nautilus@nuge113.its.rpi.edu (John M Twilley) (04/26/91)
Well, I am new to our local chapter, but it is dying... The main attraction is a talk server like IRC (called Connect). I am trying to get people involved, but the membership has dropped by an order of magnitude (~200 to about 20) in two years. -- |John M. Twilley (Nautilus)|"Electricity is the dangerous|Disclaimer: Take| |Internet: nautilus@rpi.edu| stuff in an extension cord."|what I say with | |BITNet: Nautilus@RPITSMTS|(paraphrased from S. Dorner) |a grain of salt.|
acm@acm.rpi.edu (RPI-ACM) (04/27/91)
As the Secretary for the Student chapter of the ACM at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, I'd like to discuss Naut's points. He has made several good points, but I'd like to correct a couple of things about the chapter, and bounce some ideas off the community at large. (For RPI people, this is posted seperately to rpi.acm. Followups on specifics should go there.) > Well, I am new to our local chapter, but it is dying... You're right on the money there. It's been sick for a long time. In the past several weeks we've been working with the Student Union and among ourselves to revitalize it. There is certainly a long ways to go. > The main attraction is a talk server like IRC (called Connect). The day-to-day operation of Connect is largely out of our hands nowadays, and has been for several years. Most users of Connect have no clue what the ACM is. So what is our "main attraction" nowadays? There are several, depending on the user: - A social group (SIGFriendlies) - Providing accounts for the MTS operating system and for the ACM operated 3b2 UNIX machines (which we got from AT&T). - Providing on-line consulting services. (ACM:CONSULT) - Groups of people (such as the recently formed DEVELOPERS group) who are interested in working on things, such as various projects, and educational classes. > I am trying to get people involved, but the membership has > dropped by an order of magnitude (~200 to about 20) in two years. The latest membership list has 227 members (not including people who have joined in the past 2 weeks or so). Of those, 118 are Undergraduates, with most of the rest being either RPI staff, Alumni, or Grad students. This is up from 120 members about 5 years ago. Membership at meetings has averaged about 30 people per meeting, which is down from about 60 people 5 years ago. Gettting people involved is not easy. They expect to see something already going, and to get something going - we need more people. (If anyone has a solution to this catch-22... please?... pass them along?) Yes, the RPI-ACM is in bad shape, what are we doing about it? (Anyone else is free to borrow these ideas, and yours are well appreciated.) - Trying to increase awareness of what we are and what we do on the campus. How? Posters advertising the meetings, announcements in the campus paper, trying to get the ACM name on programs that students use, etc. - Talking to Information Technology Services (the computing center) to provide additional applications for the Computers in Education project (something that RPI is into nowadays - bringing high-end workstations into Math, Physics, and Chem labs). - Guest talks this semester included demostrations on Virtual Reality and a Beginners Guide to the Internet. More talks and classes are already scheduled for next year. - Moving most of our public files from MTS to UNIX. - Updating our online Consulting service. These are only a start, before we get off the Intensive Care list there are a lot of things that we still have to do: - Getting more resources (books, microphones, information on-line) for our members and the RPI community. - New classes to help connect people who know lots with those who wish to learn lots. - We have a lot of old programs on MTS, we should update them for UNIX. - There are lots of good ideas for new projects, lets get them started and show them to the public. - Run another programming contest (its in the planning stages still), our last one was 2 years ago and was a huge success. (What other club tries to set up a contest where the winners are the ones that can break into an operating system? {: ) - Find a place to store a dozen or so 3b2s, a 3b15, and several other pieces of equipment, and then get them on the campus network for public access. Well... I've babbled enough. I hope I've given some people an idea of what we do. If any of you have additional ideas, I'd love to hear them (cause sometimes I think we can sure use it.) Allen S. Firstenberg (Prisoner) RPI-ACM Secretary (These views do not represent the entire RPI-ACM, but comments and ideas were solicited by many.) ----- prisoner@rpi.edu "Do you know what this means?" prisoner@acm.rpi.edu "Yes, It means I'm free." prisoner@rpitsmts.bitnet "No" -Les Miserables
uhacm@menudo.uh.edu (ACM/UH) (04/28/91)
In article <a2wgc9a@rpi.edu> acm@acm.rpi.edu (RPI-ACM) writes: >As the Secretary for the Student chapter of the ACM at Rensselaer >Polytechnic Institute, I'd like to discuss Naut's points. He >has made several good points, but I'd like to correct a couple of things >about the chapter, and bounce some ideas off the community at large. > [misc info deleted] > >So what is our "main attraction" nowadays? There are several, depending on >the user: >- A social group (SIGFriendlies) >- Providing accounts for the MTS operating system and for the ACM operated > 3b2 UNIX machines (which we got from AT&T). We at ACM/UH are interested in this. Did AT&T give you the 3B2's as a donation for tax purposes? Or did you purchase them? If you bought them, how much did you spend and where did the money come from? We are looking for someone to donate to us a DECserver so we can have terminals connected to the mainframes. The campus uses DECservers to connect to all the main systems available... > >Allen S. Firstenberg (Prisoner) >RPI-ACM Secretary > >(These views do not represent the entire RPI-ACM, but comments and ideas >were solicited by many.) > >----- >prisoner@rpi.edu "Do you know what this means?" >prisoner@acm.rpi.edu "Yes, It means I'm free." >prisoner@rpitsmts.bitnet "No" -Les Miserables Paul Sears ACM/UH Secretary -- ** The Association for Computing Machinery, UHACM@JETSON.UH.EDU ** ** University of Houston Student Chapter UHACM@MENUDO.UH.EDU ** DISCLAIMER: These opinions do not necessarily reflect the polices of ACM, its members, or The University of Houston.
