Is not only a challenge because of language and culture, but also will be a challenge because is not an easy to topic to talk about. I will be giving a keynote about Venezuela, and how an Entire Country Migrates To Linux. Venezuela has, like all Latin American countries, a strong interest in using free and open source software for many different purposes. That gives them more independence from big software corporations and gives them the opportunity to develop the software in their own country giving their local talents a chance to grow professionally.

So the Venezuelan governament has started its own Linux distribution, called Canaima, which is installed on most of the computers in all governmental institutions. Venezuela also has a program for equipping all schools with laptops, which were first bought in Portugal and are now produced inside the country. So the kids grow up using Linux on their computers from the age of eight.

This talk will give an overview on the migration to free and open source software in Venezuela. I really hope people enjoy and use as example all the efforts done in my country to migrate and can follow this example :)

See you in Vienna next week!!!!!!!!!

As a community leader, it is important to identify what motivates the individuals that participates in a community – to identify what makes them tick – and work to not lose what makes that individual motivated to keep contributing to the group towards a common goal. When we expect everyone to be motivated by the same thing or when we ignore looking for what motivates people we eventually find members resigning or burning out.

Understanding that each type of interest group can have a common motivating factor is the key that will make things move ahead. Let’s look at some easy examples:

* As a designer, occasionally receiving a t-shirt, stickers or part of the artwork that you have created will keep you motivated to keep creating artwork.

* Programmers/hackers will feel motivated (and invite friends too) if we provide pizzas and soda for a group hack night (Fedora Activity Day)

* Marketing people will feel motivated if they have resources to create amazing ideas to spread technology.

In countries with few resources or places where Red Hat support is not that easy to get these small details can make a big difference. Sometimes, we think that this is mostly a *money* issue, and while sometimes it is, we often find that if we don’t know or explore how to spend these resources to make a difference, then we are just wasting them.

The same way a hacker designs a piece of software, or a designer does a mock-up, or a writer creates documentation, we can make a plan to keep people motivated. But our lack of patience is our own worst enemy. All of us have amazing ideas and our leaders tell us to *just do it*. Sometimes it is easy, however, we are talking about a worldwide community here and we need to plan, organize and be prepared to turn failures into achievements. How do we prepare to motivate the world?

Even if we are a horizontal organization, we can do a pyramidal structure to determine the motivating factors of our community. Let’s start with the biggest motivating factor:

Freedom. As FLOSS users, our main motivation is to create/use/spread technology. We all agree on that.

Another factor is to determine what drives (motivates) people to want to be members of the team. Design, Program, Translation, Documentation, QA, Marketing and many more. There are teams where people join trying to learn, teach or just show/use their skills. Even if people inside each team are different, they have some common goals that can be easily determined. Designers are always trying to send a message, telling a story or turning complicated ideas into *easy to see* graphical stories. Translators love to learn different languages and make things readable for their local teams. Hackers love to hack, create and modify things – they have an awesome purpose and create/improve new tools that will make someones life easier (sometimes even their own). Each team has their key tasks that we can work with. However, we need to remember that each team consists of people with different language skills, cultural backgrounds and therefore contributes in different ways.

There is a third motivation factor – localization. If you ask someone from North America and someone from Latin American, how easy is to get marketing goodies, you will not get the same answer. If you ask someone from Asia or Europe (for instance) how easy is to use Social Networks to spread knowledge you will get different answers. Determining each region’s features is also important. Different languages, currency, customs, designs, ideas, programs and many more things, can seem really complicated, but it is just a matter of time and dedication.

From my perspective (not perfect), as long people see that we are interested in how to make everything work better and easier, they will also be more interested in contributing. We give love to Fedora and other FLOSS projects. The same way people expect to receive *something* even if they are too humble to say *NO, I’m ok this way*. I’m not only referring to receiving money, trips or goodies, I’m talking about comments, visits to their blogs, help with packages and with events, potential employees/employers and a lot of things that can be acquired inside such a diverse membership. Things are out there, but ask yourself this: “Are we looking to see what is needed to be improved or are we just sitting at our computers expecting the problems get resolved by other peoples ideas?”- I’m sorry, but I’m not the kind of person that likes to wait, maybe that’s why some think that I’m too annoying and others think that I push too much. Either way, this is what makes me happy.

