Mauro Gaspari | Membership Application

Community Membership
1

Hello,

My name is Mauro Gaspari, and I would like to submit my application to become an Ubuntu Member.

Past and current contributions

  • I have been involved with Linux since the late 1990s, and I have jumped on board with Ubuntu since its first release. I have been promoting the use of Ubuntu Server with all my commercial clients at my previous jobs, and I have also been spreading the word about Ubuntu and Ubuntu flavors with friends, clients, and people I have met over the years. I am one of those people who always has a few USB thumb drives at hand with Ubuntu ready to go.
  • I contributed to the documentation of the openconnect server, mostly testing on Debian, Ubuntu, and Gentoo. You can find some of my documentation efforts here: https://ocserv.gitlab.io/www/recipes.html
  • I have been part of various Linux communities, such as Destination Linux and Tux Digital, for a long time, and I have been involved in writing articles mostly for Ubuntu Flavors for various sites, such as Front Page Linux: https://frontpagelinux.com/author/ilvipero/
  • I helped Ubuntu Studio with some articles and tutorials on JACK audio. Those articles can also be found on Front Page Linux: https://frontpagelinux.com/author/ilvipero/
  • I am the community manager for Ubuntu Budgie. My responsibilities within the team are mostly around managing donations, the swag store, the community, social media, and communications. You can find some of my articles here: https://ubuntubudgie.org/blog/
  • I am creating themes for Chrome and Chromium-based browsers with artwork from the Ubuntu Wallpaper competition winners: https://discourse.ubuntu.com/t/mantic-minotaur-23-10-wallpaper-competition/37235/121
  • I have been fortunate enough to be the main organizer for the Ubuntu Summit 2022 and 2023. It was a great experience for me to be able to work with so many great people from the FOSS community. Ubuntu Summit 2022, Ubuntu Summit 2023, and Ubuntu Summit blogs
  • I am leading the effort into modern communication platforms for the Ubuntu Community: https://discourse.ubuntu.com/t/modern-communication-platforms-call-for-feedback/36763/25
  • I lead the Flavor Sync meetings and work with Flavor representatives and Canonical staff to make sure our official flavors have a great experience. I organize and lead video meetings and in-person meetings each year at the Ubuntu Summit. I write reports on discourse and make sure that issues and requests are properly addressed.
  • I represent Ubuntu and Canonical at various events, such as Akademy and GUADEC. Before each event, I write a blog post and a discourse report afterward. Before reaching the countries I visit for those events, I do my best to reach out to local communities, invite them to the events for a chat, and get people to share their experiences and give us some feedback. While at events, I also promote LoCo activities to people who are not native to the country that hosts the event. When possible, I attend community, inclusion and diversity talks, BoFs, and sessions.

Future plans

These are a few things that I want to do in the near future:

  • Help spread the word about Ubuntu membership and its perks, and encourage people to apply. There are many long-time contributors, and new and energetic community members that should apply and help us shape the future of Ubuntu.
  • Encourage more donations to the Ubuntu Community Donations Fund. With more funds, we can have more community events and activities, and spread the word about Ubuntu even more.
  • Share my knowledge with more Ubuntu people who might benefit from it. Help people who want to form LoCos, Flavors or Ubuntu-related projects, with processes, best practices and documentation on “how to get started”.
  • Bring the workshop “Presentation Skills” I created with Igor Ljubuncic to more events. The goal is to encourage people to step on the stage and tell the world the wonderful things they created with open source.
  • Overall, continue spreading the message that the Ubuntu community is fun, welcoming and awesome all year long!

Launchpad account

My Launchpad account: https://launchpad.net/~ilvipero

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Mauro is a definite +1 from myself as project lead of Ubuntu Budgie

Long overdue i must say.

A key part of the UB team as Community Manager. Well respected by the community as a whole and of course within the team.

Mauro has been involved with planning the future of UB, active in our social media, “singing the budgie tune”, instrumental setting up our matrix channels & bridging other communications channels, organising and running our LTS desktop wallpaper competition, working and bringing in new members of the team … and much much more

Mauro has a wonderful sense of humour. Please accept Mauro as a ubuntu member!

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We (Ubuntu Membership Board) are welcoming the heavyweight undeniable contributors.

I can’t deny @ilvipero contributions to the Ubuntu Community generally and for his assistance and support for me personally.

As the main organizer for both year’s Ubuntu Summit, I would like kudos to you and the organizing teams for such an amazing and unforgettable event. It was packed with knowledge sharing and showcases, community and business networking, a closing party, and much more…

Not to forget, he and the Canonical EA team helped smoothen my journey to both years’ Ubuntu Summit.

Thank you for also helping us the UbuCon Asia organizer to host a successful diversity event collaboration between UbuCon and LibreOffice Conf.

