Hey!  Is the PHP User Group still viable and is there a meeting in Houston this evening?

Bill McCuistion

On Apr 10, 2012, at 9:56 AM, Joao Prado Maia <[address removed]> wrote:

> Guys,
> 
> This is a sort of tough email to have to write, but I feel this is needed in light of recent meetings. I have been organizing the group for the past 7 years or so (maybe even more?), and this issue has never happened to the extent that it is happening over the past few months.
> 
> We have a problem in our group: there are always a good number of people who RSVP to meetings, and then never show up. In some ways this is kind of what comes from doing public free meetings like we do, in that anyone can join us, or not. Nothing wrong with it, and from my time running the group I have seen this happen many times before.
> 
> However, what seems to be happening more is that an average of 60% of people that RSVP to an event never actually come to the meetings. I would understand if this number was around 20%, but 60% (or more) is just a sign that there is something very wrong going on.
> 
> For the past two months we had 18-25 people RSVP'ing to the meeting, but we only got around 8-10 people show up for the actual event. This past meeting where we had the MySQL presenter fly in from Atlanta, only 8 people showed up (including myself and the speaker). There were 25 people RSVP'ed to the meeting.
> 
> I understand that some unexpected thing might happen that would require some people to change their plans, but this type of thing is happening every month, and it's slowly destroying the group's reputation.
> 
> In the future I might actually have to turn down presentation offers because I can't be sure if more than 10 people will show up for the event. It wouldn't make financial sense for a company to send someone over to Houston, when fewer than 10 people come to the event.
> 
> My only recourse in this situation is the obvious one -- ask you to not RSVP if you don't plan to come. If you initially responded with an RSVP, and later changed your mind, please update your status on meetup.com.
> 
> Again, I have lots and lots of meetings under my time here with the group, and I have seen all kinds of problems crop up. Weather being nasty, getting lost on the way over, etc. You have my cell phone number if you need help getting to the meeting location.
> 
> I understand that this stuff happens, but 60% (or even 75% at the last meeting) of people that RSVP'ed not showing up seems to me to be a different problem altogether. If this type of thing continues, there won't be much of a point to keep the group running.
> 
> I'm asking for your help to get this issue corrected immediately, or we won't be able to continue much longer.
> 
> Regards,
> --Joao
> 
> 
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