Mladen:

# There is no more sense of community, OUG meetings are now a sheer
marketing push, without any really useful technical information.

Which OUG are you talking about specifically? The IOUG or ???

The local groups vary tremendously but any of the local ones probably
vary quite a bit topic by topic meeting by meeting.

It takes time and energy and motivation to present to the local user
groups and obviously the quality of presentations depends on not only
those 3 factors but also the person presenting and along with their
presentation skills ( if any ) how much deep techical useable
knowledge they have.

In other words ... if you think you have things to contribute
technically get out there!

I have been a member of my user group for almost 15 years and an
officer for the last 4 years. It does take committed people to keep
these groups flourishing or even just still meeting.

Many of the meetings unfortunately do at times run out of
presenters ... and at that time it is easy enough to borrow the use of
one of the local Oracle people who often do put together a
presentation light on the technical side and more biased toward
sales.

On Fri, 03 Dec 2010 08:45:50 -0800, John Hurley wrote:

NYOUG, happening in the Big Apple, every now and then.

Why would I want to do that? Is this yet another motivational speech? I
spent a fair amount of bandwidth explaining that there is no sense of
community, that everything has turned into a marketing push and that
Oracle is doling out technical information to the precious few, using so
called "oracle ACE program", and you tell me to "get out and contribute"?
To whom? For what purpose? Community has to have some common principles,
in order to be successful. I see none.


I'd gladly work for a common goal and a common good, but I have problems
accepting the bottom line of the Oracle Corp. as a common good.


It's very hard to make a good presentation when there are very few
technical details on what is there to present. Also, OEM has killed
almost all 3rd party monitoring tools. In order to use OEM effectively,
one has to buy performance and diagnostics tuning packs, which are rather
expensive. I suspect that suppressing the internal knowledge of the
database is done on purpose, to push sales of diagnostics and performance
tuning packs.

I dislike their attitude, I dislike their behavior and pricing and I've
even been told that DBA personnel like me is no longer welcome to the
"community" by none other than Larry Ellison. Why in the world would I
"get out and present"? I will leave that to DBA 2.0. In cards, the card
with number 2 is sometimes called a deuce. In the world of Oracle, so
called "DBA 2.0" is frequently referred to as a dunce, which rhymes with
deuce. I am not a dunce. Let them present to the community. I have better
things to do. If Oracle Corp. wants to win me back, they'll have to work
on it. Nuno is right, Oracle Corp. will reap what they sow, just as
everybody else.


--
http://mgogala.byethost5.com

Mladen:

# It's very hard to make a good presentation when there are very few
technical details on what is there to present.

You appear to have your mind made up and would rather complain about
the user groups than participate to help the user groups. Fair
enough ... everyone makes their choices.

It does take a fair amount of time and energy and commitment to
develop a presentation for one of the user groups. I always think of
this time as ( hopefully ) providing some benefit to the people
attending the user group meeting and not something directly linked to
Oracle Corporation etc.

The presentations that we have at my user group ( Northeast Ohio
Oracle User Group ... http://www.neooug.org ) span a broad range of
topics going from DBA centric ones to Developer centric ones
( probably too many DBA ones ) and from advanced to introductory. The
proposition that OEM has killed off all relevant technical topics and
details seems a little off base. I am working on one for the January
meeting on Shared Pool Monitoring that is totally independent of any
mandatory licensing implications.

On Fri, 03 Dec 2010 12:51:50 -0800, John Hurley wrote:

John, personal argument is an ancient oratory trick. It's so old that it
even has a Latin name, "argumentum ad hominem". Unfortunately, accusing
me for having my mind made up can in no way invalidate any my arguments.
I had more than 2 decades to study Oracle Corp. and make up my mind.
To remind you, the arguments are that Oracle Corp. is not very
forthcoming with the technical information and that these meetings are a
marketing push. That is my personal experience from quite a few OUG
meetings. I've probably been an Oracle user for a longer than you. I've
published a few articles in NYOUG magazine, even one in the Select
Magazine for the international OUG. Been there, done that. Unfortunately,
I no longer see any sense in doing that. This oratory trick with a
personal attack is quite pathetic, really.
I don't want to turn this debate into a personal quarrel between you and
me, I am expressing my opinion as a long time Oracle user. You as an OUG
officer and someone who wants to see ROI for the investment made in
Oracle technology probably dislike such a candid opinion but I can't help
you there. However, you should ask yourself what did Oracle Corp. do
wrong to put off such long time users and proponents as Nuno and me. I am
not a witch, I am you.




--
http://mgogala.byethost5.com

Mladen Gogala wrote,on my timestamp of 4/12/2010 1:56 PM:


Just a quick note here. I've grown so tired of the whole OUG experience that I
don't bother anymore. I vented my feelings and opinion about the way the OUGs
and conferences were run in NSW to the national AusOUG manager back in 2003.

The result was shortly after, AusOUG canceled all conferences in NSW and Qld and
only does them in Victoria and WA now.

Of course: all the "groupies" claim those two states are the only ones with
"quality" Oracle dbas. It only shows their perfect idiocy and lack of any
professionalism.

Meanwhile I and a few other NSW dbas, fed up with the constant useless marketing
hype at the infrequent AusOUG meetings, have started another group called the
Sydney Oracle Meetup. Alex Gorbachev and Pythian helped us start it and still
contribute regularly, thanks guys! Now, THERE is a team of Oracle supporters, if
I ever saw one. They do a better job than the entire Oracle marketing in NSW!

In two weeks time we have Cary Millsap talking at one of our regular meetings.
And we've had a great many international "stars" talking there. As well as
local "coal face" dbas. That means yours truly and the other members. Only
technical talk, thank you.

Of course when any services company approaches us to transform the SOM into yet
another marketing circus, we refuse point blank.

And of course Oracle Australia refuses to sponsor us in any shape or format,
unless we "show an audience of at least 30". Funny thing though: the AUSOUG NSW
chapter has meetings with less than half our attendants (same for Vic, Qld and
WA, BTW), but has full tactical as well as financial support from Oracle.

I wonder why?

What, I am not "supporting" Oracle in an equally valid REAL user group?
Ah yes: they want me to "toe the line" and support their useless circus?
I've got two words to answer that, and the first one starts with "F".

Mladen Gogala wrote,on my timestamp of 5/12/2010 8:33 AM:


You mean Larry will go for another plastic surgery "stretch"?

Mladen:

# John, personal argument is an ancient oratory trick. It's so old
that it even has a Latin name, "argumentum ad hominem". Unfortunately,
accusing me for having my mind made up can in no way invalidate any my
arguments.

I was not trying to argue dude. You have strong opinions and are
entitled to any and all of them.

I was trying to point out that it takes a lot of time and energy and
dedication to develop quality technical presentations for any
audience ... whether that is in a "formal semi affiliated" Oracle User
Group or some other manner.

Nuno appears to have gone off the "semi affiliated" pathway and still
be contributing ... points to him for that effort.

User groups without a lot of people taking time to develop quality
presentations can fall into accepting a lot of marketing based
presentations from the local Oracle people ... that's just the way the
ball bounces.

John Hurley wrote,on my timestamp of 9/12/2010 12:07 AM:


Or lots of marketing presentations from the service provider companies that own
those groups top to bottom. That is the main problem here. They stopped being
"user" groups, to become "marketing" groups.
Useless. (if you pardon the pun)