Last Chance – Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce Technology Leader of the Year Awards Application Deadline: February 2

by Steve Earle | Dec 29, 2014 | Marketing, Newsletters

Apply Online

Highlights individuals and organizations with extraordinary technological hands-on experience whose management of technology resources or technological innovations have made outstanding contributions to their organization and the community. These leaders guide the effective use of technology to improve their company’s business performance or to develop new markets or products and have made significant positive contributions to the South Florida technology community.

Contact: Maribel Pozo 305-577-5477: mpozo@miamichamber.com

FLUX Welcomes John McLaughlin

by Steve Earle | Dec 29, 2014 | Marketing, Newsletters

Hello everybody,

If there’s one thing we are familiar with in the world of computing, it’s change. And now it is time for change at FLUX. Over the last few months some of our longtime members have been running our meetings while I was out of town. Now I am moving up to New Hampshire and we need a new president for the group.

We are very fortunate that John McLaughlin has stepped forward to take on the job. I’ve known John for many years and have worked with him on several volunteer events. John has technical experience in the Linux world, he has lots of contacts throughout the South Florida tech community, and he has great ideas to spread the word about FLUX and keep the group relevant and useful for everyone.

FLUX is going to kick off 2015 in a big way. The speaker for our January meeting is Jim Wildman of Red Hat. Jim is a Field Engineer and a true FOSS evangelist. He was our guest speaker at the 2013 ITPalooza event and gave an amazing talk. The meeting announcement and details will be posted shortly. Meanwhile please mark your calendar for the second Thursday of January.

I’d like to thank lots of people for their efforts on behalf of FLUX. There’s not room to thank everyone, but here are a few:

Thanks to Nova Southeastern University for all of their support over the many years we have been around. NSU has provided meeting space and other support and not asked anything in return. Not many colleges have a community outreach ethic like this and we are very fortunate that NSU has been here for us all this time.

FLUX has always been an all-volunteer group, and I especially want to thank all of the group members who have shared their knowledge by giving a talk at a FLUX meeting over the past sixteen years. It’s not just a FLUX tradition but part of the Linux way of doing things, and you should be proud of your contribution to the Linux community.

Quite a few people have asked to help the group while remaining anonymous. I can’t name them, but many thanks to the people who have donated hardware, hosting for our website, worked on the site, and helped pay for refreshments every month.

And of course thanks to you, everyone who has attended FLUX meetings and events.

Please join me in welcoming John McLaughlin as the new president of FLUX. I know he will continue our best traditions and also expand the group and continue its success after so many other Linux user groups have disappeared. Here’s a short bio of John:

• Using UNIX since 1979 (V7 on a PDF-11/45 with my friend ed(1))
• Helped form and run the SFUUG (South Florida Unix Users Group) in 1987 for many years.
• Worked for 15 years @ Sun during the “UNIX wars”
• Formed and ran a Sun Local User Group (SLUG). Later became VP of national Sun Users Group (SUG)
• Have been publishing IT Newsletters for 16+ years – See http://it.systemnews.com
• Work for a “software defined storage” vendor – Nexenta Systems
• Have been a Linux admin for 15+ years
• ITPalooza organizer (The 3rd annual event this month was a big hit with 1800+ attendees)
• Runs three South Florida, after-work, networking events for IT professionals every month – See vbeers.org

Here is John’s Resume.

It has been a lot of fun, and sometimes a little scary, to run the FLUX group all these years. I’m sure I have forgotten to thank lots of people who have worked to keep the group going, but I appreciate everyone who has been part of FLUX since we founded it in 1997.

I look forward to seeing everyone when I visit South Florida, and I’ll be on the mailing lists and social media sites too. Meanwhile, everyone please mark your calendar and keep going to FLUX meetings. This is a very special group of people and it’s South Florida’s Linux community!

Posted by  Adam Glass:
http://www.flux.org/announcements.php?show=185

Diversity brings diversity

by Steve Earle | Dec 22, 2014 | Marketing, Newsletters

With Christmas literally around the corner, I’m reminded just how lucky we are to live in such a culturally diverse part of the world. South Florida in general and Miami in particular is home to people from around the world – and not just during the holidays. It is this cultural diversity that make our IT community so strong and I believe a contributing factor to the regions success as a tech hub. Diversity brings with it a different view of the world and a different approach to solving problems. So stop thinking ‘outside the box’ and start thinking inside our community’, there’s a lot more going on than meets the eye.

SherlockTech becomes SherlockTalent

You may have noticed our on going re-branding campaign. We will continue the process of becoming SherlockTalent over the months ahead but as you can see from this edition of our newsletter, we are getting there. The re-branding has proved to be a deeply thought provoking process, not only because of the many changes that need to be made but because it has given us the opportunity to re-examine our core benefits and to assert our belief that we live in extraordinary times surrounded by incredible opportunities.

Your Feedback Counts

by Steve Earle | Dec 15, 2014 | Marketing, Newsletters

Anyone who has been involved in managing an event like ITPalooza understands the complex logistics that go on in the background but most visitors to events and trade-shows, are not exposed to the nitty-gritty.

I would like to invite anyone who was involved with ITPalooza at any level, either visitor, speaker, sponsor, volunteer, to participate in the short ITPalooza Survey found below in the news letter.

Your input and feedback will help us make the event even more successful in 2015.