[FOSS4G-Oceania] Motion: Increased discount for workshop presenters

Sun Sep 2 19:20:56 PDT 2018

I think offering the ticket for free further complicates things since we
have an existing community contributor ticket at $150

Like, does a workshop presenter spend significantly more time preparing a
workshop than a committee member spends organising the conference? Or than
someone who has contributed to FOSS4G software or OpenStreetMap data? I
think if we were up front about it, it would be no problem, but if we're
changing it this late in the piece then I think we should set it at $150.

We're also changing the value proposition for sponsors which makes me a
little uncomfortable, but given how supportive everyone has been, I don't
think we'll have any trouble.

+1 for $150 for workshop presenters and $300 for helpers.

On Mon, Sep 3, 2018 at 1:28 PM Cameron Shorter <cameron.shorter at gmail.com>
wrote:

> I'm in favour of supporting our workshop presenters, who will need to put
> in a significant amount of effort to put together their workshops - much
> greater than the value of a registration fee.
>
> If budget allows it, I'd be inclined to suggest workshop presenters be
> offered either:
>
> 1. To be able to sign up to the conference for free.
>
> 2. Decide to dedicate their fee toward the good mojo fund. (The slight
> rewording to potentially help presenters sell the concept to their
> employer, and also to have the presenter/employer recognised in conference
> credits).
>
> I'll leave it up to John to decide whether he wants to adjust the motion,
> or feels it should be left as is.
>
> Cheers, Cameron
>
> On 3/09/2018 9:39 AM, John Bryant wrote:
>
> Thanks Trisha, I'm splitting this out into a separate thread as a motion.
>
> Just having a look at the workshop presenters, I think there are at most 6
> people to whom this would apply - others have already registered as
> sponsors, committee members, or already qualify for the CC discount. So, in
> theory, the actual maximum impact on the budget is quite small, probably on
> the order of $500-750.
>
> We should also consider offering the $300 presenter rate to some workshop
> helpers, within limits (max one per workshop?). This might incur a few
> hundred extra dollars in budget adjustment.
>
> Some of the presenters may have their registration paid for by their
> employer, and may not care about the extra discount, especially if it means
> redoing paperwork.
>
> I'm pretty comfortable projecting that we'll surpass our target of 90
> workshop registrations, so some of the projected budget surplus is directly
> related to the success of the workshop program. Re-investing some of this
> surplus back into the people providing invaluable content seems positive to
> me.
>
> It would take extra effort to communicate this with the presenters and
> make sure they're clear on what's on offer. Trisha, sounds like you're
> willing to take this on?
>
> So, to be clear, I'll phrase this as a motion:
>
> *Motion: to offer workshop presenters the option of registering for the
> conference at the Community Contributor rate ($150), and to offer workshop
> helpers the option of registering at the current Workshop Presenter rate
> ($300). The expected total cost of this adjustment is estimated to be in
> the range of $1000.*
>
> I'm comfortable supporting this proposal. +1 from me.
>
> John
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ---------
> From: Trisha Moriarty <moriar1y at gmail.com>
> Date: Sun, 2 Sep 2018 at 17:30
> Subject: Re: [FOSS4G-Oceania] * Important - budget update *
> To: foss4g-oceania <foss4g-oceania at lists.osgeo.org>
>
>
> Its good to see the budget summary info, thanks John.
>
> I agree with Cameron principles and the seed fund is important, but I
> would like to see this year's events  benefit as much as possible  as well.
>
> So as an  idea, in light of the surplus, could we  increase the discount
> on the conference ticket rate for presenters. Currently the presenter
> ticket is  $300.  Could we lower it to the community ticket rate $150.
>
> A number  of the presenters already have access to sponsor  or community
> ticket rates, so the impact on budget would be for approx. 10 tickets  $1500
>
> Only  2 have actually purchased their presenter rate tickets, so I was
> about  to send out reminders to the others to register.
>
> I feel the presenters are making a very valuable contribution to the
> conference, and this could be one way to demonstrate the community's
> appreciation.
>
> But I  realise this is going backwards on a decision and it will be a bit
> messy offering refunds for the presenters who have registered, but I
> thought it still worthwhile putting the question out there.
>
>
> On Sun, Sep 2, 2018 at 8:04 AM Cameron Shorter <cameron.shorter at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Thanks John for the summary. It will be helpful for making decisions
>> later.
>>
>> Talking to the principles of how we manage the surplus, I think:
>>
>> * Honour our agreement with SSSI, and ensure we continue to make our
>> maximum budgeted surplus and SSSI is paid the agreed 50% of this for the
>> risk they took in backing us.
>>
>> * The rest of the surplus should be put toward community value, whatever
