George DeMet (gdemet) is a member of the Drupal Association Advisory Board and Chair of the Drupal.org Content Working Group.

Seven years ago this month, Dries presented the State of Drupal in front of a few dozen developers at the Open Source Content Management System Summit on the Yahoo! campus in Sunnyvale, California. Drupal 5 had just come out, PHPTemplate was all the rage, and everyone was abuzz about the news that the Nigerian Prime Minister was using Drupal for his blog.

Today, Drupal is used by the President of the United States and nearly every other government on the planet, DrupalCons are attended by thousands of people, and PHPTemplate will soon be replaced by Twig in Drupal 8. The Drupal project and community have grown rapidly in a very short amount of time.

The Drupal.org Content Working Group (DCWG) is one of the groups recently chartered by the Drupal Association as part of its ongoing governance initiative for Drupal.org.

The mission of DCWG, as outlined in our charter (https://drupal.org/node/2001502), is, “to make sure that the content on Drupal.org websites is compelling, well-curated, and relevant for all of its various target audiences and supports a content marketing strategy that serves site visitors and generates revenue to make Drupal.org sustainable.”

The Drupal Association has grown rapidly over the past few years and is entering a new stage in its growth from an all-volunteer run organization to one that employs a growing number of paid staff members. Part of this transition is a move from a working (or task-oriented) board of directors to a policy-focused board. The goal of this move is to greatly enhance the transparency and accountability of the Association and provide the board the tools they need to focus on the long-term strategy of the Association.

These changes are necessary in order to lay the foundation for our next stage of growth. To keep our community informed, here's an overview of what's happened so far and where we're going from here.

It's been very busy the last few months at the Drupal Association; so busy in fact, that we haven't had time to tell the community about everything that's been happening!  Here's what's been going on since our last update back in May:

• The Drupal.org redesign and Git migration effort has accelerated dramatically with the addition of several paid contractors to supplement the ongoing volunteer effort. You can view the latest version at beta.drupal.org, and we're looking for members of the community to help us provide quality assurance to ensure a successful launch! This effort is being funded and supported by the Drupal Association.
• DrupalCon, Inc., the United States-based not-for-profit organization that partners with the Drupal Association and other non-profits to organize and promote events that help educate people about Drupal, recently received its 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status. DrupalCon, Inc. was founded in 2008 and is the organization that's been responsible for DrupalCons in Washington D.C., San Francisco, as well as the upcoming DrupalCon Chicago and other events. With its new status, DrupalCon, Inc. will be better able to serve the Drupal community by providing fiscal agency and insurance for DrupalCamps and other local events as well as insurance benefits for its employees.
• This summer, DrupalCon, Inc. provided fiscal agency for DrupalCamps in Chicago, Colorado, New York City, and Connecticut. Support was also provided for Drupal promotion efforts at OSCON 2010, which was held in July in Portland, Oregon.
• The Drupal Association provided support for a survey of DrupalCamps around the world. This survey was intended to help the Association better understand the challenges faced by camp organizers and figure out the most effective ways it can help support and foster local efforts in different parts of the world.
• The Association is in the process of expanding its paid staff with new hires who will help provide support for DrupalCon event management as well as sales and sponsorship coordination.  Open positions can be viewed at association.drupal.org/jobs
• The Association provided logistical support and funded scholarships for DrupalCon Copenhagen, held at the end of August.  DrupalCon Copenhagen attracted over 1,200 Drupal enthusiasts from around the world.
• Growing Venture Solutions (GVS) has been hired to build a new Drupal-based platform that will integrate the best features of past DrupalCon sites and serve as the base for future sites. Regional organizing teams will continue to be responsible for design, theme, and content of individual DrupalCon sites. This platform will be rolled out in the coming weeks for DrupalCon Chicago.
• A revised draft of the Drupal Association's mission statement was released to the community following DrupalCon Copenhagen. This mission statement, which had not been formally defined since the founding of the Association in 2006, helps describe why the organization exists and the different ways in which it supports the Drupal project and its community.
• And finally, the first-ever Drupal Association Town Hall meeting will be held on Friday October 22nd.  This event, which is being held via WebEx and IRC, will give the community the opportunity to find out more about what it is the Association does and how you can help be a part!

As always, we welcome any questions, comments or other feedback you have to offer.  Please post in the comments below, or contact us!
It's been very busy the last few months at the Drupal Association; so busy in fact, that we haven't had time to tell the community about everything that's been happening!  Here's what's been going on since our last update back in May:

