Quim