A couple of days ago, a friend asked me about my perspectives on the Fedora project and if I think that things can get better. For me it is easy to see where things need to fit to make things work better, but like most people we have a real life outside the team. Our time to spend on the project is limited. Fedora or FLOSS projects in general and life itself is a huge puzzle we all struggle with. The pieces has always been there, either they are being shaped by your experiences, knowledge and people but is also shaped by what people around you support. What’s funny is that we always stress about missing pieces or not finding the right ones. Our lack of patience makes us feel frustrated, (let me remind you), you don’t have a unique puzzle… There is someone out there that have a couple of pieces that will fit yours, and if you’re lucky enough, there will be more than one.

Let me use the example of the Fedora video project that I’m part of now. Fedora has been talking and pushing video projects since 2009, however, every couple of months things just stop. Thanks to a couple of really pushing guys, we are now about to start again the video projects but with a different perspective. Is this project going to work? I have no idea! But, we need to at least *try*. Every time a contributor tell us an amazing idea and we say *no, you can’t do that because we already tried it and it didn’t work*, you may be dumping a potential puzzle piece. Sometimes, we are so stubborn and believe that we are *the masters of the world* just because we have tried it and failed. We may be able to be the piece for someone else’s puzzle. A *no* is not an option anymore when you open your eyes to life… Failure is a fact of life – it happens. What can we do when we have been trying for some years and yet we did not find a solution? You have two options, and even though I’m speaking only about FLOSS projects, please consider applying this to your own life:

1.- The perseverance way: You can keep trying, until you actually succeed, or
2.- The patient way: You can document and leave everything as explained as possible (even the ugly parts) so other people can continue your work someday.

Life is about patience and perseverance. I have even thought about getting a tattoo saying that. This saying *does not* mean that you need to have both, I’m not as patient as I would like, but life is about balance and believe me: I’m sure that there is a patient/perseverance person out there that will bring *balance to your force*. Life IS about never giving up – NEVER. If you ask me why did I write this? Maybe just because the same user that I talk about this has encouraged me to do a blog post. Is my brain normal? NO! And I’m happy with that. Do we/I/You have a way to solve problems? YES! But do it. If someone says *NO* to you, ask him/her to explain why. Help save us my learning from your experience and to avoid the same mistakes. Even if we do, it still might show us a different way that our friends may have not seen.

Now, here comes the fun question: What to do now that we have a different perspective? Act, plan and put it *into* practice. From my point of view, our community needs a bit more interest/focus on their contributors and not quite so much about the projects, because at the end, projects are nothing without people. I truly believe that things are going fantastic, but we can always improve on *everything*. What if we take those ideas that we have (because I’m sure everyone have amazing ideas), express them on our blogs, mailing-lists and whatever comes to our mind, and encourage people to make them happen? Do it as a test, as people need a push (motivation) sometimes. We also need it but it will never happen unless you TALK!.

Uno de los beneficios es el ahorro que el Estado realiza al no tener que abonar las importantes cifras que requiere la instalación de software legal en las computadoras de sus dependencias. Se habla de al rededor de 350 a 450 USD por cada una de las computadoras que se legaliza el software que utilizan. Sin embargo, la adopción de este sistema, más que una cuestión económica, es una cuestión de libertad, porque permite el acceso al código fuente del programa, que implica que se pueden generar modificaciones y conocer el funcionamiento del programa. Esto va a permitir adaptarlo a sus necesidades y además, promocionar la industria del software, que está promovida por una ley nacional.

Para mi es MUY grato ya que durante bastante tiempo si mi pequeño aporte al excelente equipo en el que Javier Barcena (quien me informó hace poco) tiene trabajando años completamente dedicado a ello. Es una excelente noticia, otro país se une y abre las puertas al cambio, a la evolución y a la libertad tecnológica.

