[LA.pm] Fwd: hollywood.pm.org

[Terrence Brannon]

On 2/2/06, Kevin Scaldeferri <kevin+lapm at scaldeferri.com> wrote:

> Personally, I find it a little mindboggling to see one person who works
> in WeHo and can't make it to SM, and another basically vice-versa.  I
> mean, that's what, 5 or 6 miles?

it's 11 miles: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&hl=en&saddr=West+Hollywood,+CA&daddr=Santa+Monica,+CA&ll=34.05262,-118.42596&spn=0.189444,0.192261

>  Hardly "the entire length of the
> city".
>

yeah, but in LA during the week, that is unpredictably grueling.
Unlike Chicago and NYC where you can get anywhere in predictable times
because of the extensive and punctual train system, in LA, you have to
climb into a car and pray.


> Do folks realize that people used to come from *Irvine* to attend LAJUG
> meetings in Pasadena?

Doug Wilson came from Laguna Beach to Burbank for the bdfoy meeting!

>
> It starts to sound like the problem is really that people aren't all
> that interested in having a group (or that their interest isn't being
> engaged),

yes, when Tim Bunce came to Thousand Oaks Perl Mongers, people were
coming out of the woodworks. And one guy did in fact come from Santa
Monica for the meeting.

who wants to put time and effort and gas and risk of accident into
hearing Terrence Brannon huff-and-puff about HTML::Seamstress versus
the same risks to hear Andy Wardley talk about Template Toolkit?

>rather than that there is a problem with location.

Location is a factor. If you can just work a little later and saunter
over to the conference room for a talk versus battling traffic (which
might mean going in the opposite direction from home), it does factor
in.

>
> I'm sorry to pick on people, and I hope you don't take it personally,
> but I really think that the root problem isn't where the meetings are
> or aren't located.

go_home_and_watch_the_lakers() # instead of going to LA.pm
  if ($location + $quality_of_speaker + $quality_of_topic +
$wife_not_bitching + $kids_doing_fine_on_homework +
$no_overtime_needed_at_work) < $threshold;

it's a multi-variable equation and each of us has our own weights to
add to each of the factors.

>
>
> -kevin
>
--
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