Free Software Evangelism, revisited

[Shane M. Coughlan]

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Ben Finney wrote:
>> Call me a scientist, but I prefer results we can measure.
> 
> As do I. How then do we measure our success if the purpose of a
> particular evangelist is to sell an idea?

Excellent question.

We need to clearly define the purpose of the evangelism.  For instance:
(1) Teach people about an idea
(2) Get people to adopt an idea

In the case of (1) the objective is simply to present an idea and allow
people to draw their own conclusions.  If the audience stay until the
end of the talk the objective has been reached.

In the case of (2) the objective is the obtain a high percentage of
'buy-in' from the audience.  If the audience absorb and adopt the
presented idea the objective has been reached.

If we are genuinely selling an idea then we should expect both (1) and
(2) to occur.  Therefore our best measure for success might be to
determine a percentage of the audience we expect to carry with us
through objective (2).

What percentage is reasonable?  That has to be decided by the people
doing the presentations.  Perhaps 50% or above could be regarded as a
good level of success.  If less that 50% of an audience buy into an idea
after the presentation perhaps something is going wrong.

Shane

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Shane Martin Coughlan
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