UGN Info Manager UGN Info Manager
Throughout the year, InfoManager gets on his soap box to address some current issue or idea. Here are our favorites from 2003. All invite your comment!
Recently in our AUG mailing list, there has been quite a discussion on what Apple is doing to support user groups. Now I can't speak for the time since the recent changing of the guard, but Apple has never supported groups as much as the groups would have liked. There have been times when they did seem to be more responsive. But in my mind, we really shouldn't expect much.
They have at times treated MUGs as a good thing, but pretty much the support was an after thought. The return on investment isn't immediately obvious. If they were to see a spike in sales immediately after doing a user group event, you bet they would do more events.
But the fact is their sales don't change much whether they help us or not. MUG leaders need to decide that what they are not doing what they do to benefit Apple. They are doing what they do to benefit their members, who happen to use Apple products. Apple will benefit as well, but that should be our after thought. Apple does spend a nice bit of change putting on User Group University, although I suspect that the sponsors pay for most of the expense.
Adobe should be the one praised for what they do for MUGs at the show. Although on a local basis, it would be nice if they did more to support smaller groups. But that old ROI raises its head again there too.
I know that the 200 member MUG in Tulsa turned out 3 times as many people to see an Adobe presentation as the 560 member PC group when I was there. And some of them were actually in the publishing business. (A lot of which goes on in Tulsa.) So lets show the vendors, that MUGs don't need them, but that the groups can do as much for the vendors as they can do for their own members. That way everyone will win. Let me know what you think!
(Personal experience) Last year for the first time, I used TurboTax for the Web to file both my family and my step-son's Federal income tax. Because of his income, he was able to file for free last year. This year, the IRS is trying to get as many people as possible to do electronic filing. Therefore, they have contracted with several companies to do free calculation and filing of taxes. If you go to the web site at www.irs.gov, you will find the link to those companies. Each company however has different rules about who qualifies. Most will provide free service for those with less than an adjusted gross income of $28,000. But at least one will only do it for those with incomes of less than $12K UNLESS you are over 50 years of age. One site would not set up a good secure connection, according to IE on my Mac and thus, it wouldn't let any communication begin.
I initially signed on to TurboTax to do my step-son's taxes. But couldn't find a link there to the free service that was there the year before. So I went to the IRS site and linked to several and tried them out. I tried TaxBrain Online Tax Center without realizing they were the one that required $12K or less AGI. But I found out, that I really like the speed of their service. TurboTax, TaxCut and a couple of others that I tried are formatted much like the TurboTax software, in that they ask you one question at a time. Making the process very slow. TaxBrain asks several questions to start and then only gives you options based on those questions. I was able to do my own taxes in less than an hour. Where I inputting the data into TurboTax took me over 4 hours. (Redraw time was unreal.) The plus here was that it also allowed me to file for free since I am over 50. The negative is that I had to request a code from them to provide me that free service. But that only took about an hour for an e-mail reply.
I also found a link on the IRS site that took me to the TurboTax web site's free page. (Don't know why there wasn't a direct link from their http://www.turbotax.com page.) From there I was able to access the data I had already entered and thus didn't have to input it again. All in all, I would recommend on-line filing for anyone with a high speed connection. If only dial up is available, then TaxBrain would be the only way to go online. And you probably ought to go back to one of the commercial packages anyway. (H&R Block's site was suppose to work with my Mac and browser, but didn't draw the screen proper. The reply I got from their technical people was that my machine should work. Period. Nothing to help. Glad I didn't wait for them to reply.
After I wrote the above, CBS Market Watch had an article about complaints with the services over billing practices.
IDG News reported on the conference that Fred Showker attended last week.
What I found interesting, was that the first item on the agenda was defining spam and how difficult it was to come up with a definition. Some anti-spam advocates said that spam is all unsolicited email and some said that it should be defined only as e-mail that has false subject lines or misleading e-mail headers.
