[Board] 2012 FOSS4G Decision

Wed Sep 14 07:51:24 PDT 2011

I might have missed it, did Peter's slide show anyone from China here in Denver?

.mpg

On Sep 14, 2011, at 8:02 AM, "Michael P. Gerlek" <mpg at flaxen.com> wrote:

> I thought about the culture/lang/lack-of-experience issue too... I think
> Beijing will be a *very* different conference than what we're used to, and
> will likely be smaller... but I really like the idea of trying to "crack
> open" the Chinese market.  I was really impressed by the heavy-hitters they
> lined up to welcome their new chapter some years ago, so I think the
> organizers can get the formal support they'll need... but yeah, this won't
> make OSGeo the $ that Denver will.
>
> I'm +0 on hiring out Jeff for this.  It's a great idea, actually, but I'd
> need to think about how it would work in practice.
>
> -mpg
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: board-bounces at lists.osgeo.org [mailto:board-bounces at lists.osgeo.org]
> On Behalf Of Seven (aka Arnulf)
> Sent: Wednesday, September 14, 2011 7:42 AM
> To: board at lists.osgeo.org
> Subject: Re: [Board] 2012 FOSS4G Decision
>
> On 09/12/2011 11:13 AM, Jeff McKenna wrote:
>> Board,
>>
>> We (the OSGeo Conference Committee) finally has a strong decision on
>> the
>> 2012 FOSS4G host: Beijing. The final vote was 9 to 5 for Beijing.
>>
>> (background: the initial vote was a tie, 7-7, and we did not have a
>> tie-breaker established, so we did a re-vote over a week)
>>
>> As quickly as possible I would like approval from the Board on this
>> decision.  There is a 10 minute slot in the final plenary on Friday
>> (at FOSS4G Denver) to announce/invite everyone to 2012.
>>
>> Thanks!
>>
>> -jeff
>
> Board,
> it took me long to take this hard decision but my vote on Beijing as
> conference venue for 2012 is -1. This is not lack of trust in the Beijing
> team but instead - lack of trust in OSGeo and the board and most of all lack
> of trust in myself (because I seem to not be doing a good job as president).
> The board has a history of not following through with decisions which is why
> I feel I have to take this route.
>
> Rationale for veto:
> Every single FOSS4G so far has been in "our" cultural context, China is very
> different to what we are used to. This single reason alone is responsible
> for many broken businesses and there is not reason why we should be an
> exception. FOSS4G is currently our single only source of revenue.
>
> Lausanne had Claude as a chair, even then a well versed Open Source leader.
> Victoria with Paul was beyond doubt the first event of the new large scale
> FOSS4G we now see happen every year. South Africa was a big risk - but
> worked out great in the end - even if it took more than a year after the
> conference until the cash was wired to the OSGeo account (which we could not
> afford in our current situation). But even in Cape Town the core language
> was English and communication was straight forward.
>
> Sydney was again beyond doubt from an organizing perspective with Cameron in
> the lead - but as it was half way round the nice, blue side of the world we
> did have less attendees than we would have had elsewhere.
>
> Barcelona was the first time that the Local chaps spoke a different language
> and I can assure you it was a massive pain until we even got the contracts
> done - and this even although we had Lorenzo, a highly capable local fluent
> in Eglish, Spanish, Catalan and Italian - and me backing things up who also
> speaks Spanish. None of you took much notice of this constant back channel
> issue about language.
>
> Now in Denver it is a home rum - and looks like it will be the greatest
> FOSS4G ever.
>
> Now on to Bejing: We have no representative here as we did with Lorenzo in
> Barcelona, Gavin and Peter Batty in Victoria - the first missing link. The
> official Chinese Local Chapter is very much invisible to me and has no
> record of experience with FOSS4G events as far as I can tell.
> Again - this is not to criticize the Beijing offer or the people involved -
> it may well be my massive ignorance only. So please do not feel offended.
>
> Next thing is that 70% and more revenue generated by FOSS4G conferences is
> generated within the local hosting country. I am simply anxious that we will
> not be able to generate enough monetary interest in China to pay our bills.
> Additionally Beijing is far off so that - just like in Australia - many of
> the regular attendees may well not be able to come at all.
>
> Solution to resolve veto:
> It is a very simple proposal: Allocate 20k US$ budget to fund our conference
> chair Jeff McKenna to help organize the Beijing FOSSG conference. With him
> in the backbone of the conference I feel safe to go ahead with a +1 for
> FOSS4G 2012 in Beijing. Ideally this money comes right back with the
> conference - but we will have to back it up as a foundation with a vote -
> now!
>
> Jeff,
> I know that you will not be able to support FOSS4G in Beijing for free
> without hurting your business, so please do not step up and say anything at
> all - you are out and should probably abstain from saying anything until we
> have taken this decision (unless you do not accept this offer at all).
>
>
> Board,
> one reason why I take this painful route is because I can still not believe
> that we were too miserly to back up 12k for a code sprint.
> FOSS4G means we will be backing up several 100k - and with all of the above
> said in mind the risk we take is a lot higher than we would have done with
> that comparatively small sprint.
>
>
> Motion:
> Arnulf Christl motions to allocate 20k funding for the conference chair to
> co-organize FOSS4G 2012 in Beijing, to be paid within the next year to the
> account of Jeff McKenna.
>
>
> Please let us have a discussion here - if necessary, then we need someone to
> second this motion and votes.
>
>
> Please refrain from physically hurting me until I am done with my keynote,
> after that feel free to do whatever you deem appropriate.
>
> :-)
>
> Thank you for you consideration,
> Arnulf
>
> --
> Exploring Space, Time and Mind
> http://arnulf.us
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