Mac Users and Nature Lovers Mix
It’s a warm Saturday afternoon in Santa Rosa, California. A 30-something woman sporting long, blonde hippie hair sells homemade soaps, lotions, and a dizzying array of dried herbs. The gentleman next door with the John Lennon glasses offers beeswax candles, scented oils, and grinding stones. Displays of incense, herbs, potions, and perfumes line the walkways at the local junior college as hundreds of nature-loving Northern Californians meander through on their way to the Mac Computer Expo.

A Local Show
Welcome to the North Coast Mac Users Group (NCMUG) seventh annual fundraiser. Co-sponsored by the Santa Rosa Junior College Computer and Information Science Department, the show attracts over 2,500 people from four surrounding counties. Attendees can visit with Macintosh product vendors, buy and sell used equipment at the swap meet, participate in a huge raffle, bid on prize packages offered for silent auction, or attend breakout sessions designed to better acquaint folks with Macintosh.

There were people waiting at the door to get in at 10am.

“We do breakout sessions every hour,” says Lorene Romero, President of North Coast Mac. “We run two workshops at a time, one for new users and one for those more advanced. For example, we’ll run the new user meeting at the same time as the session on Filemaker Pro. Or we’ll run the extensions and other Mac mysteries class alongside something like Internet search or web design.”

Geeks and Freaks Unite
So what’s with the herb festival just outside the door? “We have this yin-yang thing going,” laughs Romero, “geeks and freaks together. Last year it just happened by coincidence. The day we had our event inside the cafeteria, they had the herb fest going outside. It went so well—because you’ve got all those “Think different” types coming and going back and forth —we had double the foot traffic. So many turned out to be Macintosh users and owners.”

user at a booth

ncmug logo


The guy in charge of our swap meet belongs to the mushroom group over here—he’s a biologist. So he ends up working both events.
schedule of events

Romero invites the entire community to participate. Local merchants donate weekend getaways, meals, and balloon rides for two, among other things. In return, NCMUG helps them with their computer issues. It’s all about relationships.

Humble Beginnings
NCMUG has been around since 1984. Most of its 500 members are local, though some live as far away as Mexico. They offer a newsletter, web site, email discussion list, and tech help for members. About 100 people attend monthly meetings at the local Doubletree hotel. Vendors frequently visit to show their latest wares, and the monthly agenda almost always includes a Q&A session for folks who need help with their Macs. Several special interest groups meet separately, including one for new users.

“I’m humbled by the fact that I’m the president of a very active user group,” says Romero. “Five years ago, I’d never even touched a computer. It just tells me that the Mac is so easy that you can work your way up from not even knowing where the on button is to organizing an event like this.”

This year’s Mac Computer Expo will be held on Saturday, September 16, 2000, from 9:30am – 3:30pm at Santa Rosa Junior College, Santa Rosa, California. See the NCMUG web site for details. Get involved. Find a user group near you.


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