Dear All Hi my name is John and I've taken on some sort of role in getting computerbank NSW up and running. You are receiving this message because you are either on the computerbank mailing list, the SLUG list, have contacted computerbank in the past or your email address was in a mail that ended up in my inbox. If you want to be involved in Computerbank in Sydney please reply to this email. If you don't I'll never pester you again ;) ****************************************************** To become more than just a good idea there computerbank sydney needs people willing to do stuff, and not just twiddling with linux. The attached document lists what *I* think is needed to get the ball rolling. I plan to hold an "inaugral AGM" at The Crystal Palace Hotel (near Central, opposite railway square) 8.00pm 19/9/00 At this meeting we WILL formulate a plan of how to go forward and people WILL get a specific task or tasks to execute in order to put together the bigger picture. If you would like to be involved Read the attached notes Think about what you could do to help Think about *solutions* to potential hassles Come to the meeting and volunteer for one of the "comittee" "positions" Regards John Coote PS a lot of the numbering in the attachment is a bit all over the place __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - Free email you can access from anywhere! http://mail.yahoo.com/Title: The following notes spell out points for discussion, which when resolved should get Computerbank NSW off the ground
The following notes spell out points for discussion, which when resolved should get Computerbank NSW off the ground. The numbered points refer to what I consider to be the most pressing issues, in order of priority. Many items within the main points are discussion points that could be resolved by the "Steering Committee" defined in Point 4.
This agenda / set of notes won’t be revised before the inaugural AGM, I’m sure there’ll be plenty of opportunity to fine-tune it then.
To prevent individuals and communities from falling behind due to a preventable lack of technology.
To refurbish obsolete computer equipment for use by disadvantaged groups and individuals, and groups doing "charitable" works.
Computerbank shouldn’t give directly to individuals, but rather should take instructions from organizations more qualified to assess need.
Computerbank shouldn’t get involved with organizations that are
Listed below are minimum criteria for premises.
Possible places to look include: STARTTS, Northern Sydney Waste Board, Old Hospitals, Army Buildings, Scout halls, Schools etc.
APPOINT A HOUSING OFFICER
Define what makes a "suitable" recipient of a computer
Find suitable recipients
Advertise the service
Formulate some sort of Distribution policy
Organizations potentially interested in having some computers may be Work Skills Training Inc and STARTTS.
APPOINT A "SALES" / SHIPPING & DESPATCH OFFICER
Define the nature of regular meetings
Define the goals of a working day
Timetable for getting things happening
Define a quorum for getting things decided.
Incorporation: Now / Never / One Day ??
Funding??
Will we do one off jobs or follow up with service of any kind?
We need people to be responsible for specific areas,
Without people to look after all of these roles, things won’t happen. If one person looks after too many of them, things won’t happen well.
A demo network would be great for demonstrating the benefits of what we do to
It would be a good spot to train volunteers and recipient organizations
We need to come up with a strategy of where / when / how donated hardware is collected.
Will we collect if there are more than a certain number being donated?
Will we refuse to accept machines below a certain specification, or will we remove for suitable disposal for a fee?
There are supposed to be loads of people who are willing to get rid of old computer stuff. Two are
APPOINT A COLLECTIONS OFFICER
Decide on useful applications and minimal hardware specifications (for example)
Network Server
Must Run : SAMBA / NFS / Print Server / Apache / Squid / etc
Must have as minimum: Pentium, 32MB RAM, 1Gig HDD, Monitor, NIC, Modem
Low end Client / Terminal
Must Run : Telnet / email client / browsing / etc
Must have as minimum: 486, 8MB RAM, 500MB HDD, Monitor, NIC
Workstation / Standalone
Must Run : Star Office / CAD / GIMP / email client / browsing/ etc
Must have as minimum: Pentium, 32MB RAM, 1Gig HDD, 15" Monitor, NIC, Modem
Decide on suitable distributions / application bundles to meet the objectives
I also believe it is very important that clients / standalone machines should be useable without any "under the hood" tweaking being required. Refer to Simple End User Linux for details : http://www.seul.org/
APPOINT A TECHNICAL OFFICER
Obviously people who are willing to volunteer their time and effort to computerbank. To keep people interested enough we need to
Fill key positions
Delegate work effectively
Establish a framework for regular events
APPOINT A VOLUNTEER COORDINATOR