VanLUG Email Archive
Fancy sound and graphics are why those companies exist. We need to
figure out why we're going to Comdex. Is it to compete with the flash,
dazzle and glitter crowd? Or is it to show people that Linux is a
serious contender for their serious business needs, possibly even better
than what they're using currently?
> I think games as well as multi-media would certainly not detract from
> the booth.
I don't think Quake would be a good idea. A well crafted demo of the
Gimp would be excellent, however. A network based videoconference tool
of some sort would alse be great. So what if Linux runs games? Their
computers already do that, run more of them, and their employees are
already wasting more than enough time on them in many cases.
Simon A Deweerdt <
> writes:
> Most people need to see a useable desktop. Perhaps with apps that can
> read and write Excel and Word stuff. And Netscape.
Amen. Show 'em IE while you're at it. I think demonstrating an office
suite on Linux is the single best thing you can do, as that's what most
of their systems will be running. That and show them we can do what
their NT servers do now, only better.
> It would be nice to have a big pipe to the net. Can you call forward
> an ADSL line?
Nope. Again, what will we be using the big pipe for? We could have
gone without the connection at Installfest, for all practical purposes,
and none of the attendees would have notices. Except as a nice concrete
example of gatewaying for my talk. :)
But again, that could have worked with a dialup line.
> Radio stuff is cool, but we should back ourselves up with a land line.
Definitely.
> It would be nice to outdo the big boys in some way.
Unless someone comes up with something unusually brilliant, I think this
is taking the wrong approach. We cannot out-glitz, out-hustle or
out-promote the big boys. In an image driven age, that takes money in
something close to the league they're spending on it. My vote is KISS:
Keep It Simple, Stupid. Just the facts ma'am.
That's not to say we can't have a good looking and professional booth,
but if we concentrate on trying to "market" ourselves like the big
companies do, we're undercutting our biggest strength: we're *not* the
big companies.
Brian.