I’m sharing this idea before I forget it, and I also don’t think this would fit in a ticket anywhere.
What if we organized a virtual contributor fair in a similar way to a job fair? The idea is that one of the socials during the release party would be for the contributor fair. SIGs and teams who choose to participate would each have their own Jitsi calls that they’re hosting. When a speaking session ends and the contributor fair starts, people will have a list available with links to all the “booths” and a description of the team and why they should consider joining.
Usually most teams who present do ask for contributors to join at the end of their talks, but this would be a more direct way for them to make their pitch to interested volunteers. It also makes things easier for the guests joining who may be interested in contributing but feel like the process is too opaque. We would be presenting the first step of contributing in a digestible way - it’s a “job” fair where you walk around and check things out. From there you will have someone you can talk to in your interested area who can take you further down the process of contribution.
This activity would also enhance the benefit of joining the release party live rather than waiting for a recording. Some people may not want to miss a chance to easily talk to others about how to get more involved. That also gives the Marketing Team extra material for promoting the event.
This is all just an idea I wanted to share. What do you think?
I reckon Q&A at the end of each presentation is little rushed.
My wish is to link the contributor fair with existing entry point like Fedora Join and representatives from selected working groups. I feel there are many entry points, often leading to outdated wiki pages or decommissioned pages.
We should be clear about relative skill shortage across project/working groups and focus on learning paths and mentoring. Is it overall skill shortage or only in some working groups or cross-functional skills that can be shared across multiple groups?
Imagine 15 groups/SIGs pitch in to shout out ‘we need you’ for 2 hours, we will end up cannibalizing our efforts and internal competition. We need a moderator/judge to balance it out, so we are focused on where we should prioritize.
The first day of release party starts on Friday, which is working hours of most people. So we need to have a follow-up session on Saturday for the people who were not able to join live.
The last two release parties have given audiences short notice, not giving time for people to know about agenda. Please share agenda in good time…
The way that I’m imagining it, any SIG that wanted to “recruit” at the contributor fair would sign up to be available at the time of the session. Each team would be set up with a video call room that they will host. Then during the contributor fair the host of the session before would direct attendees to look at the list of SIGs and video call rooms that they’re in and direct people to pop in and out of the rooms they’re interested in to ask questions, similar to walking up to different booths at a conference.
In terms of next steps, the person hosting the call for their team would be the one responsible for what they do in that time. Maybe you want to share your screen while hosting so anyone who joins has access to information. You can share your contact details for people to follow up with you. You can ask people for their contact details if they would like you to follow up with them. There’s opportunity for creativity here, but we could also provide a basic template on how to recruit contributors.
The goal is not just for teams to make themselves available for questions, but for the people in those teams to be directly available to the people who are interested in contributing. Instead of reading documentation or talking to the Join SIG to then find the team you’re interested in, here is a chance to just talk to the people who are doing what you want to do.