• The Drupal.org redesign and Git migration effort has accelerated dramatically with the addition of several paid contractors to supplement the ongoing volunteer effort. You can view the latest version at beta.drupal.org, and we're looking for members of the community to help us provide quality assurance to ensure a successful launch! This effort is being funded and supported by the Drupal Association.
• DrupalCon, Inc., the United States-based not-for-profit organization that partners with the Drupal Association and other non-profits to organize and promote events that help educate people about Drupal, recently received its 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status. DrupalCon, Inc. was founded in 2008 and is the organization that's been responsible for DrupalCons in Washington D.C., San Francisco, as well as the upcoming DrupalCon Chicago and other events. With its new status, DrupalCon, Inc. will be better able to serve the Drupal community by providing fiscal agency and insurance for DrupalCamps and other local events as well as insurance benefits for its employees.
• This summer, DrupalCon, Inc. provided fiscal agency for DrupalCamps in Chicago, Colorado, New York City, and Connecticut. Support was also provided for Drupal promotion efforts at OSCON 2010, which was held in July in Portland, Oregon.
• The Drupal Association provided support for a survey of DrupalCamps around the world. This survey was intended to help the Association better understand the challenges faced by camp organizers and figure out the most effective ways it can help support and foster local efforts in different parts of the world.
• The Association is in the process of expanding its paid staff with new hires who will help provide support for DrupalCon event management as well as sales and sponsorship coordination.  Open positions can be viewed at association.drupal.org/jobs
• The Association provided logistical support and funded scholarships for DrupalCon Copenhagen, held at the end of August.  DrupalCon Copenhagen attracted over 1,200 Drupal enthusiasts from around the world.
• Growing Venture Solutions (GVS) has been hired to build a new Drupal-based platform that will integrate the best features of past DrupalCon sites and serve as the base for future sites. Regional organizing teams will continue to be responsible for design, theme, and content of individual DrupalCon sites. This platform will be rolled out in the coming weeks for DrupalCon Chicago.
• A revised draft of the Drupal Association's mission statement was released to the community following DrupalCon Copenhagen. This mission statement, which had not been formally defined since the founding of the Association in 2006, helps describe why the organization exists and the different ways in which it supports the Drupal project and its community.
• And finally, the first-ever Drupal Association Town Hall meeting will be held on Friday October 22nd.  This event, which is being held via WebEx and IRC, will give the community the opportunity to find out more about what it is the Association does and how you can help be a part!

As always, we welcome any questions, comments or other feedback you have to offer.  Please post in the comments below, or contact us!

Back in April, after DrupalCon San Francisco, Kieran Lal wrote a post for this blog with some ideas for how to effectively grow DrupalCons without losing our soul as a community. One of the key items he focused on was improving session quality. As Kieran put it,

"In order to grow Drupalcon, we need to focus on the quality of the main program. Drupal sessions are still wildly hit or miss, both in session quality and session attendance. As a community, we need to take a hard look in the mirror and raise consistency and quality of every Drupalcon session."

These thoughts have been echoed by many other folks within the community, including Mike Anello, Heather James, and Larry Garfield.

As one of the co-chairs of the upcoming DrupalCon Chicago 2011 and a permanent member of the Drupal Association, I’m writing this follow-up post to talk a little bit more about the things that we’re doing that will hopefully help improve session quality, provide more support to DrupalCon presenters, increase attendee satisfaction, and make for an overall better DrupalCon experience for long-time members of the community and newcomers alike.

But first, a little background:
Back in April, after DrupalCon San Francisco, Kieran Lal wrote a post for this blog with some ideas for how to effectively grow DrupalCons without losing our soul as a community. One of the key items he focused on was improving session quality. As Kieran put it,

"In order to grow Drupalcon, we need to focus on the quality of the main program. Drupal sessions are still wildly hit or miss, both in session quality and session attendance. As a community, we need to take a hard look in the mirror and raise consistency and quality of every Drupalcon session."

These thoughts have been echoed by many other folks within the community, including Mike Anello, Heather James, and Larry Garfield.

As one of the co-chairs of the upcoming DrupalCon Chicago 2011 and a permanent member of the Drupal Association, I’m writing this follow-up post to talk a little bit more about the things that we’re doing that will hopefully help improve session quality, provide more support to DrupalCon presenters, increase attendee satisfaction, and make for an overall better DrupalCon experience for long-time members of the community and newcomers alike.

But first, a little background:

The DrupalCon North American Regional Organizing Group is looking for input from the Drupal community to help pick the location for DrupalCon North America in 2012 and beyond.

The Drupal Association is proud to announce that several of the previously-announced contract positions to help facilitate the Drupal.org redesign and the CVS-to-Git migration effort have been filled. These positions will serve to supplement the ongoing volunteer efforts around these initiatives.

• Sam Boyer has been hired as the Git Migration Lead. In this position, he will be responsible for helping migrate Drupal.org from CVS to Git, and making all adjustments necessary to existing Drupal.org collaboration tools to support our existing centralized, patch-based work flow. You can learn more about Sam's approach to this process on his blog, and find out how you can get involved by joining the Drupal.org Git Migration Team group and following @DrupalGitGremln on Twitter.
• Neil Drumm has been hired as the Drupal.org Redesign Architect, responsible for communicating the architecture of the Drupal.org redesign and enabling contributors to implement the redesign. Neil has also blogged about what he's been working on and you can get involved by joining the Drupal.org Redesign Implementers group.
• Achieve Internet has been contracted as the lead Solr developers for the Drupal.org redesign. They're tasked with enabling Drupal.org visitors to find the information they need by implementing Solr search applications as specified in the redesign.
• 3281d Consulting has been contracted to provide development on the project, issue and release management systems to enable new functionality for the drupal.org redesign and the migration to Git.

