Guerrilla Marketing

[OpenXTalkPaul]

So once we have something tangible to share with the world, we should probably promote it in some ways so people looking for such a thing can find it.

One complaint I've seen a lot of, and tend to agree with, about "the mothership" is poor marketing. I mean I've talked a lot about xTalk, Live Coding, HyperCard, etc. on Facebook and I've never once seen an targeted ad for LiveCode on there, why!?!?

Marketing the language is something the Community could've contributed to a LOT more I think. I know I tried to do what I could in that department. If you look at sites like RosettaCode http://rosettacode.org/wiki/Rosetta_Code you'll find a bunch of example code (as well as adding LC to HyperTalk entries where compatible) that I, and one or two others, put there as part of such an effort (it can also be quite useful reference too).

Also, if you google around for words like HyperCard, English-like Programming, xTalk, Natural Language Programming, etc. you'll find articles and StackOverflow or Quora questions about things like that, and you'll find in the comments section, comments from me promoting LiveCode. I don't know if any of that actually helped, but it certainly couldn't have hurt! Obviously LC didn't have any employee doing that kind of thing.

I think it could be great to put together a guerrilla marketing campaign of sorts, an OpenXTalk "street team" that could find free or cheap advertising and search engine optimization opportunities.

[SethMorrow]

I like this idea and I hate to be "that guy", but I'm pretty sure it's "Guerrilla marketing."

istockphoto-1139199739-612x612.jpg (45.67 KiB) Viewed 11862 times

[richmond62]

Presumably that Gorilla is called 'Che' and is not bad at making spelling mistakes.

[OpenXTalkPaul]

I like this idea and I hate to be "that guy", but I'm pretty sure it's "Guerrilla marketing."istockphoto-1139199739-612x612.jpg

Nonsense, please be that guy here! I don't want to be allowed to go around using incorrect spellings

Of course I could've meant Gorillaz Marketing...
"City's breaking down on a camel's back
They just have to go, 'cause they don't know wack
So while you fill the streets, it's appealing to see
You won't get out the county, 'cause you're bad and free
You got a new horizon, it's ephemeral style
A melancholy town where we never smile
And all I wanna hear is the message beep
My dreams, they got a kissing
'Cause I don't get sleep, no"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyHNuVaZJ-k
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAXWR7umFvY

But I didn't, so I corrected the topic.

[OpenXTalkPaul]

This is what I'm talking about.
I see posts like this in various places fairly frequently:

Screen Shot 2021-10-05 at 9.17.54 PM.png (1.99 MiB) Viewed 11820 times

In a very short time this post has >150 likes, tons of comments, most lamenting the lack of a modern HyperCard, not one mention of LC apart from comments by me.

[OpenXTalkPaul]

I'd like to think this was a result of spreading the word on that Facebook post, how do you think this happened?
>> Most users ever online was 39 on Wed Oct 06, 2021 1:14 pm

If just even just one of those sticks around that would be cool IMO!

[xAction]

I block ads and only download what I need when I need it. Doesn't everyone?

A general plan:

1. Get OpenXtalk to be able to build (I hear library dependency is an issue there)
2. Provide Binary Releases
3. Update wikipedia
4. Bug hunt
5. Build all new 'getting started' and 'common example's support documents...thats a monstrous task
6. Partner with Free Software Foundation
7. Get someone like GamesFromScratch to do a little run through, they cover programming alternatives big and small.
8. Then crawl through links like these, contact the authors/websites and let it be known that OpenXtalk is available and does cool stuff.
9. solve programming tasks, and other similar things that people will google and cross post to reddit, stackOverflow, youtube.
10. make comparison videos like "Do x in OpenXTalk vs Python" use machine speech and subtitles, it's all the rage these days.
11. Develop and maintain an absolute beginners introduction to the language and IDE -- might have to be self contained app.

But first, those binaries. Wish I could help but I just get frustrated in Visual Studio...nothing ever works!

[OpenXTalkPaul]

I block ads and only download what I need when I need it. Doesn't everyone?

Not sure what this is reference to? I wasn't talking about an ad, that screenshot was of a post to in a vintage Macintosh FaceBook group where someone else posted a meme about HyperCard.

A general plan:

1. Get OpenXtalk to be able to build (I hear library dependency is an issue there)
2. Provide Binary Releases

Working on that, but first we need to finish de-branding / re-branding, which is NOT a choice that we've made, it's required.
I plan to try to compile on macOS sometime this week (need to download/install some older SDKs first).
As for dependencies, the only problem that I'm aware of there is the Linux Build uses some really old sound library called EsounD (IIRC), which has to be built manually from source separately. I've already modified the existing binaries on Mac and Windows so that they appear as an app called OpenXTalk without even recompiling from source. I don't see a great immediate need to compile the binaries when there hasn't yet been any changes to the C++ source code. All of the branding changes are in scripts, dictionary, links to LC servers changed, logo images replaced, etc.

[*]Update wikipedia
[*]Bug hunt
[*]Build all new 'getting started' and 'common example's support documents...thats a monstrous task
[*] Partner with Free Software Foundation
[*] Get someone like GamesFromScratch to do a little run through, they cover programming alternatives big and small.
[*] Then crawl through links like these, contact the authors/websites and let it be known that OpenXtalk is available and does cool stuff.
[*] solve programming tasks, and other similar things that people will google and cross post to reddit, stackOverflow, youtube.
[*] make comparison videos like "Do x in OpenXTalk vs Python" use machine speech and subtitles, it's all the rage these days.
[*] Develop and maintain an absolute beginners introduction to the language and IDE -- might have to be self contained app.
[/list]

But first, those binaries. Wish I could help but I just get frustrated in Visual Studio...nothing ever works!

Most of those seem like ways you could help without compiling any binaries from source.

I do like the idea of having a YouTube channel, demos and such. I made my own channel to show off my LCB stuff a while ago. I think an OpenXTalk YT channel would be good to have. Could do some videos on how to build extensions with Builder! A video to introduce users of other xTalks to LC/OXT, there's still so many people out there that bring up how great HyperCard was and the last update for that was 23 years ago! Could run HC in an emulator and do the same things in HC and OXT side by side on screen, and then maybe the same with SuperCard, Toolbook, Oracle MediaObjects, etc. Just some ideas. I mean it can't hurt, our advertising budget is $0!