With all his past and current contributions, I personally vote for his membership and welcome him on board! I hope the other Ubuntu Membership Members swiftly approve his application too! :crossed_fingers:

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As part of the Ubuntu Budgie team, I have had the pleasure of working with Mauro for a couple of years. On a personal level, as I am a relative newcomer to contributing to Ubuntu, Mauro has helped me on several occasions to integrate with the wider Ubuntu community. He has always been a very positive force for us at Ubuntu Budgie, whether promoting our project, helping our users, or just getting people involved. I can’t imagine there is a better example of someone who personifies what the Ubuntu community is all about.

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Hiya Mauro,

could you please add yourself to your preferred meeting in the schedule at Membership/Boards - Ubuntu Wiki or indicate which meeting you’d like, and I can add you there. Unfortunately, we don’t schedule beyond one month.

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Huh? Whaaaaat ? You’re not a member yet ??? Totally about time after all the great contributions you have done to the community yet !!

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I’m very glad to see Mauro applying for Ubuntu Membership!

As @fenris mentioned, I would like to appreciate him for organizing Ubuntu Summit - If you have any experience with organizing large scale event, this really requires bunch of efforts and time to make success. And Ubuntu Summit has been one of my best unforgettable experience every year.

I would also like to thank him for many help on organizing UbuCon Asia for help with fundraising (Canonical sponsorship), Bringing Canonical and Ubuntu folks to the event, spreading the words about the event and much more. Without his good guidance on applying for Ubuntu Donations funding, It would be difficult for me to travel to Singapore and Taiwan for attending FOSSASIA and COSCUP for promoting UbuCon Asia and meet potential sponsors this year.

I’m looking forward to see what he will do in the future as one of Ubuntu member :slight_smile:

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I have had the great pleasure and fortune of working with Mauro through his deep involvement in the community. He is an incredibly compassionate and sensible contributor (with a great sense of humor), working to understand the wider impact of decisions, both his own and those of others, as they are made. As a valuable coordinator of both Ubuntu Summits and the regular Flavor syncs, Mauro is not only a strong leader, he is a shining beacon of light, striving to create a cohesive and passionate community. To directly quote the Ubuntu Code of Conduct:

We value discussion, data and decisiveness
We gather opinions, data and commitments from concerned parties before taking a decision. We expect leaders to help teams come to a decision in a reasonable time, to seek guidance or be willing to take the decision themselves when consensus is lacking, and to take responsibility for implementation.
The poorest decision of all is no decision: clarity of direction has value in itself. Sometimes all the data are not available, or consensus is elusive. A decision must still be made. There is no guarantee of a perfect decision every time - we prefer to err, learn, and err less in future than to postpone action indefinitely.
We recognise that the project works better when we trust the teams closest to a problem to make the decision for the project. If we learn of a decision that we disagree with, we can engage the relevant team to find common ground, and failing that, we have a governance structure that can review the decision. Ultimately, if a decision has been taken by the people responsible for it, and is supported by the project governance, it will stand. None of us expects to agree with every decision, and we value highly the willingness to stand by the project and help it deliver even on the occasions when we ourselves may prefer a different route.

To quote my endorsement of Aaron Prisk’s membership application (and this also strongly applies here):

If you ever have doubts as to the depth of his contributions, let me assure you, the countless hours (and straight days) of behind-the-scenes work and sleepless nights, and the tough conversations and decisions required to maintain a resilient community, are taxing, but hold the community up in ways you would not even imagine.

Mauro’s work outside of his direct professional work may also be profound, but his professional work (which carries over into a deep, personal passion for community, or maybe it’s the other way around?) is absolutely resounding and exceptional. We would be incredibly fortunate to welcome Mauro to the official Ubuntu Member ranks; regardless of the decision, I would encourage us all to continue to support and guide Mauro, as he continues in his Ubuntu journey.

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@lucyllewy could you please add me to the meeting Thursday 7 December at 20:00 UTC? If the slot is not available I can join the next session Thursday 7 December at 22:UTC. Thanks!
My IRC nick is: ilvipero

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Hi, @ilvipero

I’ve added you to the 20:00 slot on the 7th of December. This can be changed up to 24 hours prior to the meeting, so don’t feel it is set in stone <3

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I was surprised when I found out that @ilvipero wasn’t already a member because it is without doubt that he should be. Not only is Mauro a great contributor to Ubuntu, he is a wonderful addition to the Linux community as a whole.