Si quieres leer más pincha acá: http://www.legisrn.gov.ar/prensa2/desarro_prensa.php?cod=2295

First I need to say THANK YOU (yes, yell at you) because we are so so so close to collect the money for the travel, that I just submit 2 talk for Linuxwochen. I really don’t know how to express my gratitude to all of you who have donated so far and those that will. This are the kind of actions that make you understand that what we do is right, and change is possible. People doesn’t realize that FLOSS, worldwide, is a huge family of people that not only teach you or learn from you, but also people who encourage you, support you and help you. Life is about the actions we do to improve what is arround us, about help, teach and grow. Once again THANK YOU! Don’t forget we are still receiving donations, please check our Pledgie: http://pledgie.com/campaigns/16632

My first submissions is about One Of The World’s Largest FLOSS Events – FLiSoL. Latinamerican Festival for the Installation of Free Software (El Festival Latinoamericano de Instalación de Software Libre) is one of the largest free software events worldwide. The FliSoL event started 2005 and has been held every year since. The main goal of the event is to promote Free and Open Source Software and its use.

The FliSoL event is simultaneously organized on a single day in many different countries and cities all over Latin America. Around 20 countries (including Spain) participated in FLISoL in 2011 and around 60,000 people visited the different locations where the event was held on just a single day.

This talk will give an inside view in the organization of FLiSoL conference.

My second submission is about Venezuela, and how an Entire Country Migrates To Linux. Venezuela has, like all Latin American countries, a strong interest in using free and open source software for many different purposes. That gives them more independence from big software corporations and gives them the opportunity to develop the software in their own country giving their local talents a chance to grow professionally.

So the Venezuelan government has started its own Linux distribution, called Canaima, which is installed on most of the computers in all governmental institutions. Venezuela also has a program for equipping all schools with laptops, which were first bought in Portugal and are now produced inside the country. So the kids grow up using Linux on their computers from the age of eight.

This talk gives an overview on the migration to free and open source software in Venezuela.

I have come to the point of realize that VideoConferences are turning into an excellent way to interact, even if language can be a bit tricky sometimes, but is like hang with your coworkers (since at offices there is no contact either), is just like take a look over your desk and see your friends, that’s amazing.

You have NO idea of how encouraged I feel when I see the feedback that you guys have push to this, when ideas are suported by people from all the world, things matter and encourage to keep working. Once again, Thank you!!

I need to thank all of those who came and hangout with us last night, but specially to our great FPL, Robyn Bergeron, who just jump to say hi and stay for a while with us (and act like the rockstar that she is, smiling while people was taking photos of their screen with their mobiles :P ), thank you also to Alexis Pardo (Peru), Hector Alonso González Mata (Venezuela), Larry Letelier (Chile), Carlos Reges (Venezuela), Alejandro Acosta (Mexico), Mark Terranova (USA), Jeronimo Gonzalez (Argentina), Joe Mac, Alejandro Perez (Panamá), Andres Pascasio (El Salvador), Adolfo Fitoria, Fran Monroy Moret (Venezuela), Jeferx BugDox (Venezuela), Hector Carrillo Hugo Alonso Ibarra García (Venezuela), Johan Camilo Manrique Sanchez (Colombia), Oliver Rivas (USA), Ricardo del Nogal (Venezuela), Edgardo Herrera (Venezuela), Eduard Lucena (Venezuela), Yury Jajitzky (Venezuela), Carlos Pineda (Venezuela), Lilibeth Ramirez (Venezuela) and Abdel Gabiel Martinez Lassonde (Panamá).

Last night VC was mostly to know ste status of our ambassadors and contributors in 3 countries, Venezuela, Mexico and Panamá; but we also had an amazing brainstorming where we were able to talk about how to improve the way we do marketing, solutions for marketing goodies, introduction to new contributors (since we had some on the VC), FUDcon ideas and even leadership, and how to expand Fedora (and FOSS) in our region. Let me show you the topics and ideas lists so you can read them and provide some feedback as well.

= FUDcon Venezuela tasks =

* One of our contributors, Hector Alonso, needs to contact UDO Cumana with us, so we can have a meeting.

= Fedora México =

* Nushio, Alejandro and? we need to contact the rest of contributors there
* Our ambassadors are contributing a lot on local lugs
* There is an awesome communication and will between local community and RH-México, however, we might need to push a bit more so we can act together. We should try to push a FAD.
* Alejandro might find useful to have a meeting with Venezuelan contributors that work on Governament to get some feedback for his classes.

