Open Stack

Will be happy to participate in this discussion at the summit.
My team is running OpenStack meetups in Boston and Austin.
As hype of OpenStack subsided the meetup participation dwindled.


From: Lauren Sell [mailto:lauren at openstack.org]
Sent: Wednesday, May 16, 2018 4:16 PM
To: Matt Van Winkle
Cc: user-committee
Subject: Re: [User-committee] FW: OpenStack NA User Group Scorecard

Thanks Matt and John.

All good topics to raise, and I believe are represented on the agenda Ashlee has been working on with Ambassadors and User Group leaders for the meeting in Vancouver:
https://etherpad.openstack.org/p/YVR-UG-Ambassador

For those on the list who are interested in attending, it’s scheduled for Thursday at 2:40 pm in room 207.

I think a big discussion topic will be whether the current “groups" site (groups.openstack.org<http://groups.openstack.org>) is useful and worth investing in updating, or if we should go a different route. We’ve been in touch with Meetup and have some proposals for funding MeetupPro ready for discussion next week.

FWIW I agree we should revisit the “official” user group criteria.

Cheers,
Lauren



On May 16, 2018, at 1:21 PM, Matt Van Winkle <mvanwink at rackspace.com<mailto:mvanwink at rackspace.com>> wrote:

Forwarding this as requested by John

VW

From: John Studarus <john.studarus at openstacksandiego.org<mailto:john.studarus at openstacksandiego.org>>
Date: Thursday, May 10, 2018 at 5:52 PM
To: Matt Van Winkle <mvanwink at rackspace.com<mailto:mvanwink at rackspace.com>>, MelvinHillsman <melvin.hillsman at huawei.com<mailto:melvin.hillsman at huawei.com>>, amy <amy at demarco.com<mailto:amy at demarco.com>>
Subject: Fwd: OpenStack NA User Group Scorecard

Adding Matt. Feel free to forward to the rest of the user committee.

John


----
John Studarus - OpenStack Ambassador - John at OpenStackSanDiego.org<mailto:John at OpenStackSanDiego.org>

============ Forwarded message ============
From : John Studarus <john.studarus at openstacksandiego.org<mailto:john.studarus at openstacksandiego.org>>
To : "melvinhillsman"<melvin.hillsman at huawei.com<mailto:melvin.hillsman at huawei.com>>, "amy"<amy at demarco.com<mailto:amy at demarco.com>>
Date : Thu, 10 May 2018 15:15:33 -0700
Subject : Fwd: OpenStack NA User Group Scorecard
============ Forwarded message ============


I put this report card together last December showing the current state of affairs across the US OpenStack meetup groups (basically that the majority of groups are defunct and things are only getting worse). At the time, I sent it to the foundation staff but I really think the members of the user committee should be aware of the status. Chicago going defunct last year was the start. Since then, NY and DC went silent and last month, the LA organizer stepped down with no replacement in sight.

I've been keeping several groups alive (life support) by running a road show across San Diego, New York, Chicago, and NoVA. Unfortunately, this is a unfunded initiative that isn't feasible in the long term.

In general, the groups have been disappearing since it is tough for organizers to promote the groups, find space/funding to run the group and find speakers/content to present. Then, once a group is up and running, the organizers changes careers (i.e. a sales engineer switching out of cloud sales) and the group gets dropped.

In general, the user groups/meetup groups need help in the following to address these issues:

* Lack of a central working User Group Website - The OpenStack "Groups" website doesn't have a critical mass of users, is not a draw of new users and has a number of technical issues with a lack of technical support available (the website developer has since moved on). Organizers instead pay for Meetup groups out their pocket fragmenting the user base. And once an organizer leaves, the group disappears. The CNCF provides organizers with paid meetup accounts that are under the greater CNCF meetup umbrella account. We'd like to see a similar model. This would solve the problem of groups disappearing when the organizer changes careers.

* Speaker Bureau Searching - We'd like to see the Speaker Bureau have some sort of search by city/state/zip code area so that meetups can find speakers. Right now, the smallest granularity is by country which doesn't help a someone in SoCal find a local speaker.

* Funding - We'd like to see funding for the groups that is commensurate with the number of group events and members. Currently, each group receives $500 for a yearly birthday party regardless of the size of the group or the number of events. This could include covering expenses for space.

* Content - Well put together content (other than marketing slides) - perhaps hands on workshops - put together by the Foundation or through Foundation outreach, that local organizers can present. This is what I've been doing for the four groups I've been running. I put together the content once and then present it across the four groups.

Let me know your thoughts! I've of discussions with the Foundation staff through the year and longer but these core issues remain. I'm hoping you might have some thoughts on how we can push this along.

