[Board] ED Update

[Tyler Mitchell (OSGeo)]

Hi everyone,

Here's a brief update of some things happening lately.  Sorry it's  
pretty rough but I just returned from Spain and recovering from the  
trip.  I will be writing up more about this trip it in the next few  
days once I'm recovered.  Otherwise, here are a few of the others  
things I've been working on - we can discuss them further in our  
board meeting:

ANNUAL REPORT
Most of the 56 planned reports are in, a few outstanding ones remain:
* All the ones I have to write
* A Board level report
* A Financial report (draft of financial summary is available)
* Conference Committee
* Software: GeoNetwork, GEOS, OSSIM
* Local Chapters: Brazil, California, Thailand
One thing I was really glad to get were a complete set of sponsor  
reports.
Compilation underway, target for end of month to complete

FUNDRAISING
* Two more new Associate Sponsors are being finalised
* Several promising discussions in Spain that may turn up more  
sponsors (more below)
* More work to be done on strategy docs

SYSTEMS/WEB SUPPORT
There are various issues outstanding that I've begun to look at: CMS  
translations, spam filtering, other online systems (journal, conference)
* Helped with initial conference system web site setup and tweaking

501c3
* Requested an update from David

TIME DISTRIBUTION
We've talked previously about having a brief picture of where my time  
has been spent.  Here is the general breakdown of the top 5 or 6  
categories of how I spent my time in 2007:
* Communications (30%) - general email, online, including sponsor  
discussions
* Journal (10%) - start up and production of 3 issues including  
FOSS4G proceedings, project and event reports
* VisCom (30%) - meetings, event planning, speaking/attending  
conference events, travel
* WebCom & Systems (15%) - Drupal, conference system
* Finance (5%) - reports, 501c3 application prep, banking, invoicing
* Miscellaneous (7%) - meetings and general organisation, document  
management, elections
* Board related (3%) - reporting, meetings, documentation

In 2008 so far the distribution has changed in a few areas:
* Communications (30%) - general email, online, etc.
* Conference (10%) - systems and event support
* Marketing (20%) - meetings, interview, presentations/travel
* Board (8%) - meetings, reports, 501c3 documentation
* WebCom/Systems (8%), Annual Report (6%), Finances (6%), Fundraising  
docs (5%)
* Miscellaneous (5%)

TRAVEL REPORT - SPAIN
* The impetus for this recent trip was that I was invited as a  
keynote speaker at this Free GIS conference: http://www.sigte.udg.es/ 
jornadassiglibre
* While there I was hosted (accommodations and flight paid) by the  
University of Girona (SIGTE were conference organisers).  While there  
I worked with Lorenzo Becchi, Jorge Sanz and others to organise a  
series of additional meetings and introductions for the week  
following the event.  Lorenzo was an indispensable guide and host and  
really helped me make the best use of the time.  The Generalitat de  
Valenciana (Provincial Infrastructure and Transportation Ministry  
that runs the gvSIG team) also organised several meetings and helped  
facilitate discussions about gvSIG and OSGeo in general.
* I participated in many meetings while at the conference, presenting  
OSGeo and answering questions, helping to guide development of the  
Free GIS book, discussing our various processes, reviewed various  
applications people wanted to demonstrate and more.
* For the occasion of my visit several meetings and tours were set up  
to meet critical contacts such as: federal mapping agency (IGN),  
Catalunya provincial mapping agency (ICC), federal open source  
business promotion organisation Cenatic, heads of gvSIG project  
including the Generalitat de Valenciana, Prodevelop, IVER and  
discussed challenges of SIG Libre in managing spatial assets of the  
Port of Barcelona.
* There is clear open source uptake happening at all levels in the  
geospatial domain there.  The presentations were not just about  
possible ideas, but about actual implementations and real-world  
barriers/opportunities.  There were several fundraising discussions  
and a lot of local geographic interest in establishing further local  
chapters.
* I will report more on some of these particulars in upcoming blog  
posts.