Look forward to a full update on the progress of the Drupal.org redesign in the coming days, as well as further updates on additional hires.
The Drupal Association is proud to announce that several of the previously-announced contract positions to help facilitate the Drupal.org redesign and the CVS-to-Git migration effort have been filled. These positions will serve to supplement the ongoing volunteer efforts around these initiatives.

• Sam Boyer has been hired as the Git Migration Lead. In this position, he will be responsible for helping migrate Drupal.org from CVS to Git, and making all adjustments necessary to existing Drupal.org collaboration tools to support our existing centralized, patch-based work flow. You can learn more about Sam's approach to this process on his blog, and find out how you can get involved by joining the Drupal.org Git Migration Team group and following @DrupalGitGremln on Twitter.
• Neil Drumm has been hired as the Drupal.org Redesign Architect, responsible for communicating the architecture of the Drupal.org redesign and enabling contributors to implement the redesign. Neil has also blogged about what he's been working on and you can get involved by joining the Drupal.org Redesign Implementers group.
• Achieve Internet has been contracted as the lead Solr developers for the Drupal.org redesign. They're tasked with enabling Drupal.org visitors to find the information they need by implementing Solr search applications as specified in the redesign.
• 3281d Consulting has been contracted to provide development on the project, issue and release management systems to enable new functionality for the drupal.org redesign and the migration to Git.

Look forward to a full update on the progress of the Drupal.org redesign in the coming days, as well as further updates on additional hires.

Welcome to the first of what we hope will become a series of regular updates on recent Drupal Association activities! This installment covers March and April of this year:

• On March 2, Drupal Association elections were held, resulting in the addition of several new members to the General Assembly and one new board member.
• In mid-March, Jacob Redding was hired as interim General Manager to help establish and streamline process for the Drupal Association
• In early April, the Association purchased two new Dell PowerEdge R610 servers for the Drupal.org hosting infrastructure. These servers have now been configured and deployed into the production environment.
• At DrupalCon San Francisco on April 28, members of the Drupal Association presented a session explaining the organization's roles and responsibilities and answering questions from the community. The video of this session is now available on the DrupalCon San Francisco website.
• During the closing session of DrupalCon San Francisco, the next two DrupalCons were announced. DrupalCon Copenhagen will be held August 24-26, 2010, and DrupalCon Chicago will be held March 8-10, 2011. The Drupal Association will be providing business and logistical support for both conferences.
• After DrupalCon, members of the Association's General Assembly met for a full-day retreat to discuss the mission and goals of the Association and determine areas of focus for the next year. Angie Byron posted her report on the Association site.
• At its retreat, the Association identified completion of the Drupal.org redesign implementation as its top priority for the coming year, and made the decision to hire several individuals and/or companies to supplement the work of the volunteers who have been working on the project and assist with the migration of Drupal.org's version control system to Git.
• In late April, the Drupal.org redesign theme (known as "Bluecheese") was rolled out on the Drupal Association site. If you're interested in helping out with the Drupal.org redesign, you can find out how to become involved at the Drupal.org redesign implementers group.

Welcome to the first of what we hope will become a series of regular updates on recent Drupal Association activities! This installment covers March and April of this year:

• On March 2, Drupal Association elections were held, resulting in the addition of several new members to the General Assembly and one new board member.
• In mid-March, Jacob Redding was hired as interim General Manager to help establish and streamline process for the Drupal Association
• In early April, the Association purchased two new Dell PowerEdge R610 servers for the Drupal.org hosting infrastructure. These servers have now been configured and deployed into the production environment.
• At DrupalCon San Francisco on April 28, members of the Drupal Association presented a session explaining the organization's roles and responsibilities and answering questions from the community. The video of this session is now available on the DrupalCon San Francisco website.
• During the closing session of DrupalCon San Francisco, the next two DrupalCons were announced. DrupalCon Copenhagen will be held August 24-26, 2010, and DrupalCon Chicago will be held March 8-10, 2011. The Drupal Association will be providing business and logistical support for both conferences.
• After DrupalCon, members of the Association's General Assembly met for a full-day retreat to discuss the mission and goals of the Association and determine areas of focus for the next year. Angie Byron posted her report on the Association site.
• At its retreat, the Association identified completion of the Drupal.org redesign implementation as its top priority for the coming year, and made the decision to hire several individuals and/or companies to supplement the work of the volunteers who have been working on the project and assist with the migration of Drupal.org's version control system to Git.
• In late April, the Drupal.org redesign theme (known as "Bluecheese") was rolled out on the Drupal Association site. If you're interested in helping out with the Drupal.org redesign, you can find out how to become involved at the Drupal.org redesign implementers group.

As part of its efforts to better serve the Drupal project and community, the Drupal Association recently took the step of hiring its first full-time staff member. Longtime Drupal contributor and Association Treasurer Jacob Redding has been retained as the Association's interim General Manager, tasked with the responsibility of setting process in place and making it possible to hire more staff members over time.