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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Frank,<br>
I agree that a compelling proposal should include meeting foss4g
financial expectations.<br>
<br>
For the record, the last board meeting discussed changing
guidelines for foss4g budgets from expecting a $20K profit under
conservative estimates, to a $50K profit. (This would typically
result in a $100K+ profit under expected conditions).<br>
<br>
David Bitner, pointed out that a $100K profit spread across 1000
attendees equates to $100 extra per delegate, which is a good
point, but should be tempered against the variability of FOSS4G
attendees, and the high impact on profits this has. Looking back
at an old foss4g budget, I extrapolated some profit figures:<br>
<br>
Attendees: Profit<br>
1000: $58K<br>
900: $35K<br>
800: $11K<br>
700: -$11K<br>
600: -$35K<br>
500: -$58K<br>
<br>
While I made some gross generalisations in my extrapolation, the
take home message is that fixed costs of a large conference such
as FOSS4G are very high, and consequently, a small percentage
increase or decrease in attendance has high impact on
profitability.<br>
So if we want to ensure a worst case scenario of 500 delegates
will break even, then we should expect to make a $110K profit for
an expected attendance of 1000.<br>
<br>
On 13/04/13 08:10, Frank Warmerdam wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote
cite="mid:CA+YzLBfqDPjx1zfaRV621rP6w5Ktj=APNWrdZt+jTR6NCYCK8g@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">
<div dir="ltr">Cameron,
<div><br>
</div>
<div style="">I feel this question ties into the expected
revenue to some degree. I'm personally fine with your
suggestion with the caveat that we should expect a "compelling
proposal" to meet our revenue generation guidelines which is
(IMHO) going to be hard to do if aim for $50K revenue in the
conservative case. </div>
<div style=""><br>
</div>
<div style="">I'm also fairly flexible on this who issue, but I
*feel* like every time we have a revenue discussion we come up
with one set of conclusions, but somehow we fail to actually
apply those conclusion when setting requirements for the
conference.</div>
<div style=""><br>
</div>
<div style="">Best regards,</div>
<div style="">Frank</div>
<div style=""><br>
</div>
</div>
<div class="gmail_extra"><br>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Apr 12, 2013 at 2:24 PM,
Cameron Shorter <span dir="ltr"><<a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:cameron.shorter@gmail.com" target="_blank">cameron.shorter@gmail.com</a>></span>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0
.8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">In the
last board meeting, the question was raised about global
FOSS4G rotation.<br>
<br>
we currently have a 3 way rotation policy: Europe 2013 /
North America 2014 / Rest of world 2015<br>
<br>
It has been suggested that we should revisit this rotation
policy, and consider:<br>
<br>
Europe / North America / Europe / North America<br>
<br>
Reasons:<br>
* Previous global FOSS4G events have attracted more people
and been more lucrative in Europe / North America<br>
* Europe/North America could be argued to be less
financially risky. Our one cancelled FOSS4G was in China in
2012.<br>
* FOSS4G (global and regional) events traditionally draw
half their attendance from the local region. Europe and
North America both have large populations with established
OSGeo communities.<br>
<br>
I'm in favour of continuing our current 3 way rotation, on
the proviso that there are proven OSGeo communities outside
of NA/Europe. By proven, I'd suggest that we would consider
regions which have already successfully staged a FOSS4G
regional event (or similar) and who can put together a
compelling justification that they can attract comparable
attendees and sponsors to Europe/North America.<br>
<br>
Looking at: <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Live_GIS_History"
target="_blank">http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Live_GIS_History</a><br>
I see that there have previously been regional FOSS4G events
in:<br>
Argentina<br>
India<br>
Korea<br>
Malaysia<br>
Japan<br>
<br>
So for 2015, I'd suggest that our FOSS4G pre qualification
should invite responses from "rest of the world" and Europe,
but we should give a preference to "rest of world" assuming
they can provide a compelling proposal which is likely to
attract similar success to past European and North American
conferences.<br>
<br>
Generalising the rule. Our rotation policy should be:<br>
<br>
* We give a strong preference to a region which hasn't had
FOSS4G for 2 years<br>
* We next consider the region which had FOSS4G 2 years ago<br>
* Only as a last resort would we consider a region which had
FOSS4G last year<br>
<br>
Regions are considered as: Europe / North America / Other
locations<br>
<br>
-- <br>
Cameron Shorter<br>
Geospatial Solutions Manager<br>
Tel: <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="tel:%2B61%20%280%292%208570%205050"
value="+61285705050" target="_blank">+61 (0)2 8570 5050</a><br>
Mob: <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="tel:%2B61%20%280%29419%20142%20254"
value="+61419142254" target="_blank">+61 (0)419 142 254</a><br>
<br>
Think Globally, Fix Locally<br>
Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open
Source<br>
<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://www.lisasoft.com"
target="_blank">http://www.lisasoft.com</a><br>
<br>
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target="_blank">http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board</a><br>
</blockquote>
</div>
<br>
<br clear="all">
<div><br>
</div>
-- <br>
---------------------------------------+--------------------------------------<br>
I set the clouds in motion - turn up | Frank Warmerdam, <a
moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:warmerdam@pobox.com"
target="_blank">warmerdam@pobox.com</a><br>
light and sound - activate the windows | <a
moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://pobox.com/%7Ewarmerdam"
target="_blank">http://pobox.com/~warmerdam</a><br>
and watch the world go round - Rush | Geospatial Software
Developer<br>
</div>
</blockquote>
<br>
<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Cameron Shorter
Geospatial Solutions Manager
Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050
Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254
Think Globally, Fix Locally
Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open Source
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.lisasoft.com">http://www.lisasoft.com</a>
</pre>
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