The Ubuntu Membership Board is responsible for approving new Ubuntu members. I interviewed our board members in order for the Community to get to know them better and get over the fear of applying to Membership.

The third interviewee is El Achèche ANIS:

What do you do for a career?

Right now I’m working as an IT guy (SysAdmin, DBA, NetAdmin, some DevOps, etc..) a job that I, somehow, got because of the Ubuntu community 🙂

What was your first computing experience?

I don’t really remmeber what was, the only thing that I remember is a when my cousin give me more than 100 CDs full of programs to intall and try, that was before I got a ADSL line.. I was so happy, speding the whole weekend trying every single software on those CDs..

How long have you been involved with Ubuntu?

I joined the LoCo Team since September 2009.. After some months I joined the team in an event for 1st time ever, meeting nizarus, the Spiritual father of my LoCo Team.. Since then I was trying to be more and more involved in the team.. Till I joined the Ubuntu-tn board team.. And then a whole new adventure starts 😀

Since you are all fairly new to the Board, why did you join?

My main goal is to motivate myself, being part of a LoCo which was #1 prioritie after my Family and seing myelf almost alone in my LoCo and seing it having less activities is really a demotivating thing.. And I can tell you that I’m not disappointed at all 🙂 😀

The second goal was to be more involved with the international Community, and as a Board memeber, reviewing the condidates Wikis and LP accounts activites, is a good opportunity to see what people all arround the world are doing to help the community, and have a new inspiration source to try to kick-off again my LoCo..

What are some of the projects you’ve worked on in Ubuntu over the years?

Most of my contributions was arround my LoCo.. Supporting users, try to keep our Wiki updated (that was a real strugle x( ), Helping translating some Ubuntu strings and of course planning many events in the Tunisian Universities.

What is your focus in Ubuntu today?

I believe that the main focus of everybody should be the Community it self, during the last years I saw many people joined the community then left to join others, the bright side here that they joined other FOSS communities, which is a great thing because after all we are a FOSS community too.. But the dark side that we are not able (maybe am the only one who feels like that, I don’t know) to make new Ubuntu users involved in the communty.

Do you contribute to other free/open source projects? Which ones?

Right now the main FOSS project that I’m contributing to is Ubuntu & the community, but I try to help anyone who’s looking for technical support on IRC or Social Networks.

If you were to give a newcomer some advice about getting involved with Ubuntu, what would it be?

If you’re not having fun, you’re doing it wrong.. So have fun and meet new people and learn about new cultures 🙂

Do you have any other comments else you wish to share with the community?

You’re contributing to Ubuntu for many years now? People arround you thinks that you should’ve be a Ubuntu Member since many years? So what are you waiting for, go ahead an apply

Originally posted here by Svetlana Belkin on June 25, 2015

The Ubuntu Membership Board is responsible for approving new Ubuntu members. I interviewed our board members in order for the Community to get to know them better and get over the fear of applying to Membership.

The second interviewee is Walter Lapchynski:

What do you do for a career?

I’ve worked for local custom bicycle manufacturer for 14 years now, having done nearly every job. Currently, I do sales and also help in Information Services with project management and general sysadminy kind of stuff.

What was your first computing experience?

Ah, my Commodore 128. How I miss it. Got it when I was 8 and read the whole manual and was programming BASIC at 10.

How long have you been involved with Ubuntu?

I had played with Ubuntu many times but it was the 12.04 release of Lubuntu that really pulled me into the community. I came to the IRC channel to ask a question and everyone was so nice I just hung around and started helping.

Since you are all fairly new to the Board, why did you join?

I recognize that leadership is not a skill everyone has, nor one that everyone wants to flex, yet I feel it comes fairly naturally to me. I felt that there was a need and decided to join. Beyond that, I have a curiousity about the governance of the Ubuntu community in general. In Lubuntu, we are constantly in need of contributors, and I felt that anything I could do to facilitate more sustained contribution would be worthwhile. Finally, I wanted to act as a voice for our lesser known flavors within the governance structure.

What are some of the projects you’ve worked on in Ubuntu over the years?

Mostly Lubuntu, where I’ve done a little bit of everything except development. Currently, I’m the Release Manager and Head of QA. I’m also now on the LoCo Council and am the Team Leader for our Ubuntu Oregon LoCo.

What is your focus in Ubuntu today?

As above, Lubuntu. The big thing I want to do is encourage more contributions, especially to bug triage where we are particularly lacking. I want to help with packaing/development, too, so that’s in the works. I’d like to continue to contribute to the community and hope to help with the Community Council when terms expire. Finally, for the Ubuntu Oregon LoCo, I’d like to continue to grow us and make us more active. I also play with Ubuntu Touch and Snappy (on a Raspberry Pi 2) on the side.

Do you contribute to other free/open source projects? Which ones?

I would say that there is no sustained contributions I have anywhere else, though there’s lots of open source projects that I write bug reports for or help test. The latest one that comes to mind is OpenKeychain, a PGP tool for Android.

If you were to give a newcomer some advice about getting involved with Ubuntu, what would it be?

Whoever you are, whatever your skills are, don’t be shy! Not only is there likely a place for your existing skills, but there are lots of friendly people that are often more than happy to help you learn new ones. You do not need to write code to contribute. In fact, there’s a lot of things that the community needs that are not technical. Think about a manufacturer. Sure, they have a production area, and they have engineers, and quality control people, and everything you think about when you think about manufacturing, but don’t forget they also have leaders, marketers, documenters, support staff, etc. The business literally would not run without them.

Do you have any other comments else you wish to share with the community?

Just a note about open source. Maybe you’ve never thought about contribution. You’re a user, your software works, you don’t need anything else. I certainly understand that. There is no requirement to contribute. In fact, in a world full of proprietary and commercial products, you are outright discouraged to contribute. Wouldn’t want to void the warranty. With that in mind, contribution sounds like a pretty alien thing because it is.

Contributing to open source software is more like joining a cause. Uniting with like-minded people for a common purpose. Sure that purpose is only software, but it allows us an opportunity to participate in our world rather than simply being in it. Even the smallest contribution can make a big difference.

Now imagine a whole world where every product encouraged contribution, or better yet, all of life? What if governments operated with transparency and our voices made a significant difference? What if we collectively worked together to find the right solution rather than simply choosing the quick one? Maybe I’m going out on a limb here, but what if we moved beyond money and consumerism and instead acted out of egalitarianism? What if the source code to all of life was available to us and we could start hacking it at will? Well, it is, and we can.

As a user of a fringe operating system (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_systems), you probably already realize that there are many opportunities for change in the world, just waiting for someone to seize them. Now you just need to realize that you can facilitate these sweeping changes through incremental improvements.

That being said, start with something you know, and do something small. Maybe file one really good bug report. Maybe make some documentation. Maybe just spread the word. Whatever you do, join the revolution. Open source is about so much more than just code.

Originally posted here by Svetlana Belkin on June 19, 2015