John







----
John Studarus - OpenStack Ambassador - John at OpenStackSanDiego.org<mailto:John at OpenStackSanDiego.org>

============ Forwarded message ============
From : John Studarus <john.studarus at openstacksandiego.org<mailto:john.studarus at openstacksandiego.org>>
To : "Sonia Ramza"<sonia at openstack.org<mailto:sonia at openstack.org>>, "lnamphy"<lnamphy at gmail.com<mailto:lnamphy at gmail.com>>, "Shilla Saebi"<shilla.saebi at gmail.com<mailto:shilla.saebi at gmail.com>>
Date : Mon, 04 Dec 2017 20:23:20 -0800
Subject : OpenStack NA User Group Scorecard
============ Forwarded message ============



Here are some statics on the US OpenStack user groups. This information was gathered from groups.openstack.org<http://groups.openstack.org/> and meetup.com<http://meetup.com/>.
Having good measurements of our current situation is crucial in determining how to proceed. The statistics tell us a lot.

Chicago being abandoned is the tip of the iceberg. After gathering the statistics, it is apparent that NY, Seattle, and North Carolina will be next.
Since it is unclear if the Foundation is willing to step in and support the groups, we need to figure out an alternate funding strategy.
This may include marketing out to other interested parties to see if they would be willing to step in and fund these groups.
Without some mechanism to cover these meetup costs, these groups will disappear. It is unreasonable to ask organizers to cover fees for multiple groups.

I've started contacting these inactive groups and 100% of the responses have been receptive to receiving support.


Majority of Groups are Inactive

There are quite a few user groups (62%) that aren't active (>= 3 meetups in 2017). 43% didn't meet at all in 2017. Sample size is 37 groups in total.
There are a few (3) that no longer exist at all but OpenStack.org<http://openstack.org/> lists as existing.
The minority of the groups (14 or 38%) are active having at least 3 meetups in 2017.
It is easy to see these inactive groups being abandoned in the next 12 months as organizers pass on pay the meetup fees.

Large Groups are in Peril

There are a number (4) of very large groups (> 900 members) that had zero or one meetup in 2017.
This extends to ten user groups with > 300 members that had zero or one meetup in 2017.
These groups are in peril of being abandoned unless action is taken to step in and rescue these groups.
These groups are in major geographies (NY, Seattle, DC, NoVA, Research Triangle/North Carolina).
NY and Seattle, the top two groups in peril of being abandoned, are the 2nd and 3rd largest OpenStack groups (second only to SF/Bay Area).


Name

Official

Ambassador

Members

2017 Meetups Count

New York

Yes

Lisa

2229

0

Seattle

No

Lisa

1565

1

North Carolina

No

None

1047

1

DC

Yes

Lisa

979

0

Northern Virginia

Yes

Shilla

648

2

Philadelphia

Yes

Lisa

487

0

Houston

No

Sean Roberts

463

0

Portland (PDX)

No

Lisa

421

2

Chicago

No

None

369

0

Baltimore

No

Lisa

307

0


Here are my suggestions:

  * Actively step in for the largest of the "in peril" groups and take over the membership fees and leadership before the group defaults
  * Start recruiting new leadership for these inactive groups
  * Reach out and provide content to the remaining smaller and delist them if they go insolvent
  * Raise awareness at the Foundation on the need to support meetup groups (paying fees/Meetup Pro); OR
  * Gather up funding from outside parties to cover meetup fees through group sponsorships
  * Push the Foundation to provider a speaker list by US zipcode/state to better provide regional content; OR
  * Start building a North America speaker bureau broken out by zipcode/state
  * Rework the Foundation's cloud trial program for longer durations than 30 days to better support the user groups; OR
  * Contact North American public OpenStack providers (Rackspace, OVH, Packet) to see about direct support for the user groups
  * Purge the dead groups from OpenStack.org<http://openstack.org/>
  * Remove ex-Ambassadors from the listing. Most have moved on from OpenStack.
  * Get the Foundation to fix the functionality in groups.openstack.org<http://groups.openstack.org/>. Seems that various workflows are broken (web errors) including the ability to request/approve new groups.
  * Get the Foundation to provide access to the email/contact info of the listed organizers
  * Revisit the definition of "Official" user-group and the process of how and why a group should become Official. What's the value? Stickers?
  * Push "Squatters" (organizers sitting on OpenStack groups but not using them) to release the group to organizers willing to host events

I'm sure everyone is busy through the end of the year but the numbers are interesting. We can pickup in the new year and discuss how to proceed.

John




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