[OGRUG] R Flashmob

[Dan Goldstein]

Dear Ottawa R Users,

We're organizing an "R Flashmob" to get students and researchers asking
and answering R questions on the very useful questions site
"stackoverflow.com" during one fun-filled hour. 

We were wondering if you might help out in promoting this event by
blogging something about it and/or emailing it to students or
researchers who would benefit by having a friendly, efficient resource
for asking and answering R questions. It would be great if you could! 

An easily-forwarded invitation is below.

Thanks on behalf of the R Flashmob #2 organizers,
Dan Goldstein
Michael E. Driscoll
JD Long

(Also at http://www.decisionsciencenews.com/?p=1042 )

>From: The R Flashmob Project
>Subject: R Flashmob #2
>
>You are invited to take part in R Flashmob, the project that makes the
>world a better place by posting helpful questions and answers about the
>R statistical language to the programmer's Q & A site stackoverflow.com
>
>Please forward this to other people you know who might like to join.
>
>FAQ
>
>Q. Why would I want to join an inexplicable R mob?
>
>A. Tons of other people are doing it.
>
>Q. Why else?
>
>A. Stackoverflow was built specifically for handling programming
questions.
>It's a better mousetrap. It offers search (and is well indexed by
search engines),
>tagging, voting, the ability to choose the "best" answer to a question,
and the ability to
>edit questions and answers as technology progresses. It has a karma
system to
>reward people who are happy to help and discourage MLJs (mailing list
jerks).
>
>Q. Do the organizers of this MOB have any commercial interest in
stackoverflow?
>
A. None at all. We're just convinced it is the best way to help and
promote R. All
>the content submitted to stackoverflow is protected by a Creative
Commons
>CC-Wiki License, meaning anyone is free to copy, distribute, transmit,
and
>remix the information on stackoverflow. All the content on
stackoverflow is
>regularly made available for download by the public.
>
>INSTRUCTIONS - R MOB #2
>Location: stackoverflow.com
>Start Date: Tuesday, September 8th, 2009
>Start Time:
>10:04 AM - US Pacific
>11:04 AM - US Mountain
>12:04 PM - US Central
>1:04 PM - Ottawa, Canada 
>6:04 PM - UK
>7:04 PM - Continental W. Europe
>5:04 AM (Weds) - New Zealand (birthplace of R)
>Duration: 50 minutes
>
>(1) At some point during the day on September 8th, synchronize your
watch to
>
http://timeanddate.com/worldclock/personal.html?cities=137,75,64,188,179
,136,37,22 
>
>(2) The mob should form at precisely 4 minutes past the hour and not
beforehand.
>
>(3) At 4 minutes past the hour, you should arrive at stackoverflow.com,
log in,
>and post 3 R questions. Be sure to tag the questions "R". See the
posting
>guidelines at http://stackoverflow.com/faq to understand what makes a
good
>question.
>
>(4) Follow R Flashmob updates at http://twitter.com/rstatsmob
>
>(5) Post twitter messages tagged #rstats and #rstatsmob during the mob,
>providing links to your questions.
>
>(6) During the R MOB, you can chat with other participants on the #R
channel
>on IRC (freenode). To do this, install the Chatzilla extension on
Firefox.
>Click "freenode" on the main screen. Then type /join #R in the field at
the
>bottom of the screen. Then chat.
>
>(7) If you finish posting your three questions within the 50 minutes,
stick
> around to answer questions and give "up votes" to good questions and
answers.
>
>(8) IMPORTANT: After posting, sign the R Flashmob guestbook at
>http://bit.ly/6F8B2
>
>(9) Return to what you would otherwise have been doing. Await
>instructions for R MOB #3.

--
Dan Goldstein | Assistant Professor of Marketing
London Business School S232 | Regent's Park 
London NW1 4SA | United Kingdom | +44 20 7000 8611
www.decisionsciencenews.com

______________________________________________________________________

This email has been scanned by the MessageLabs Email Security System
on behalf of the London Business School community.
For more information please visit http://www.messagelabs.com/email