[Board] Teach-in 2009

[Markus Neteler]

On Fri, May 30, 2008 at 12:43 AM, Tyler Mitchell (OSGeo)
<tmitchell at osgeo.org> wrote:
> On 28-May-08, at 12:44 AM, Markus Neteler wrote:
>> On Tue, May 27, 2008 at 9:01 PM,  <jo at frot.org> wrote:
>>> On Tue, May 27, 2008 at 09:22:44AM -0700, Tyler Mitchell (OSGeo) wrote:
>>>> Should absence of interest or initiative from other parts of the world
>>>> make it harder for those who are interested and take the initiative?
>>
>> Tyler, not sure why you immediately talk about "absence of interest".
>> The Teach-In idea was posted only a couple of hours ago...?
>> Maybe Arnulf has some comments here (seems to be offline/busy right now).
>>
>> Yes, I am interested in an European Teach-In event
>> in parallel to an US event.
>
> I'm glad you are interested - I didn't mean others wouldn't be interested.
> What I meant was there are people right now who are expressing an interest
> in running an event.  They've come forward, and no one else has put together
> such a proposal.

Let me repeat: Paul's proposal is a few days old now.

> But some of the discussion on this list sounded like
> nothing should be done until there is a formal, global, plan for this so
> it's not only a single event in the USA.  That didn't make sense to me.

No need for a global plan. But I think (as also this heated discussion here
suggests) that we need a new OSGeo policy for that. Otherwise I foresee
even more tension.
Clearly Paul doesn't need to care if others come up with a similar proposal
in another (or the same) part of the world, he has done his part in preparing
their proposal. But we - OSGeo - need to define how the brand is used and
how to handle such events:

- to avoid conflict of interest
- to avoid tension in the board and community
- to clearly indicate in which direction we go.

So far our policy (if it exists) isn't clear to me concerning "Teach-in" events
or likewise. If I am wrong, please point me to the Wiki/Web pages.

Markus