[Epo-marketing] Marketing announcements - opening discussion and tasks

[J. Shirley]

On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 1:31 PM, Chris Prather <perigrin at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 3:56 PM, Mike Whitaker <epo at altrion.org> wrote:
>> Ok, since this list appears to contain the brains trust for announcing
>> things.
>>
>> We have three (and counting) things that need announcing, especially given
>> the current storm over various blog posts like Ovids, and striking while the
>> LPW iron is (hopefully) hot
>>
>> 1) EPO itself.
>> 2) The extended core working group
>> 3) The marketing working group plus (possibly) 52 weeks of Perl.
>> 4) (perhaps) Me keynoting Perl Oasis
>
> I would love for there to be lots of press about 4 all about the
> universe. But I'm admittedly highly biased.
>
>> Announcing all of these in one go is probably going to make folks switch off
>> halfway down. To my mind, we also need two versions of both - a snappy one
>> for blogs, Perl Buzz etc, for the Perl audience, and a more press release-y
>> one for outside.
>
> I'm not sure we do, we want Perl to be seen as still having spikey
> hair, tempered with a long history of "Getting the Job Done". We're
> competing with Ruby as much as Java. What you have below seems to me
> to work well for both crowds. Punch active text, with a bold statement
> of policy.
>
>>> A lot of folks out there, outside the 'Perl community', have a lot of
>>> misconceptions about the language - in fact, sometimes it seems the most
>>> common perception of Perl that it's still the language that's presented in
>>> early editions of the Llama and the Camel (not that there's anything wrong
>>> with the Llama and the Camel!).
>>>
>>> Perl's come a long way since then, and a bunch of us involved in
>>> development of what could be called 'modern' Perl modules and frameworks
>>> have got together and formed Enlightened Perl to try and do something about
>>> that perception.
>>>
>>> Why Enlightened Perl?
>>> - Because Perl isn't dead;
>>> - Because we're not waiting for Perl6;
> Because Perl is an enterprise language
>>> - Because TMTOWTDI, but ours works, and scales;
> Because it's time
>
>>> What's it for?
>>> - To promote the use of Perl as an enterprise-grade platform;
> - To sponsor development, marketing, and support of projects that
> further that goal;
>>> - To make it easier to install and deploy Perl in the enterprise;
>>> - To specify and support a common extended core of enterprise-quality Perl
>>> modules;
>>> - To encourage people to write about their experiences with Perl.
>>>
>>> What will we do?
>>> - Solicit applications for grants for specific projects to further our
>>> goals;
>>> - Source funding for those grants;
>>> - Raise the visibility of Perl as an enterprise language, both at a
>>> developer level and a CxO/management level, within and outside the
>>> community.
>>>
>>> How can I help?
>>> - Join.
>>>  - As an individual, it tells employers you're committed to the use of
>>> Perl enterprise projects, and it gives you a chance to have a say on our
>>> working groups
>>>  - As a company, it tells prospective and current employees you're equally
>>> committed to the use of Perl in the enterprise; it allows you to give back,
>>> both in a material and technical way, to the future of Perl as a modern
>>> development language.
> - Join.
>>>  - Join one of our working groups and have your say.
>>>  - Contribute code or documentation, whether grant-backed or not;
>>>  - Write articles and/or white papers about Perl in the enterprise, for
>>> specific target audiences.
>>> - Use.
>>>  - Make a point, where you have a choice, of using modules from the
>>> Enlightened Perl extended core.
> - Discuss.
>>>  - Spread the word;
>>>  - Blog about us;
>>>  - Add one of our banners to your site.
>
> I've just tried to make the text you have hit a bit harder, removed
> the phrases "we think" in favor of more direct sentiment, and changed
> some passive verbs (advertise) to active verbs ("discuss"). I quite
> like both the initial bullets
>
> Why Enlightened Perl?
>  - Because Perl isn't dead;
>  - Because we're not waiting for Perl6;
>  - Because Perl is an enterprise language
>  - Because TMTOWTDI, but ours works, and scales;
>  - Because it's time
>
> And the triplet Join | Use | Discuss. They nicely pull out the basic
> theme, and the call to action motif.
>
>> EPO Extended Core working group brief
>>
> EPO is delighted to announce the formation of a working group
> dedicated to working on the EP Extended Core. It's goals are:
>>>  a) to identify the areas of functionality an extended core needs to cover
>>>  b) to draw up a set of recommended extended core modules which cover the
>>> tasks required for
>>> modern enterprise use of Perl
>>>  c) to agree on a set of minimal standards for release process,
>>> documentation and (where possible) API for those modules
>>>  d) to liaise with the authors of those modules regarding their inclusion
>>> in the extended core
>>>  e) to identify places where those modules fall short of the core
>>> standards, and then
>>>      i) to advise the EP funding working group on possible fundable
>>> projects to rectify these
>          ii) to define projects for GSoC 09 and future hackathon's to
> rectify these
>>>  d) to liaise with major Linux/Windows etc distributions (RH, Debian,
>>> Ubuntu, ActiveState, Strawberry Perl) to get the extended core packaged in
>>> an appropriate manner
>>>  g) to coordinate releases of the extended core
>>>  h) (perhaps) to find a better name for the extended core
>>
>> [aside: we need a small section on WHY this isn't P5EE and won't go the same
>> way]
>
> Here I just Americanized the phrase "it's brief is the following" to
> "It's goals are" ... the latter works on both sides of the pond I
> think, the former sounds bad to American ears. I also added a phrase
> to teh GSoC line about future hackathons as well, so we don't put all
> our eggs in the GSoC basket, not everybody is a student, and not
> everybody will get paid ... but we would like them to still contribute
> technically where possible.
>
> Finally, I think we need to figure out how many people have heard of
> P5EE, I've heard of it but I don't know it got much uptake outside a
> small community. How much of a problem *will* it be for us marketing
> wise?
>
> I'll work on a press release type thingy for Perl Oasis.
>
> -Chris
>
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>

However much I hate Wikis, I think that for the drafts going out it
may be prudent to use one... or perhaps some other revision control
mechanism (outside of Email and Microsoft Word's "Track Changes"
features)

Thoughts?

-J