[Board] Funding for IslandWood sprint?

[Seven (aka Arnulf)]

Hello Board,
this was a request to which the board should actually react. You are the
board, so please feel obliged to react.

:-)

My personal opinion is that we should consider to do this kind of thing.
Maybe even with a margin for OSGeo if successful, similar to the project
sponsorship program. Eventually this might become a moderate source of
income. OSGeo is the only place where you can access all the FOSS4G
folks at once and I can imagine that there are potentially interested
parties, especially larger public administrations and so on who could be
interested in having us organize code sprints.

With an organizer like Michael leading the event I have no doubt that it
will be a great event.


I put it on the agenda for Thursday:
http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Board_Meeting_2011-09-01#Agenda

The agenda is starting to fill up quickly, so if you have something
important please stick it up at the top - or reorder items as you like.
I will rearrange them as we go anyway, except somebody else feels like
leading. :-)


Not sure if this is really required - and please only feel slightly
offended; this is a personal note to the board: We are not the
administrators of the organization but the visionaries and supposed to
give guidance and decide about the future development of OSGeo. In this
position we need to actively invest some time and brains. In preparation
for our f2f we really need to get up to speed now. We never managed to
have more than one f2f per year (very much to my regrets) so this is
really important.

Best regards,
Nag.

On 08/24/2011 05:25 PM, Michael P. Gerlek wrote:
> Dear Board (and lurkers):
> 
> First, let me say I'm excited (and more than a little humbled) to be joining
> the board and look forward to Denver where I'll get to meet you all...
> 
> That said, I'd like to inquire about the possibility of having OSGeo
> "underwrite" the cost of the proposed IslandWood code sprint (details here:
> http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/IslandWood_Code_Sprint_2011).  The cost of the
> event, with a 30 person projected attendance, is US$24,000.  Registration is
> $525 per person, which includes all lodging and meals.
> 
> To date, I have raised almost $12K, with a good mix of both registrations
> and sponsorships, which is enough to cover the needed deposit.  However,
> I've not been able to collect more than that this far in advance of the
> event.  I'm reasonably confident that in a few months people will start to
> say "hey, of course I'm coming!" and will start sending in monies.   But not
> personally confident enough that I can afford the risk of being personally
> liable for $12K.
> 
> At this point, every additional registration will reduce the net remaining
> amount, so ~20 people would cover it.  Would OSGeo be willing to agree to
> cover any shortage that occurs?  I don't know what OSGeo's finances look
> like right now, and I don't know what the board's position on things like
> this have been in the past, but it never hurts to ask.
> 
> Thoughts? Comments? Discussions?
> 
> -mpg
> 
> 
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Exploring Space, Time and Mind
http://arnulf.us