The notorious nutsack (cc-by-2.0)
The conference pack for LugRadioLive was called a “nutsack” for some reason (anyone know why?). It seems like a pretty good pack, as far as these things go.
First of all, it’s a durable paper bag, so much greener than plastic. It contained:
- the event programme/schedule
- a LUGRADIO LIVE badge which I only discovered when I tipped the bag out,
- a key-shaped yahoo keyring – I don’t know what it’s meant to symbolise and I already have one far-too-big novelty keyring – seems like a total waste of metal
- UKUUG t-shirt with amusing slogan on the back and a membership application form – tempting, especially since AFFS seems to be idling since I quit and ORG is a self-perpetuator AFAICT
- flier for PyCon UK 12-14 Sep 2008 Birmingham
- subscription form for the £50/year Linux Magazine
-
flier for LinuxPro Magazine’s conference streaming which says “no special software is required”. Well, users actually have a choice of Java, MPlayer, Real, WindowsMediaPlayer or anything else which can view an Ogg Theora stream, which is pretty good, but not quite “no special software”. ffplay seemed unhappy in my first tests, with errors like “[vorbis @ 0xb7dbc430]Not a Vorbis I audio packet.
[theora @ 0xb7dbc430]Warning, unsupported keyframe coding type?!
[theora @ 0xb7dbc430]Header packet passed to frame decoder, skipping” which I’ll follow up RSN, unless any kind soul knows how to fix that. - a bytemark pen – always handy to advertise a decent hosting company at people in business meetings, but I don’t think it’s refillable, so that’s not going to last long,
- a fun goodbye postcard from Birmingham Perl Mongers to LugRadio – it’s actually a digital photo print, which seems a really good idea that I’ve not seen done before
- CDs of ubuntu 8.04 LTS Desktop Edition (oh well) and openSUSE 11.0 (oh dear)
All in all, smarter than your average conference pack… or am I just thinking that because it looks a bit like a picnic?
You would also have got an Ubuntu UK Podcast sticker, but the company printing company delivered them on the Tuesday _after_ the event 🙁
Not sure about the “so much greener” comment about durable paper bags. The main downside with plastic is the impact on wildlife when carelessly disposed of; aside from that plastic seems thoroughly greener (needs less energy and resources to create, much less impact in terms of transport etc.). I know a number of very conscious food businesses who’ve moved back from paper to plastic.
In fact, I worry that the move to better-built bags (be they paper, plastic, cotton, whatever) will actually make the problem worse – I re-use bags all the time without needing stronger ones, and it’s the re-use that needs to be encouraged.
Alan Pope – I don’t use Ubuntu, so I don’t mind missing out on Ubuntu UK Podcast stuff. By the way, how much do Canonical pay for it?
AlexH – I think another major downside of plastic is how fragile they are. The ones which are “less energy and resources” like the new Sainsburys bags are thin and stretch and tear hopelessly easily. Also, our paper recycling is collected from our doorstep – plastic bag recycling collection is in a neighbouring supermarket (but if most people remember their bags, they’re going to re-use, aren’t they?).
Environmental comparison of paper and plastic: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/graphic/2007/10/03/GR2007100301385.html
I agree that re-use is best, though: is there an efficient way to do a conference pack like that? Does it work if they put the fliers in a line and let people pick up what they want?
The key-shaped keyrings are bottle openers.
D’oh! User Interface Design? FAIL.
The key rings are indeed bottle openers, but I’m sticking with my OpenSolaris one for the time being since it looks cooler, uses the word “open” in a rather apt way and Sun haven’t screwed over my email accounts forcing me to move to Gmail.
To find what the name “nut sack” is referring to you can take a look between your legs. From the sophisticated humour that brought us the “Mass Debate” 😛
Yeah, I got that meaning of the name, but why call the conference pack that? Dog’s bollocks reference or what?
[…] – MJ Ray: What was in my Nutsack? (from Lug Radio Live) saved by […]
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Someone’s asking for how to recycle bottle-openers at http://www.recyclethis.co.uk/20090327/how-can-i-reuse-or-recycle-promotional-bottle-openers