= Fedora Panamá =

* Potty is the new local leader, his tasks are mostly TONS of events and run FLISoL. He needs to have a public agenda where people can know which events he will attend and how to be reach.
* Work with college new students, go back to first year recruitment. And push graduated people to go back and recruit based on their own experiences.
* Try to get involved in non-fedora events.

= Fedora =

* Lead and Delegate
* We need to spend latam budget… hasn’t been fully used
* Motivate people to DO, not only to spread.
* People cannot try to do everything by themselves… so we need to motivate the new contributors that want to join the groups we are part of on taking tasks. If we don’t act fast when they just join, they might get bored and just drop off. Nice reference to read is http://blog.melchua.com/2012/02/24/thought-experiment-design-an-open-source-new-hire-process/
* Drupal Central American event that we MUST go… Insight!

= Event box =

I think this is the main point from yesterday hangout. We have several issues to face: Shipping between LATAM countries is a NOT (too expensive, too slow, too complicated on customs), Ambassadors are not asking for funds or do it too late, Each LATAM country wants design independency and even if that’s cool doesn’t allow us to have a general branding marketing campain.

So, the main idea and steps to try to follow to use the Event Box as an option are:
* We need a local list of suppliers on each country where we can have sorta arrangement and print items.
* We need a latinamerican (or general) marketing team that deals directly between each country supplier and RH budget, so ambassadors doesn’t have to deal with everything everytime, only fill a request.
* Suppliers will have designs twice a year (per each release), so we only have to do a request without work design, prints quality, etc. this not only helps with quality, but also make items be delivered faster.
* Ambassadors need to request X amount of event boxes and explain WHY need that quantity and how will he use it.

Now, we have an idea of what might go inside that box. Boxes will be build according to the smalles event we may attend (something between 10-20 people), so if a user is going to a larger event, he only need to ask for a different number of boxes. Items will be (pls add or remove if you think is needed):
* T-shirts (5 per box)
* Stickers (50 per box)
* Flyers (50 per box)
* Special Item (one per box) this can be used as motivarot, prize or X, so ambassadors actually ASK for this boxes.
* Cd… Now here comes the best idea:

For media, we could do a REALLY SUPER LARGE request (maybe china or somewhere else) where they send us a lot of labeled media (only fedora logo, NO VERSION) and without burn. If each country have a stock of labeled but nor burned media, they can burn thoe locally and we can add on the event box only the envelope with the version name.

This not only help with prices, but also with shipping weight and, if people want to go and burn a spin, remix or different version, since there is no burned media, then disc won’t get lost or obsoletes.

I hope that people keep enjoying our hangouts, and if anyone PLEASE can help us contacting someone from google that let us use the live option so more people can join… pls let me know. Once again. Thank you! I will let you know next week when and topics about our next meeting (if you have an idea… please let me know ASAP!)

This will be a general talk about:

• How to join the Ambassadors program
• Steps to fullfill before open a trac tickets
• How to contact and interact with your mentor
• What to do once you are aproved
• What will Fedora expect from you once you’re an Ambassadors
• Tips to be the best ambassador

When: Friday at click here to know your time
Where: Google Hangout gplus.to/tatica
Language: English (first 30min) / Spanish (second 30min)

I didn’t expect this sucess, however, I embrace it. Maybe our community just need to use tools that aproach them and give them an oportunity to give faces to names and nicks. Last night was a clear example of this, where we had 21 people having an EXTRAORDINARY hangout like I had never seen… I can be completely honest and say that was as productive as a FUDcon (maybe someone can jump with an online FAD? :D )

I didn’t had a prepared conference for this time, since mostly I wanted to know how has been for Amber Graner and Selena Deckelmann to be FOSS contributors, their experience, ideas and feedback; however, everything took a different direction before and after that conversation that the 3 of us had. I need to say THANK YOU SO VERY VERY MUCH (yes, awful sentence) specilly to our amazing invited, Amber and Selena, who show us a lot of reasons to be part of FOSS communities, to keep learning, to keep teaching… and to keep having fun! but also I want to thank to the rest of the crew that join us: Mark Terranova, Alejandro Perez, Hector Alonso Gonzalez Mata, Hedayet Mabrook, Clint Savage, Pat Mcgovern, Carlos Reges, Nemecis Rojas, John Dulaney, Vinil V. Menon, Abdel Gadiel Martinez Lassonde, Oliver Rivas, Ben Williams, Miguel Alvarado, Garry Elliott, Click Mapa, Sandeep Pothuganti, Junior Paz, Javy Martinez and Fabrizzio Moreno

