A question to this list regarding Fedora as a Product

Sun Feb 21 16:58:42 UTC 2010

+1 

--- On Sat, 2/20/10, Nelson Marques <07721 at ipam.pt> wrote:

> From: Nelson Marques <07721 at ipam.pt>
> Subject: Re: A question to this list regarding Fedora as a Product
> To: "For discussions about marketing and expanding the Fedora user base" <marketing at lists.fedoraproject.org>
> Date: Saturday, February 20, 2010, 10:23 AM
> 
> 
> On Sat, 2010-02-20 at 11:53 -0500, Paul W. Frields wrote:
> > On Fri, Feb 19, 2010 at 03:18:03PM -0500, David Nalley
> wrote:
> > > On Fri, Feb 19, 2010 at 3:07 PM, Nelson Marques
> <07721 at ipam.pt>
> wrote:
> > > >  From what I could understand, two
> goals to reach:
> > > >
> > > >  - Increase the number of Fedora users
> > > >  - Increase the number of Fedora
> contributors
> > > 
> > > Well I'd say that's a misconception.
> > > Fedora is concerned with growing it's contributor
> base and advancing
> > > the state of free software.
> > > 
> > > Fedora isn't at all concerned with the "getting
> mindshare above all
> > > else" type of mentality that most orgs have.
> While we want and like
> > > users, I don't think that we actively try and
> seek out what people
> > > want as driving our decisions.
> > 
> > At the same time, though, we're trying to identify
> places where we are
> > actually *driving away* users.  Through more
> attention to these
> > problems and the many easy fixes we could put in
> place, we can do
> > better on both of the goals Nelson mentions.
> > 
> > Our aim is not to carpet-bomb the planet with CDs, nor
> to just
> > accumulate fans.  We prefer to define and follow
> more sustainable
> > practices, aided by strong engineering and good
> upstream partnership
> > with the projects creating important and innovative
> software.
> > 
> 
>  My idea is not to change how Fedora operates neither boss
> people
> around. I shouldn't go technical on this one but this is
> important to
> mention, and it's about segmentation. It is important to
> segment your
> audience (doesn't mean you need to change your product).
> Keep in mind
> that Fedora is aimed for a international community, and
> that very
> community has different goals and perceives value (from
> Fedora) in a
> different way from individual to individual. You need to
> segment your
> communication, else it won't work. 
> 
>  There are other things that Fedora has that need some
> work, I'll point
> two of them that need a lot of work at communication
> level:
> 
>  - SELinux (being rivaled by Novell's AppArmour)
>  - Red Hat FOSS drivers (check the output of several
> communities about
> this news, ex: slashdot threat).
> 
>  The last one points clearly for several types of users,
> those who don't
> really need outstanding 3D performance, and those who
> explore this
> subject on a more technical point of view and show
> different advantages.
> 
>  Threads like the one on Slashdot could be avoided if there
> was good
> communication around that topic. Another disruptive fight
> is going
> around GNOME and gnome-shell vs gnome-panel.
> 
>  All of this could be sorted out by marketing. Those who
> believe that
> Marketing is a sales force, are completely wrong. Marketing
> has the most
> powerful diagnose tools at it's service for issues like
> this one. See it
> this way: If you are sick, you search for a doctor for a
> diagnose and
> then you get a set of conditions to fulfill in order to
> improve your
> situation. An organization should use Marketing not only to
> support
> sales, advertising and so on, but to diagnose as well
> itself and it's
> product in order to achieve it's goals. Marketing might
> provide a good
> set of procedures to improve it.
> 
>  Everyone forgets a single point, Fedora at some point
> promotes the
> technology created by it's sponsor Red Hat. If you fall
> back in users
> related to other distributions supported by Red Hat
> competitors,
> eventually in a 10/15 year time frame, all this users that
> are currently
> using other distro's will hit the market, and they will
> flavour as their
> tools those they work for a long time.
> 
>  I might have a degree on Marketing and not on Engineering,
> which
> doesn't mean I've worked years packaging software the
> former Center of
> Telecommunication Studies in Portugal (nowadays Portugal
> Telecom
> Innovation S.A.).
>  I used SuSE back then at home, and was forced to work with
> Red Hat, and
> since then I'm far more comfortable with Red Hat/Fedora
> than with SuSE
> itself. If I needed to choose between distro's taking
> productivity in
> mind, I would go Red Hat for sure because of the strong
> background I
> have with it.
> 
>  This will apply to the users that somehow people want to
> neglect.
> Eventually the Industry and it's professionals at a later
> stage will
> reflect what we do today.
> 
>  The higher the number of users, the better it will serve
> Fedora and
> it's sponsors in the future. I might be wrong on this.
> 
>  To finish, people can't expect to keep a community if we
> don't provide
> them challenges and if we don't incentivate them to
> cooperate. By
> statements like: 
> 
> "I don't think that we actively try and seek out what
> people want as
> driving our decisions." 
>  
>  We are doing exactly what we shouldn't, marginalizing the
> users. We
> don't have to be driven by what people want, but we should
> try to
> understand their needs and provide the right communication
> segmented for
> them in order that we can offer them a product that they
> recognize value
> on it.
> 
>  Expectation > Satisfaction = Loose situation
>  Satisfaction > Expectation = Win Situation (and you can
> only achieve
> this if you don't neglect your users and if you understand
> then, and
> most important of all, if we can answer to their needs).
> 
>  From the marketing point of view, Quality is not achieved
> by security,
> stability or whatever, it comes as easy as:
> 
>  Quality = Expectation - Satizfaction
> 
>  Positive = Quality 
>  Negative = No Quality
> 
>  This is how users perceive Quality. If we can asnwer them
> accordingly,
> I would believe that everyone has something to win, Fedora
> as a
> community, Fedora as a Product, Red Hat as a sponsor and
> technology
> enabler and above all, all users.
> 
>  Keep in mind the following as it is always true:
> 
>  Organization Goal: Profit (might come in different
> flavours,
> capital/finantial profit, social profit, etc), for Fedora
> community I
> would recon it would translate better into social profit.
>  Organization Means: Product/Service (always)
>  Organization Target: People (always)
>  
>  People/Consumers/Users, whatever is always the key
> element. Neglecting
> their role on this "symbiotic ecosystem" is not wise.
> 
>  There is no point in being a King without people to rule.
> 
>  NM
> 
>  PS: This is a personal opinion, nothing more, nothing
> less.
> 
> > -- 
> > Paul W. Frields         
>                
>       http://paul.frields.org/
> >   gpg fingerprint: 3DA6 A0AC 6D58 FEC4
> 0233  5906 ACDB C937 BD11 3717
> >   http://redhat.com/   -  - 
> -  -   http://pfrields.fedorapeople.org/
> >           Where
> open source multiplies: http://opensource.com
> 
> 
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