Recruiting ideas

[Michael]

I exchanged a few PM's with DanC earlier on today and here are a couple of idea's that the conversation sparked:

1) The forum needs META-tags that have the right keywords for distributing computing and then the URL's should be submitted to the major search engines. That way, the team pages will pop up high when ever anyone does a search under the topic. This applies to the team pages as well as the forum page.

2) With school back in session, that means that school newspapers are also back. Corporations very often write press releases and background information that is quoted word for word in small newspapers and trade magazines. If the team had something like that, members could modify it and submit articles to school and community papers.

Michael

 

[Orange Kid]

Michael;
sounds like a good idea, you'll have to sharpen your pencil

I have meta tags on my site, will do some submitting.
Not good at submission though

 

[BurntKooshie]

or we could have some pages on the team website (WHEN IT GETS UP.......ViRGE.....get the website up! ) use meta tages instead of the forum.....

 

[RaySun2Be]

Great Ideas! Let's don't stop there!

Come On Team Anandtech let's put the TA Brain Trust (=all of us together) in high gear and everyone come up with a recruiting idea and post it here.

Several Suggested Guidelines:
1. All ideas be carefully considered, don't ingore any that seem a bit wild or far-fetched. They just might work!
2. Respect the originator. No need for flames, put downs, etc. That stuff only kills motivation to submit ideas. Someone who has been quiet or lurking before is just as likely to have an idea that works.
3. We work within (maybe strech a little?) the guidelines of Distributed.net, and Anandtech. Without them, we wouldn't be here.
4. Everyone take a shot at coming up with recruiting ideas!

I'll donate a weeks worth of blocks to whomever comes up with a plan that works!

So how about it? Everyone up to the challenge? Or are we going to let things slide? Come on, I dare ya! I double dare ya!!

Do it for Russ, Do it for Dan, Do it for the Gimpy, DO IT FOR TA!

From the Styx song:
Aaww, come on COME ON, get back on your feet, your the one they can't beat and they know it....aaww come on COME ON, let's see what you've got, just take your best shot and don't blow it yeah, yeah, yeah .....

Let's get this thing done!

 

[Michael]

I've seen a few posts about Usenet. Spamming is strongly discouraged, but answering questions with the info and a link to our FAQ's would be acceptable.

Michael

ps - a small edit. People who are inexperienced with the internet should tread very, very carefully on Usenet. Usenet is not a BBS on a website. There are many people on Usenet who you do not want to piss off and they take spamming very seriously.

 

[Ken g6]

I notice there is no link to the "Join TA RC5" page on Anandtech anywhere on our present site. I suggest we either copy the RC5 FAQ into the D.Net area, make a frame with the FAQ in the bottom, or at least add a link to it! I notice the page already has meta tags, so we may be getting hits, but they may be confused.

Likewise, I think the SETI section should probably either directly link to our SETI page, or at least have it in a frame. I wouldn't recommend an Iframe anywhere, as I couldn't see the frame, on Netscape. :Q

Edit: that I in italics looked like something else.

Edit2: Okay, I finally found the link, but it should be more obvious. Something like

<< How to join Team Anandtech, from http://www.anandtech.com/rc5.html >>

followed by the FAQ would be ideal. Note that I mean these as quick fixes until ViRGE gets the site up...

 

[Ken g6]

Also, I don't know if anyone saw my idea before, but what if we put a check box on the interactive stats sign-up page (automatically checked, of course) to join the Team Anandtech RC5 Mailing List. I don't know if you can get that to work with the EGroups list, but I understand mailing lists aren't too hard to set up, and wouldn't it look more professional to get mail from teamanandtech.com anyway?

 

[Wulf]

Ive started a fairly simple way of getting people to join TA. I offer discounts to TA members on stuff I sell in the For sale trade forum .

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.cfm?catid=45&amp;threadid=224906

 

[Wulf]

Heck...while your at it you could give stuff away to TA members. Something like &quot;Free hardware to Team Anandtech members&quot; in the title is bound to get alot of looks. Even if its just an old hard drive, floppy or a 486 cpu or something

 

[DanC]

Nice... great ideas guys - Keep 'em coming.
What about the SETI and OGR folks? - Will they trade blocks now for help from us later? - even a small percentage will help.

How about getting chummy with a SysAdmin at the local city? - Lot's of machines doing nothing for 16 hours a day....

 

[sciencewhiz]

I just changed my PIII 500 to RC5 for a week or two (at least until MF6 is done)

I am also donating my 386 40 motherboard and cpu for use in recruiting more people to TA. I think I also have an ISA video card with like 256k of memory

 

[Wulf]

Maybe we could all donate some old hardware and have a raffle in one or more of the other forums. Entry fee could be joining TA? Or maybe make it open to TA members only(new people welcome to apply, hint hint).