What is amazing, is that when the Internet first got started, everyone was saying that web sites and thus companies would be able to be very specific in their targeting their e-mail to specific customers. What wasn't realized, was that e-mail marketing is so cheap that it isn't necessary to send to only people they know would be interested. Thus we get all this material on products for which we have no use. Personally, that is my definition of spam. Any e-mail that I didn't request that I have no use for. I think most individuals would agree with me. However I know that marketing companies would disagree with me. (BTW - I work in a marketing department for a major corporation.)
It will be interesting to see how Virginia's new law causes a crack down on spam.
We don't have any problems defining spam, in fact you can read complete definition of "UCE" (spam) as part of the AACUG's ISP Anti-Spam Initiative
Rumors and more rumors! Almost every where I turn on the Internet, there are rumors that Apple is going to switch to the IBM PowerPC chip that IBM calls the 970. Some think it will be the "G5" processor for new Macs. Some feel that the new Macs which would be professional level will be announced at either the World Wide Developers Conference in June or at the MacWorld Creative Pro Expo in July.
All of that is possible and maybe even accurate. I wouldn't be surprised to see such an announcement. However, it means little to me as I am not in the market for an upgrade. If you are, you MIGHT want to wait, but then again, it is possible that those machines will not show up on dealer shelves until August or September. How much additional productivity would you get by getting a new machine NOW! That is the rub. For some it would make sense to wait using that criteria, but for many others, it doesn't make sense.
What I am wondering is, what will the new Pro machines mean to the consumer level. Will the G3 PowerBooks go away? None of the desk machines currently use the G3. Only the iBooks are using it at this time. Will they become G4s? Now that could happen, in the time frame that I am considering in getting a new machine. Comments?
We are having a good discussion on the UG mailing list on this subject. Several members have pointed out that a dial-up account can cost as much as a dial-up account with the expense of an additional phone. Another person pointed out that the broadband connection allows the users to have more than one computer connected and that the connections are always on, giving quicker access to information. (Thus switchboard.com may be faster than going to the phonebook.)
Another pointed out that the cost of broadband is worth the decrease of friction between family members who wish to use the phone. Of course, there are some that feel like that dial-up is all they need. And that could be true for them.
I want to thank Hank, George and Richard for contributing to that discussion and encourage you to sign-up and participate.
In the AUGD mailng list this past week, there has been quite a discussion of increasing the number of volunteers in a MUG. It seems that your group is not the only one trying to do it with only about 2% of its members volunteering. Some suggestions:
(1) list what positions are available and what they entail. Example from QMUG:
http://www.qmug.org/LA/qi-qore/_future.html
(2) hold elections for one-year terms the same time each year
(3) hold new officer orientations to:
* find out what they have already done
* find out what they would like to do
* acknowledge that this is a volunteer position, and that no one will ask them to do something they don't want to do
* reassure them that delivering bad news is okay, and that that is better than not saying anything or disappearing, and to
* show them what resources are available to them as officers
(4) thank them at the end of our year w/ Certificates of Appreciation
(5) It is actually better to have NO ONE in the position than to have someone in the position who either can't or won't fire on all cylinders.
(6) Realize you can't do everything, and if no one else wants to do it, maybe it just won't get done.
(7) form committees to take over large jobs
(8) get these people to your board meeting and ask for committee reports
(9) do not micro-manage tasks
(10) give your general members a job
(11) be ready and willing to accept resignations from board members
(12) tell your board how long you plan to be the President
(13) Some concret rewards:
a) volunteers/leaders have membership fee waived
b) budget for leadership meeting breakfasts, lunches or dinners
c) first dibs at review items
d) last dibs at review items
e) "free" raffle tickets (depending on out look of group)
f) recognition awards, dinner, etc.
g) the fun of being amongst others that are willing to talk Mac
(14) Some are just waiting to be asked rather than letting you know that they would be willing. What lets me continue to strive for more is knowing that I do what I want because "I" like to do it
(15) Limit terms to avoid burn out and the impression that it is "Joe's group"
(16) Start asking members to do small tasks; After several months, ask them to switch to something else; Ask them to attend a short board meeting of lots of members
I did an essay a few years back on why I volunteer. Bascially it came down to the teacher learning more than the students. Why do you volunteer?
Have a greate week...
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