>> we decide that to be.
>>
>> * We should invite SSSI to contribute to the discussion about how the
>> surplus is spent, which might include reserving some of the surplus for
>> next year.
>>
>> On 1/09/2018 12:44 PM, John Bryant wrote:
>>
>> *TL;DR: based on conservative assumptions, in a 200 attendee projected
>> budget, we are currently looking at a $30k+ surplus.*
>>
>> Hi team,
>>
>> As we push towards the event (80 days to go!), I want to provide an
>> update on our financial position, as I think it will be important to have
>> this in the front of our minds. There will be some financial decisions to
>> make in the upcoming weeks, and we need to have this as context for this
>> decision making.
>>
>> To date, we've operated with a fairly lean approach, budgeting
>> conservatively, and making only modest adjustments to our budget. In our
>> agreement with SSSI, we committed to aim for a surplus of $3k-$10k, and in
>> fact have consistently guided our budget to a surplus more in the $15k-$20k
>> range, to accommodate our uncertainty.
>>
>> Despite this constraint, we've done a great job of planning an exciting &
>> interesting event, and our success on this front can be measured in part by
>> our significant over achievement in the sponsorship area, and the high
>> probability that we'll significantly exceed our target of 150 attendees.
>> So, good job, us!
>>
>> But my point here, rather than to congratulate, is to raise awareness
>> that *we are currently sitting on a much larger than expected surplus*.
>> I wanted to understand this surplus better, so I set up a new 200 attendee
>> scenario in our budget worksheet
>> <https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/14yHWdvEPxshBSBgxjc4vWgJlg0Svk8Qg0G-D3kF-siM/edit#gid=1274394515>.
>> If there are any doubts whether we can reach 200, keep in mind we're
>> already over 125 regos sold or committed, 11 weeks out, without even
>> announcing a program or going into a heavy promotion phase.
>>
>> This scenario is based on what I consider to be realistic & conservative
>> assumptions (*listed in the worksheet, I'll repeat them here*). I don't
>> want to prejudice our future discussions by including specifics like TGP &
>> videorecording in these assumptions, we need to discuss these in a separate
>> thread, but I include them as examples of significant expenditures we could
>> add to our budget, and still have a large surplus.
>>
>> *Assumptions for 200 scenario:*
>> 200 conf regos
>> 150 half day workshop regos
>> 120 dinner tickets
>> CC tickets won't be taken up as much as expected
>> increase student regos
>> no additional sponsorship
>> increase to TGP expense
>> increase to keynote travel expense
>> increase to paid staff expense
>> include $5000 for swag
>> include $4000 for video recording
>>
>> Even with all of these assumptions, which I consider to be generally
>> erring on the side of caution, *we are looking at a $30k+ surplus*,
>> which is large. See the budget worksheet
>> <https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/14yHWdvEPxshBSBgxjc4vWgJlg0Svk8Qg0G-D3kF-siM/edit#gid=1274394515>
>> for the detailed scenario (*extra scrutiny would be very welcome*).
>>
>> Recall that part of our partnership agreement with SSSI is that we share
>> 50% of the surplus with them, so at present we don't have the option of
>> simply retaining the full surplus for future years. However, I hope we can
>> open a discussion with SSSI and see if there is appetite for investing part
>> of any unexpected windfall into future events. But clearly, we need to
>> honour the agreement we have in place, and respect our partner's wishes on
>> how they wish to proceed on this front.
>>
>> So, as we go forward over the next 11 weeks and careen to the finish
>> line, I suggest we need to keep this budget surplus in mind. We've had many
>> discussions where we've opted out of doing things because we haven't felt
>> like we could justify the cost, but I argue at this point that we need to
>> adjust our thinking a bit on this front. The money is coming from the
>> community (sponsors and attendees), and I feel we owe it to the community
>> to make wise decisions on how we spend this money, while ensuring the best
>> event possible. This doesn't mean we start spending like sailors, of course
>> (no offense to sailors!), but I suggest we have latitude to spend some
>> money on things that will benefit the community and the event.
>>
>> I suggest we don't raise specific motions on expenditure in this thread,
>> rather if there are specific motions arising, they should be raised in
>> separate threads.
>>
>> Thoughts?
>>
>> jb
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
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>>
>>
>> --
>> Cameron Shorter
>> Technology Demystifier
>> Open Technologies and Geospatial Consultant
>>
>> M +61 (0) 419 142 254
>>
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>> FOSS4G-Oceania at lists.osgeo.org
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>>
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> --
> Cameron Shorter
> Technology Demystifier
> Open Technologies and Geospatial Consultant
>
> M +61 (0) 419 142 254
>
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