Who wants to volunteer to help photo.net grow?

[marshall]

Philip -

 

I'd be very interested in helping photo.net use the base of users it's got and grow into a more powerful tool and an even more compelling forum. My situation would allow me to contribute a fair amount of time in the short term. I have 4 years experience in online product management, focused on enhancing and introducing products for consumers (10 years overall in consumer-oriented product management). Of course, if your need is primarily technical, I'm not of much use there, having had access to a group of programmers .

 

Where I could help:

- moderating

- editing, nudging, and writing as experience allow (and expert help - I'm not an expert in most of the areas where expert advice is necessary) to help add tutorial and educational content

- as exposure allows, thinking about other ways to enhance the experience of photo.net

 

 

So, I guess largely 2, 3, and 5 (unfortunately needing to learn the tech side), but also willing to help in other ways. I do live in the Boston area.

 

I've been "into" photography for the last 15 years, though I've

too often found myself short on time for it. And, uh, the last really good movie I saw was "Wag the Dog"...

[regular tim]

This is what I do for a living, and I'd like to help improve photo.net's availability. I might be able to handle some subset of alerts (as appropriate) piped to my pager, if you have a good monitoring system; if not I can build one (more precisely, adapt the system I customized for work). Likewise if you want to trust me with the enable password on your router, you won't be the only one. I don't really want to deal with people other than contributors, and it's a bit of a waste of time for a novice like me to try and moderate, but some extremely large companies and agencies trust me with their data, and I'd like to think you could, too.

 

Sorry about the private email to philg, I scanned straight from the title to the list of tasks. I probably could commit to 4-8 hours/week of as-needed assistance, sometimes more, sometimes less (depending on my workload).

[sliu]

I posted my response early this morning. Now I want to add some comments and suggestions.

<p>

The list Philip made is very detailed and organized. That is very helpful for volunteers to find their position. This list also explains why photo.net is one of the best web site on the internet. The quality of a web site or any system depends largely on the clarity of the mind and techincal quality of the designers. Hardware and software come after that.

<p>

The whole idea of this post is a breakthrough for photo.net. It allows photo.net to grow from a personal hobby and a small team project to a big truely internet based community system (see the diversity of these volunteers).

That is very exciting. On yesterday's NY Times (Curcuits, 3/28), there is an article "As the Web Matures, Fun is Hard to Find".

We all agree that we find fun here in photo.net. But it would be more fun if many of us can do something for it and raise this baby by ourselves.

<p>

The importance of this techincal list made by Philip is the list itself. Once you have this list, you can enhance it and make it better. Once you open your mind, there is no way back. I strongly support the idea of "501c3 non-profit corporation". That will make photo.net fully devoted to photography itself instead of its share holders.

<p>

<hr>

One technical suggestion. It seems the current user accounts on photo.net are plain flat account without group permissions. If you make user accounts true UNIX-like accounts with group permissions, you can form different groups and build internal group BBS/Forum/Email aliases. This is also easy to manage.

<p>

One financial suggestion. Many of the users on photo.net own business in photography industry. It would be helpful to give them some space to provide their service on photo.net (a.k.a. yellow page) if they pay small amount of fees. They can also give discounts to photo.net users if they want ;-). This is a win-win game.

[Jim_Tardio]

I can help a few hours a week with 2,3 & 5.

[pphaneuf]

While I don't have heaps of time, like most people, I'd love to go in and fix something once in a while.

 

Making anonymous CVS access possible could allow people like me to check out the current code base, see if they can do something and contribute back a patch.

 

For example, it's been about 6 months I've been mentioning my availability to do some cleaning up on the photodb equipment tables content (removing duplicates, and so on) to Rajeev and Lisa. I have been told that as soon as some UI was written to do this, I would be able to do it.

 

While I have more experience with Apache/mod_perl/PostgreSQL, I could certainly hack some interface to do this kind of stuff.

 

Also, some people might like having access to the actual code of a working, popular web site for educational purposes. Some kind of web interface to CVS would be nice, though optional.