As Co-Founder of TuxDigital and Editor in Chief of Front Page Linux, I’ve known Mauro and collaborated with him for years. He is one of the best people I’ve met in the Linux community and in my opinion there should be no need for a vote, he should be made an Ubuntu Member immediately . . . formalities schmoremalities

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I also endorse @ilvipero membership application. I have collaborated with Mauro on multiple community initiatives such as enabling Matrix as a new communication option for the Ubuntu community, both the 2022 and 2023 Ubuntu Summits, and the creation of the Ubuntu HPC community team.

Mauro has been really helpful in being a bridge between business and community, and I am excited to see him contribute even more to the Ubuntu community. I’m excited to see Mauro share his “presentation skills” workshop with the wider Ubuntu community as it is quite good. I saw Mauro and Igor give the workshop during a Canonical sprint, and it was quite good. I am happy to see that Mauro wants to formally share it with the community as it will make us a professional force to be reckoned with at conferences!

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I’m here to endorse @ilvipero 's membership application, although seeing all the endorsements here, I doubt he needs it.

Mauro has done so much for the Ubuntu community and has been a part of the Ubuntu Studio team as well, having written a tutorial for installing Ubuntu Studio’s benefits and components on other official Ubuntu flavors that we have linked from the website to this day. When Mauro joined Canonical as a Community Engineer, I couldn’t think of a more perfect person for the job.

With that, and considering all of these other endorsements, if Mauro can’t be an Ubuntu member, then none of us who are Ubuntu members deserve that title. :slight_smile:

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Mauro is such an incredible force in the Ubuntu community!

I’ve had the honor of working with him on both Ubuntu Summits and he’s reached out for advice on other projects he’s working on. He’s unfailingly enthusiastic, motivated, and best of all, really supportive and excited to help others work on their own projects. He’s full of great ideas, and yet is always eager to include others and find out what they think is exciting and incorporate those ideas into a bigger and greater whole.

All in all, he’s fun to work with, and his enthusiasm and joy for the spirit of Ubuntu is contagious, and that’s even if you’re already an Ubuntu contributor. In my opinion, Ubuntu would only be improved by officially recognizing his vast contributions to the community, and it’s a shame it’s taken so long for it to happen. But in the same spirit, there’s no better time than now!

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Really ditto to what everyone else has said, but let me pile on here. Mauro is a force of nature within the Ubuntu community! His enthusiasm and excitement is infectious and he is constantly making me want to be a better contributor. Mauro really sets the standard for how we should all be engaging within the Ubuntu community.

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I may not know Mauro as well as others here but i’d like to borrow this quote:

Mauro reaches down to pick people up.

He’s checked in with me on a steady basis for over a year in his spare time to help me find the direction i’d like to go in FOSS and helped me find ways to contribute.

He’s made all the difference in the way I perceive Ubuntu and it’s community by introducing me to the people in it’s ecosystem and the things it’s working on.

Mauro invests time in people and their communities and I see any investment in Mauro as a general win.

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@ilvipero you are amazing!!! Not only that you were leading the organization of the best free software conference series I know of, the Ubuntu Summits, I love working with you in the organization team, and I remember your 3.5-hour sleepless night you had with me where I formed the idea of the Snap workshop series, the panels, the most impactful lightning talk I have ever heard about, … you also gave me excellent support on organizing the Opportunity Open Source in the Indian Institute of Technology in Mandi in northern India!! Providing internet infrastructure, swag, a lot of good words and hints to make the conference a real success … Now they are waiting for the second edition …

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kf2V9xpLXHo

An excellent cooperation between the Community Team of Canonical and the Community Team of OpenPrinting …

You are a really good friend of me …

You really deserve to be a Ubuntu Member!

Till

(Project Lead and Community Manager of OpenPrinting)

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We should make @ilvipero an Ubuntu Member right now, Honoris Causa, and not wait for the voting on Dec 7 (where he will probably pass anyway … Who would vote against him?).

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Mark my words: it’ll be unanimous. :grin:

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I have worked with @ilvipero on a variety of projects, I can honestly say that I have not met someone so dedicated, supportive, and willingness to help others in the community. Be it from his drive to adding more gaming options into the Ubuntu Budgie welcome app, easing the install process of getting gaming up and running on Ubuntu Budgie. He has stayed for long haul on multiple charity streams that Tuxdigital has done for variety of charities, such as CURE, St Jude’s Childrens Hospital, and more.

He has been a joy to collaborate with when doing content for Front Page Linux, and various Tuxdigital content. He is always willing to help other people’s project and one of the first people willing to beta test something. He was the willing participant to try out getting CoreCtrl up and going as an available option for the gaming tab in the Ubuntu Budgie welcome app. He is one of the first to reach out and ask the community for feedback in areas that he is looking to improve. He will make a fantastic addition, and I believe should be unanimously approved. As he as done a fanatic job with the last two Ubuntu Summits and running that. He totally encompasses the meaning of Ubuntu.

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