[SFS] Job #1: Build the community

[David L. Willson]

First, check your doorstep for squalling orphans. If there are none, and you have no graduations, weddings, or funerals to attend all the morning of Saturday, September 3rd, go RSVP for the Small Is Beautiful for September.

https://www.meetup.com/sofreeus/

----- Original Message -----
From: "David L Willson" <dlwillson at sofree.us>
To: "sfs" <sfs at lists.sofree.us>
Sent: Wednesday, August 17, 2022 4:43:00 PM
Subject: [SFS] Job #1: Build the community

First, the call to action with clever acronym: Attend, Participate, Invite (API)

In any endeavor, it's important to know, "What's job #1?" For SFS, it's this: Build the community. (Build the business is #2.) First of all, we build and maintain a strong, supportive community that fosters the growth of real friendships, so that members of the community experience positive effects in their social lives and then in their professions and businesses.

How do we do that? How do we "build the community"?

Strategy: Get everyone together...regularly, in-person if possible, online at least.

Tactic: Offer a monthly buffet, smorgasbord, cornucopia, and encourage everyone to show up to enjoy it and to contribute to it. Putting this together every month will be my "Job #1", unless and until the idea proves ineffective. I hope I can get your help.

So, on the first Saturday of September, and every first Saturday thereafter, SFS will offer a few "small is beautiful (SIB)" sessions and encourage *everyone* to show up, with a question, an idea, a bit of interesting news, a tech tip, or just a few words of encouragement.

What is a "small is beautiful (SIB)" session? It's a learning unit of 20 to 60 minutes. It might follow Time Pie format, Show & Tell format, or no format. It might be expert-led, peer-led, or facilitated. It might follow a script, or it might be improvised.

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What can you do to help? API.

**Attend** - Be here with us, in-person if you can, or online if you can't.

**Participate** - I'll be asking people to lead SIB sessions, but you don't need to sit around waiting for me to ask you, you can volunteer, or you can ask a friend who knows something software freedom related to offer a session. That's how we'll work together to get good people to lead or facilitate SIB sessions. If neither you nor your friend are comfortable leading a SIB session, show up with something else: a problem, a soluton, a new libre hardware or software toy or tool, or whatever.

**Invite** - If you enjoy SFS, invite a freedom-loving or libre-curious friend to join in.

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Another clever acronym? For a long time now, I've called the first Saturday "Software Freedom First Saturday (SFFS)" and I've suggested that every SFS fish (a member of a school is a fish) does something to build their software freedom on that day, with or without us. I'm thinking of a change: Call it "Community Building Day (CBD)" and encourage everyone to join, in-person if possible, online at least, for as long as they can, every first Saturday.

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As always, your input is welcome and wanted.
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