[michael_alexander3]

5 to 8 hours a week. I'm borderline qualified for the following:

 

#2 - User Handholding - There are many areas of photo.net that I haven't explored, so there is some risk that a use would ask about some area I haven't been to. I have done support before (answering calls from users with problems).

 

#4 - Bug Tracking - Lately I've been working as a Cobol/Perl programmer so I'm familiar with bugs.

 

#5 - Managing Editorial - I have used Unix and HTML. I have a personal web site where some of the HTML code was generated by Perl programs that I wrote. I don't know Unix editors.

 

#6 - Programming - I would have to learn some stuff to do this. Lately I've been working as a Cobol/Perl programmer and I have used Unix and C in the past.

 

#8 - Database Administration - I have used Unix and SQL in the past. I don't use them currently. I've never used Oracle, but would like to learn it.

[rich long]

I could donate a few hours per week (4-8?) on any or all of items 1 through 4. This is a great site for learning about photography, I'd be happy to help keep it that way to the best of my limited abilities. The non-profit status isn't extremely important to me.

[jennifer_waak]

Phil, I'd be happy to help out for about 5-10 hours week. Switching to a non-profit means nothing to me (mostly because I'm not really sure what that means). I just want to keep the site up and productive -- I've found it to be a tremendous resource.

 

I can help with anything in the 1-5 range (although I'm not crazy about #3). I have about 10 years of IT development and management experience, most recently a few years with the web. I know HTML fairly well and have a decent, but not stupendous, knowledge of Unix and vi. I think that my strong suit is actually the people end of things -- I'm told that I'm really good at explaining technical things to even the most non-technical person so they can understand it.

 

BTW, I know of a pretty good web-based bug tracking system if you are interested (and I know how to customize it).

[rmohan]

Phil,

#8) I can handle the database administration for Oracle. I'll commit 2 hrs a week(I can put more hrs but I can't commit now) on one weekday on-site in the evening (if u can help with parking in Boston). I work as a Datawarehouse Architect for a large company near Boston. I am quite familiar with Oracle database. I can offer my data-modeling and dba expertise.

 

Rajesh

rmohan26@yahoo.com

[rom]

Hi,

I can probably help by contributing around 4 hours every week. This is a welcomed break from my work (writing my dissertation, managing students' grades, etc.). I am from GMT+8 timezone and would probably be able to do the work that is needed whilst you guys are resting.

 

Areas that I can work on:

1. User account management. My experience with this one - well, I manage our college mail and web server - managing accounts is not unfamiliar.

2. User Expulsion. I have several Yahoo! groups under me and have expelled quite a number of spammers and non-conforming users from the mailing list.

 

Cheers!

[wayne_crider4]

10. I'll produce your new photonet TV show and/or serve coffee and donuts.

[chrisober]

<UL>1, 2, 3, 4, 5</UL>

<UL>Couple of hours a day.</UL>

<UL>7 years NT/2000 and Domino system administration, some Linux and Solaris, user support and training.</UL>

<UL>I'll help whatever status photo.net takes.</UL>

[2yellowdogs]

I'd be happy to help. While not a computer expert, I'd be qualified to help with either user account management, user handholding or user expulsion.

 

As far as qualifications, I've been a lurker and sometime poster around here for a couple of years now. I'm what would be considered a serious amateur with a pretty good knowledge of photographic basics.

 

I'd be willing to work 4-6 hours per week in the evenings or on weekends. Just let me know what you need.

[sliu]

It seems that most of the volunteers you mentioned in the list are computer

related. Photo.net also needs some well trained art/photograph critics who

can review uploaded photos and write <b>high quality comments</b> to help

people improve their photographic skills. Current rating and critique system

has its shortcomes and no algorithm can beat serious critics.

[dennis jones]

I agree with S Liu... Maybe a panel voted on by members to critique/rate/whatever the photos...and to provide helpful suggestions, recommendations, tearing apart in a humane way to teach useful lessons.....maybe only photos submitted for serious ratings/critiques/whatever. Maybe find a way to use the general populations thumbs up or down before the photo moves on to the panel for serious judgements.....

