Message from the AUUG Board

[David Purdue]

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Dear AUUG member,

Over the last two years the AUUG board has made a conscious effort to
refocus the organisation, to make it clear who we are and what we stand
for, to satisfy ourselves that we know AUUG's raison d'être.

We believe we have made significant progress, and have taken on board
the feedback from members - in particular that AUUG should retain it's
identity as an organisation that promotes Open Standards and supports
Unix professionals, whilst re-emphasising AUUG's long standing support
for Open Source of all kinds. As a result we have formulated the tag
line "The Organisation for Unix, Linux and Open Source Professionals,"
and formed a clear message on how AUUG complements other organisations
such as Linux Australia, OSIA, SAGE-AU and the LUGs.

In order to gain momentum, we have concentrated on three activities:

* staging the annual conference,

* developing and enhancing the new website to make it a valuable
  resource for members and to allow more timely and effective
  communication,

* and the production of software DVD's.

The feedback from members (and others) has been largely positive - the
conference is healthy and has a lot of respect both locally and
internationally, we have had many positive comments on the new web site,
and requests for particular DVD content. The response to the recent call
for former members to renew has also been positive, showing that there
are a number of people who want to see AUUG continue.

The problem we face right now is the need for new blood - some members
on the current board have become jaded, or need to spend time on their
own businesses or their day jobs (or both!). This of course has been
made worse by Liz Carroll's departure - which has meant we lost a
driving force for AUUG, and the board has had to share the load in the
interim period whilst we re-assess the job requirements and recruit new
staff.

But we have a serious problem - there was an underwhelming response to
the recent call for nominations for the annual election of board
members. Perhaps it was a sign that members are largely happy with the
current board, or perhaps it just reflected the "busyness" of everyones
lives ... but in order to maintain momentum we need to recruit new board
members with drive and enthusiasm for the organisation, and we need more
members to get involved with AUUG activities and to work on taking AUUG
forward.

Whilst there are members of the board who are willing to carry on with
helping to direct and promote AUUG*, the key roles of President,
Secretary and Treasurer remain vacant. AUUG also needs to go through the
process of hiring a CEO who can organise the volunteers, drive the
board, and lead AUUG to the growth needed to sustain itself and deliver
better value to members. Although a number of board members are willing
to renominate, please do not hold back from putting your name forward if
you can serve, as new blood on the board would be very healthy for AUUG.

The alternative is that the current board membership will continue, but
begin the process of either winding AUUG down (retaining the web site as
a repository of AUUG history and donating any remaining assets to causes
consistent with the aims of AUUG such as the John Lions Chair at UNSW)
or looking to merge with another organisation. Neither of these options
is particularly attractive, but at least AUUG is now in a position where
we could take that route and not lose the 30+ years of AUUG history and
identity.

With that in mind, we are reopening the call for nominations, albeit on
a tight timescale before the end of the present board members' terms of
office.

The commitment would be two face-to-face meetings a year, plus perhaps
one telephone conference call per month, and the willingness to take
responsibility for one particular area (e.g. coordination of the DVD
production) and drive that process by getting others involved to share
the load. And one of the continuing board members would work with you to
help ease the transition and act as a "board mentor".

You can nominate by filling in the attached nomination form and faxing
it to AUUG on 02 8824 9522. Please don't be concerned if you can't find
three people to nominate you - send your form in anyway and we will find
people to nominate you. Nominations should be sent by Friday, 16th June
2006.



David Purdue
President
AUUG Inc.






* Current board members who are willing to carry on are:


David Purdue as Immediate Past President
Steve Landers as Vice President
Gordon Hubbard as Ordinary Committee Member
Jonathon Coombes as Ordinary Committee Member
Susie Close as Ordinary Committee Member
Adrian Close as Ordinary Committee Member
Grant Allen as Ordinary Committee Member
Greg Lehey as President if necessary

In addition, David Purdue is willing to carry on carrying out
administrative functions (membership processing, bookkeeping, etc.)
until this can be passed to an employee or outsourced.
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