A special announcement was made by Buck Woody on Data Exposed. Microsoft expands on its announcement last year following the collapse of PASS that is committed to the Data Community and say local users groups are the life blood of the community. The announcement is here
Assets have been created that are Community-owned and Microsoft-empowered. These are resources and benefits to enable local community leaders to run their groups.
Assets, Resources and Benefits
Azure Data Community Gateway
It is a gateway not a destination. This resource is for community events, finding MVPs in the Azure data area and other resources such as diversity and inclusion that the community may find interesting.
Access to Meetup Pro
For qualified community groups to schedule, track events and for implementations of our local events
Microsoft Teams for Community Groups
Providing a full community Teams edition to qualifying community group leaders for chat, video, voice, file storage and applications. It comes with a predefined community template. It also allows you to connect with other community groups.
Community Leader Collaboration
Also Microsoft will be facilitating a periodic meeting of community group leaders to enable sharing of practices.
Resources for Self-Directed Local Groups
This is for established groups.
These resources and tools are for technologies focusing on
Effective community groups make it local, make it helpful for local jobs and improving your career and being champions for diversity and inclusion. Effective community groups are impactful.
The url is aka.ms/datacommunity
In summary this is an amazing resource for local community user groups to thrive, expand and encompass diversity and inclusion.
Azure Data Community FAQs
For answers to your questions