I have a 486 mobo with cpu and ram(all unidentified) and a 486(66?) with mobo, ram, video,sound, and controller cards Im not going to use.
I was going to donate it using my idea above but if we can come up with a better idea for it Im game .

 

[RC]

sceincewhiz: Thanks for temporarily contributing your P3 500 to a good cause.

Is anyone else on the SETI/OGR teams in a position to make a temporary donation of RC5 blocks?

Also, if anyone has a friend that runs an Internet Cafe this could be a potential resource.

 

[Ken g6]

I'll add my PII to RC5 if Sukhoi and Bighurt will...

BTW, will the team store be up soon so I can put a TA poster on my dorm door?

 

[RC]

Ken_g6: Many thanks for the offer to help out TA RC5. All I can say is that I hope Sukhoi and Bighurt are as generous as you. However, I want to make it clear that nobody should feel that they are obligated to help the cause. It's strictly a voluntary action.

Once again - My sincere appreciation for making such a generous offer.

 

[Michael]

I'm not going to switch SETI power over to RC5. I think that it is self defeating to recruit from other TA projects. The best recruits are people who do not belong to TA at all. That way it is a net plus for us all.

Michael

 

[RC]

Michael: I totally agree. However, the very generous donation made by sciencewhiz and potentially by ken_g6 is not recruitment in that they both have clearly stated that the offer was strictly temporary.

I feel no animosity towards any project within Team Ananadtech.

If I had a tremendous amount of hardware I would probably be on all the projects. LOL

 

[DanC]

Michael - your quote from the other thread is entirely appropriate in this one.



<< Date Posted: Sep/03/2000 12:11 PM

DanC is correct, Russ sending him an email to recruit would be spamming (under Dnet's view of the world). What would not be spamming is LANMAN sending an email with congrats and a query about what sort of computing power is behind the numbers. If a couple of emails get exchanged, then maybe TA will get talked about.

Michael >>



I think you may be onto something... and what a nice way to begin a conversation. It may be important to specify NON-TA members (so we don't get into another MT discussion)

 

[Slapstick]

Well, what I?ve been doing lately is &quot;charging&quot; people for the PC help I give by asking them to join one of the projects for a month, (only if they aren?t involved in one already) and hopefully they will be hooked by the end of that time. So far 2 for SETI, (I?m thinking I?ll have to specify RC5 since the comments so far have been, &quot;but SETI has that cool screen saver&quot.

 

[RaySun2Be]

Some interesting ideas so far, and to be fair and follow the ground rules, Paulson's idea should be included as he is thinking outside the box :

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.cfm?catid=39&amp;threadid=227060



Let's keep up the efforts.

Thanks Michael for starting this thread!.

This is where we should be spending energy instead of replying to Troll posts.

 

[Kwatt]

A couple of weeks ago the manager where I'm staying ask me to help him get a computer to get just do email.

Not long after that I found some old computers at a garage sale and bought them. 2-$5 14&quot; vga monitors, $10 for a 486 with a quad speed cd-rom and a 500 Mb HD, and a win 95 COA/CD. I had a p166 with MoBo not being used. I put it together added a old 33.6 modem found a cheap ISP.($15)
Set it up at their place with the condition that they leave it on 24/7. They are having fun playing FreeCell and sending Email to family around the country. And its cracking 24/7. They are already talking about getting a faster computer too! With 17&quot; monitor.

Already 2 other neighbors have ask me to be on the look out for them one at yard sales.

I have already found everything I need for a P133 system but the MoBo.
So, I'll be going to yard sales this weekend.

This is just something that works for me maybe someone else can try it. And this way I don't have to pay the power bill for the PC or the AC to cool my place down.

Kwatt

 

[Dantoo]

From Michaels original post:

http://&quot;1) The forum needs META-tags that have the right keywords for distributing computing and then the URL's should be submitted to the major search engines. That way, the team pages will pop up high when ever anyone does a search under the topic. This applies to the team pages as well as the forum page&quot;

At least a couple of the mini-teams have web pages in incipient construction. Surely submitting these in the right way to the search engines should help people that come &quot;looking&quot;.

My thinking currently is along the lines, &quot;If Russ hadn't jumped in and scolded me, would I have ever heard of RC5?&quot;

Now there hundreds of teams and tens of thousands of players out there. TA has this forum to recruit with. How are the other teams so successful at recruiting. How did /. put that effort together? Can we examine what else is working in the market and put it to work for us. Clearly we want to become the &quot;name brand&quot; in a section of the market.

To reach out to your customer is part of marketing but so is knowing who your customer is. &quot;Who&quot; are the people at /.? How many more of them are out there, unattached, just waiting to hear about us. Who are they, where are they, what do they read/listen to/play with.

I wonder if I'll be arrested if I hold up a TA recruiting slogan at the Olympics?

 

[sciencewhiz]

donating?!?

I thought I was trading for a week of TA cube's output















Just wanted to keep this on the front page