theo.bbs@shark.cs.fau.edu (Theo Heavey) (05/02/91)
nautilus@nuge113.its.rpi.edu (John M Twilley) writes: > Well, I am new to our local chapter, but it is dying... > The main attraction is a talk server like IRC (called Connect). > I am trying to get people involved, but the membership has > dropped by an order of magnitude (~200 to about 20) in two years. > -- What else have you all tried?
cavrak@kira.UUCP (Steve Cavrak) (05/02/91)
One thing that might help would be a routine posting of "table of contents" for the various ACM journals. This would stimulate both journal readership and and net readership. Steve
miller@sctc.com (Steven M. Miller) (05/02/91)
If it wasn't for the SIG's I wouldn't be an ACM member at all. However, even with them the quality seems to vary significantly. I'll put in my plug here for SIGCOMM and SIGOPS. I'm consistently reading their quarterly publications more thoroughly than just about anything else. I've never found CACM to be very interesting, though some of its new departments are starting to catch my interest. However, the new style is distracting and not appropriate for the CACM. The other ACM journals that I've tried seem to be aimed more at the acedemic set than the practioner set. As a result, the ones I've tried have only been single year experiments. Another problem is price/value. I'm seriously considering paying non-member rates to join SIGCOMM and SIGOPS because I don't think that I'm getting what I'm paying for with a full ACM membership. I believe that I get a lot more value out of my IEEE/CS membership. The IEEE seems to support the practioner and the community better by sponsoring standards projects such as POSIX and 802, and their comprehensive tutorials and even videos. Plus their CS journals and other publications are more readable and for me generally more informative and applicable to my work. Additionally, the ACM seems to always be playing catchup to the IEEE. They've recently added their ACM Frontier series of books, and are now starting to sponsor some of the group orientated benefits such as insurance and so on that the IEEE has had for years. And since I'm already getting them from the IEEE I'm not going to take advantage of them. Maybe the ACM can turn it around, but this is likely my last year as an ACM member. -Steve
theo.bbs@shark.cs.fau.edu (Theo Heavey) (05/03/91)
miller@sctc.com (Steven M. Miller) writes: > Maybe the ACM can turn it around, but this is likely my last year as an > ACM member. > > -Steve Steve: Sine Pres White has made membership services #1 on the Assn agenda this is the perfect time to tell ACM what you would like to see... Group Insurance, mementos, credit cards seem to have been around for awhile now --- just not marketed as well as it should have been. You see the new look and sections in the CACM -- well the readers spoke up and the Assn changed it! Remember ACM is almost a total volunteer force concerned with computing --- we do not have the large staff that IEEE has. I know what you are saying about IEEE/CS but it has all of that EE stuff I just do not need. Speak up --- here is the perfect chance! Theo Heavey Florida Atlantic University
ntm1169@dsacg3.dsac.dla.mil (Mott Given) (05/04/91)
From article <1991May2.040855.16423@sctc.com>, by miller@sctc.com (Steven M. Miller):
> If it wasn't for the SIG's I wouldn't be an ACM member at all.
I agree with your completely. I have joined our local chapter and the
SIGART group, but the national ACM has become rather expensive to maintain
a membership in. multics@acm.rpi.edu (Richard Shetron) (05/06/91)
I dropped out of the national ACM for the same reasons mentioned here by others. The 'free' journals that came with membership were the ones I didn't want and never read, while the ones I had to pay extra for were the ones I did want. I could not justify paying the money for a membership that did so little for me. It wasn't so bad as a student, but after I graduated it became too expensive. -- A good bureaucracy is the best tool of oppression ever invented. Richard Shetron USERFXLG@mts.rpi.edu multics@rpi.edu