Posted on September 25, 2008 - by jono

Call For Intrepid Release Parties and Ubuntu’s 4th Birthday!

Ladies and Gentleman who love and adore the world most lovable and adorable Operating System, Ubuntu, we plan on releasing Ubuntu 8.10 Intrepid Ibex on October 30th. Now, this release is a pretty special release because not only do we kick out another kick-ass Ubuntu, but October 20th is Ubuntu’s 4th birthday!

As such, it is time to par-taaay. Seriously. The Beastie Boys faught for your right to partaaay, so show some dignity and respect to these rights, and get out there and do it.

So, what is the skinny, I hear you ask? Well, I think it is time for us to put our collective minds together and organise an incredible series of release parties all over the world. On our last release, we had over 60 parties, largely organised by our incredible worldwide LoCo community, and I would love to see us hit nearer to 100 parties for this release, particularly with a birthday to celebrate!

Organising a party is pretty simple:

• Pick a date – I would recommend either Thu 30th October or the following weekend…Sat 1st Nov and Sun 2nd Nov. Pick a date when you can arrange for a bunch of Ubuntu enthusiasts to be in the same building.
• Pick a venue – this can be someone’s back yard, a pub, a university room, a school, a parking lot…wherever. They key thing is not the venue, it is the people. With a venue and date, you are all set to let the world know about it.
• Add your party to this wiki page – this is the big list of Ubuntu release parties.
• Let the world know – blog about it, make up some fliers and put them in computers shops / libraries / cafes / educational establishments etc. Encourage a stack of people to come along to your party.

We have a longer guide to organising a release party here. You can also discuss organising your party on the ubuntu-event-planners mailing list.

When it comes to running your party, there are a bunch of things you can do on the day/evening itself:

• Have a cake – it is a birthday, after all! If you can’t bake a cake, find someone who can.
• Hang out with other Ubuntu people, meet new faces and get to know each other.
• You may want to perform installfests.
• You may also want to organise a few talks and speeches for the event itself.
• Why not make some merchandise to give out? Maybe some badges, stickers or t-shirts?

I will be in San Francisco then, and I am thinking of organising something there too.