[matt_jacobs]

I can help with 5, 6 or 7, but I have to admit I don't know TCL, which might be a bit of a problem. I'm comfortable with unix and most other programming languages though. As for physical location, I'm an MIT student, so I'm already in the boston area and probably up well past the point when hard working professional photographers go to bed. Time available would fluctuate greatly depending on whether its final exam time, summer vacation, etc.

[semiotician]

I answered previously and would like to outline.

 

It seems that most offers are from people who have much greater skills in the areas that you require than me.

 

However in regards to IT related matters I am completely self-taught and love learning.

 

My current skills are very much related to basic HTML, however other abilities which may be useful are my problem solving skills and the ability to pick up quickly what needs to be learnt.

 

I am not exactly sure what you mean by Web forms but I have constructed and used various Web forms. Due to my limited knowledge I do not know if what I know is relevant.

 

I would enjoy helping new users learn the ropes of Photo.net because I enjoy the ideals of this site. A place where people work together in a community and learn together.

 

Thanks again for this opportunity to give something back. If you feel that my skills are not what you need perhaps you can provide links where other users in the same position as myself can teach themselves the necessary skills.

[keithneun]

I'm willing to help with 1,2,3,4, and 5 (I've been a heavy user of VI for the past few years. If that's disqualifies me then let's just say 1 through 4). I could swing 4-5 hours a week, perhaps more sometimes. I've been a photo.net reader and contributor since 1996, but lately not so much. Regardless of corporate status, I wouldn't mind giving a little back for the photography education I received from Philip and the likes of Glen Johnson, Don Baccus, Bob Atkins, Dan Smith, Russ Arcuri, etc.

[scott laird]

Although it's looking a bit redundant at the moment, I can

contribute ~5 hours/week on 5-7 and 9. I've been a professional

Unix/Linux administrator for 7-8 years now. I'm currently the

most senior person in a group that runs ~700 Linux and Solaris

systems spread across the US, Europe, and Japan. My TCL

and Oracle skills are a bit rusty (~4 years), but should be good

enough for debugging relatively easy problems. I have quite a

bit of experience with random networking equipment, mostly

Cisco, and I've built a few redundant Linux-based load

balancers. I spend most of my time these days doing perl

programming, dealing with vendors, writing documentation, and

designing large upgrade projects, but I still know my way around

a log file :-).

 

Non-profit status doesn't really matter to me.

[michael_ward1]

I can contribute about ten hours per week, and can do just about any of the listed tasks. I have heavy Linux/Unix (Solaris&AIX) admin, including shell, Perl, vi and emacs. Quite a bit of HTML, but not recently. CGI and non-dba Oracle. I've installed and set up CVS, but not used it a whole lot. I'll be happy to learn AOLserver. Plenty of networking experience and some Linux and AIX load balancing.

 

Just let me know what I can do.

 

Michael Ward

[brian_kennedy]

I volunteer to help with whatever you guys might need. I'm not qualified for tasks 6-9.

[squareframe]

pilot - photo.net Cessna Citation Jet

 

will fly for film

[rputikar]

I would love to contribute to photo.net by volunteering for points 1 through 6.

 

<p>

I can contribute about 5 - 10 hours a week.

 

<p>

I have some experience with ACS and AOLserver. I am fluent in HTML, Unix Shell, editors (vi, emacs...) and CVS.

 

<p>so it doesn't really matter if photo.net is converted to 501c3. (I don't know what 501c3 is, but i guess it will be only organizational change!).

[pmj]

As Nikon Editor, taking care of #5 for the /nikon section seems an obvious task for me. I think all I need right now is SSH access to photo.net and a pointer to the CVS you're using so I can learn how to use it.

[daniel flather]

No programming abilities but I have lots of time to help. Numbers 1 & 2 should be

doable. Hell, I must already receive 15-20 emails a week from members of this site!!<p>

Set me up!!