Now, lets make a list of interesting things that we talk about and let me show you my random notes. Please, know that this is the *crude product* comming out from my head, some of this points (I hope all) will end up beign applied or put into practice. This is not a list of goals (maybe is) but consider ir as one of the best Feedbacks and brainstorms online ever! :P

= Geeks at FOSS =

• * Weird names are AWESOME… but please, make sure to have an audio file with a proper pronunciation – Thank you.
• * ask about your friends life… they will be happy to share some details with you so you are not just a robot.

= Mentors =

• * Fedora has guides for everything, but not to be a mentor (check on this)
• * Has to know well how community works
• * Need to have amazing people skills, not enough just to be an ambassador

= Ambassadors =

• * Must know how to organize an event, learn about logistics, marketing and people skills
• * Propose talks for events that you don’t organize
• * Try to take fedora to non-fedora places, events and activities
• * To be an ambassador you need to have good ideas, but also work on turn them into goals, not only expect that someone will do it for you (or if you can’t, please, make if happen)
• * Every member of Fedora IS an ambassador

= Fedora a better place =

• * more testers
• * Better websites or way to find info at our websites
• * More brainstorming, less information meetings… push feedback
• * Focus on fulfill ideas, not only give them.
• * Show Fedora with more serious marketing (product)
• * Help tech people to show themselves more professionals and less hippies
• * Marketing are focusing on a few events… what happen with the small events and we need to be and are not fedora specifics
• * We need more marketing outside events… if we have 2.000.000 linux users on a country and we only spread fedora on an 200 people event.. we are waisting 1.800.000 potential contributors.
• * Daily marketing MATTERS
• * Passion at events and focused on fun. Gather together for the fun, not by the tittle
• * Don’t join the community expecting to get a job, join it because the fun and with fun, might come a work.
• * Curiosity
• * Explore and expand what you can do, not what you cannot or don’t know how to do
• * Whatever your motivation is… keep being motivated
• * Encourage people to make money with FOSS
• * Opensource is about friends… so find the right ones and those that make you feel a rockstar and motivate you

= Questions for Selena and Amber =

• * Are you a girl? or just a robot?
• * How is to be a community person for you?
• * What are your tasks on Free and Open source community?
• * Which is the best experience you can remember being a community leader?

= FUDCon Panama=

• * Bring a key people of each team available to allow new contributors to get sponsorship and contribute without have to wait after-event.
• * show the simplicity of contribute to fedora with people examples.

So PLEASE, if you have any further idea, or you join the conversation but you didn’t talk… feel free to add any comment. We need your ideas and feedback in order to make stronger proposals that can actually change things. Hope you tomorrow night for our second hangout, this will be about “how to be a better ambassador” (30min english, 30min spanish)“

I have become a VideoConferences addict, for many reasons (and to practice my english)! Talking is easier sometimes than writing, but problem is… where are logs? The best thing we can do is record them. Most of the time we plan to let as many people as want to join us… Let me invite you to our weekly videoconferences.

Now comes reality… I don’t think we will be able to set up an specific date/time for videoconferences. People from all over the world might be interested to join. I will try to use Twitter, blog post or whatever is on my hands to keep people informed. Also, if you’re interested in having a videoconference about a specific topic, let me know. Our next videoconferences will be these:

Geeks at FOSS

Today I will meet with Selena Deckelmann and Amber Graner General talk about tech experiences, Cultural shocks on IT fields, what it is like to be a girl working in FOSS communities and what can be done… sharing our ASCII coffees :)
When: TODAY! at click in here to check your time
Where: Google Hangout gplus.to/tatica
Language: English

How to be a Fedora Ambassador

General talk about how to join the Ambassadors program, steps to fullfill before open a trac tickets, how to contact and interact with your mentor and what to do once you are aproved. What will Fedora expect from you once you’re an Ambassadors and tips to be the best one.
When: Friday at click here to know your time
Where: Google Hangout gplus.to/tatica
Language: English (first 30min) / Spanish (second 30min)