Press Release Process
Press Release Process - Draft
The goal is to have a simple and understandable process for creating, reviewing and issuing press releases. Feel free to contribute your thoughts and experience.
Once initiated, the process will be driven by a member of the Visibility Committee. There are five basic steps:
1) Conception
Something newsworthy happens - a new software release, for example. The owner of said event wishes to publish this development to a wider audience.
2) Creation
The owner of the newsworthy event or their proxy writes the release to the wiki using a standard template (to come), and notifies the foundation of the url by emailing dev@visibilitycommittee.osgeo.org and board@visibilitycommittee.osgeo.org.
3) Review and Approval
- Review - members of the Board and Visibility Committee will have two days to review and comment on the content of the release.
- Legal review - because the foundation is a legal representative (on the board alias), a quick review by our legal representative will also be performed. This need will be reduced depending on the content of the release and as we ascend the learning curve.
- If other organizations are mentioned in the release, then they will also need to be included in the review process.
The review and approval process is driven by a member of the Visibility Committee, in concert with the initiator.
4) Distribution
The press release gets published to the osgeo-news-publisher alias. This alias will be seeded with journalists and others known to be interested in OSGeo activities, to include:
- GeoPlace.com online
- news:comp.infosystems.gis
- submit.news@consortiuminfo.org (see: http://www.consortiuminfo.org/bulletins/ )
- http://slashgeo.org/submit.pl
- http://linuxtoday.com/contribute.php3
- http://www.newsforge.com/submit.pl
- http://programming.newsforge.com/submit.pl
- http://osx.macnn.com/ (email to news tips)
- http://www.gis-news.de/ (news AT gismngt.de)
- http://www.giscafe.com/ (link: submit material, needs registration)
- http://www.freegis.org
- http://www.directionsmag.com/pressreleases.php (News -> Post Press Release)
- http://www.gismonitor.com/news/submit_news.php
- http://www.gisdevelopment.net (click on 'Submit Press Release')
- http://news.eoportal.org
- http://www.foss4g.org/FOSS4G/modules.php?name=Submit_News
5) Translation
The final press release will be posted on the OSGeo site for translation by volunteers for localization and distribution to local news agencies.