[MeeGo-community] Regional MeeGo Networks - guidelines?

[Jarkko Moilanen]

Hi,

I've been working with the issues related to Regional MeeGo Summits for about two months now; trying to define how those should be handled, monitored and such. I've been writing my notes to wiki while advancing with the MeeGo Summit FI, which will be held 15-16th Apr 2011 in Tampere. During this process two Finnish Local MeeGo Networks joined forces (to organize the summit) and formed MeeGo Network Finland (Regional MeeGo Network, RMN). I know that RMNs have not been introduced in any communication or meetings in MeeGo community. Anyway, it seemed as natural way to organize our Local MeeGo Networks under some kind of umbrella. I have started to write sort of guidelines howto organize & run RMNs and how Regional Summits are related to it. The content for the guidelines is derived from existing efforts and activities in Finland. 

The idea is to make use of and share our efforts and experiences. We have dealt with a bunch of issues already and a lot will be confronted in the future. Even though we like to be in the frontier (where no man has gone before), we do not want others to face similar situations in the future if it can be avoided. 

We are organizing the first Regional MeeGo Summit and we are beginning to organize our activities in regional level to join efforts and forces between local networks. This need to organize forces in regional level became obvious to us, when the Summit planning really got started. We see that the Summit should not be planned or organized only by one local MeeGo network, such as Tampere or Helsinki. Instead the summit should be a joined community-driven effort. So far two of three local networks, Helsinki and Tampere, form the RMN. We wish that the third network, Oulu, would also join us in the future. Also any other local networks in Finland are welcome. 

I have created a wiki page for RMNs (http://wiki.meego.com/Regional_MeeGo_Networks) and the intention is to gather RMN related information and guides under that page. One of the guides is how to organize a Regional MeeGo Summit in your area. Currently the guides/guidelines are rather limited for two reasons. Firstly, I have written the notes based on our efforts and so far nothing else has not been needed. Secondly, I have been writing this stuff alone. Although I have started to hand out tasks to volunteers if they want to take them (asked one person at a time if he/she would like to take care of some stuff/team). I assume that the volunteers might write a line or two to the guideline documents in the future. My assumptions might also be wrong. 

This Regional MeeGo Networks type of organizing of the otherwise dispersed local MeeGo networks might become needed elsewhere too, not just in Finland. I have kept in mind that the guidelines (and the actions behind it) should be written so that the model could be replicated to other regions. Also this kind of solution, if so wanted, might be one tool to narrow the gap between local and global level interaction. Lots of things are missing and unknown, but just wanted to ask opinions to this. Any thoughts? Is this worth the effort?      

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Community Manager (MNF, Meego Network Finland)
Organizer (TMN, Tampere Meego Network)
Phone: +358 40 823 5382
Email: jarkko.moilanen at hermia.fi
Location: Tampere, Finland

More info: http://meegonetwork.fi
Discussions: irc.freenode.net#meego-fi