[Board] [OSGeo-Conf] FOSS4G rotation

Mon Apr 15 12:38:25 PDT 2013

Somehow, from somewhere, we have to raise money to continue to promote what we believe in.  There is nothing wrong with that - in fact it is part of our responsibility as board members to grow the organization and hand it off in better shape to the next group of leaders. If we don't do that we will spend our board meetings agonizing on how we divide up fewer resources to do fewer good things.

We are all very sensitive to the economic implications to emerging parts of the world.  American and European conferences have demonstrated they are capable of sustaining sufficient attendance to meet the goals that we have suggested.  This money allows us to finance efforts in other parts of the world.

If anything, the FOSS4G-NA and CEE conferences have demonstrated that there is negligible cannibalization with regard to the international conference.  Just look at the attendance statistics for any of the conferences and you will find the vast majority of attendees are from within the region.

If anything, we need to encourage and expand the number and quality of the regional conferences.  As they demonstrate  success we would hope that they would also contribute to the overall effort.  The board invests in some of these conferences in the form of financial guarantees to get them off the ground.

In the past we have limited ourselves to just the international conference for revenue generation.  We don't have membership fees (even voluntary ones to just those that can afford it), we haven't tried to build revenue from chapters or regional conferences.  I wish we could do this effectively without worrying about money -  but that isn't how the world works.  If I were King for a day, I'd probably put a lot more emphasis into building up business cases, sponsors, and revenue streams that would help us expand our efforts.

My 2 cents..

Mark

On Apr 15, 2013, at 3:13 PM, Daniel Morissette <dmorissette at mapgears.com> wrote:

> BTW, my thinking when I suggested raising the bar to 40-50k$ surplus for FOSS4G in the board meeting was to put this as a firm goal on the NA and Europe years, and a soft target for the other regions.
> 
> My reasoning is that with our current expenses[1], if we got 40-50k$ from FOSS4G two years in a row, then we could afford a lower surplus, or even zero surplus the third year without putting our finances at risk.
> 
> Daniel / Treasurer
> 
> [1] http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php?title=OSGeo_Budget_2013&oldid=69501
> 
> 
> On 13-04-12 6:10 PM, Frank Warmerdam wrote:
>> Cameron,
>> 
>> I feel this question ties into the expected revenue to some degree.  I'm
>> personally fine with your suggestion with the caveat that we should
>> expect a "compelling proposal" to meet our revenue generation guidelines
>> which is (IMHO) going to be hard to do if aim for $50K revenue in the
>> conservative case.
>> 
>> I'm also fairly flexible on this who issue, but I *feel* like every time
>> we have a revenue discussion we come up with one set of conclusions, but
>> somehow we fail to actually apply those conclusion when setting
>> requirements for the conference.
>> 
>> Best regards,
>> Frank
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> On Fri, Apr 12, 2013 at 2:24 PM, Cameron Shorter
>> <cameron.shorter at gmail.com <mailto:cameron.shorter at gmail.com>> wrote:
>> 
>>    In the last board meeting, the question was raised about global
>>    FOSS4G rotation.
>> 
>>    we currently have a 3 way rotation policy: Europe 2013 / North
>>    America 2014 / Rest of world 2015
>> 
>>    It has been suggested that we should revisit this rotation policy,
>>    and consider:
>> 
>>    Europe / North America / Europe / North America
>> 
>>    Reasons:
>>    * Previous global FOSS4G events have attracted more people and been
>>    more lucrative in Europe / North America
>>    * Europe/North America could be argued to be less financially risky.
>>    Our one cancelled FOSS4G was in China in 2012.
>>    * FOSS4G (global and regional) events traditionally draw half their
>>    attendance from the local region. Europe and North America both have
>>    large populations with established OSGeo communities.
>> 
>>    I'm in favour of continuing our current 3 way rotation, on the
>>    proviso that there are proven OSGeo communities outside of
>>    NA/Europe. By proven, I'd suggest that we would consider regions
>>    which have already successfully staged a FOSS4G regional event (or
>>    similar) and who can put together a compelling justification that
>>    they can attract comparable attendees and sponsors to Europe/North
>>    America.
>> 
>>    Looking at: http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/__Live_GIS_History
>>    <http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Live_GIS_History>
>>    I see that there have previously been regional FOSS4G events in:
>>    Argentina
>>    India
>>    Korea
>>    Malaysia
>>    Japan
>> 
>>    So for 2015, I'd suggest that our FOSS4G pre qualification should
>>    invite responses from "rest of the world" and Europe, but we should
>>    give a preference to "rest of world" assuming they can provide a
>>    compelling proposal which is likely to attract similar success to
>>    past European and North American conferences.
>> 
>>    Generalising the rule. Our rotation policy should be:
>> 
>>    * We give a strong preference to a region which hasn't had FOSS4G
>>    for 2 years
>>    * We next consider the region which had FOSS4G 2 years ago
>>    * Only as a last resort would we consider a region which had FOSS4G
>>    last year
>> 
>>    Regions are considered as: Europe / North America / Other locations
>> 
>>    --
>>    Cameron Shorter
>>    Geospatial Solutions Manager
>>    Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050 <tel:%2B61%20%280%292%208570%205050>
>>    Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254 <tel:%2B61%20%280%29419%20142%20254>
>> 
>>    Think Globally, Fix Locally
>>    Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open Source
>>    http://www.lisasoft.com
>> 
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>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> ---------------------------------------+--------------------------------------
>> I set the clouds in motion - turn up   | Frank Warmerdam,
>> warmerdam at pobox.com <mailto:warmerdam at pobox.com>
>> light and sound - activate the windows | http://pobox.com/~warmerdam
>> and watch the world go round - Rush    | Geospatial Software Developer
>> 
>> 
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> 
> 
> -- 
> Daniel Morissette
> http://www.mapgears.com/
> Provider of Professional MapServer Support since 2000
> 
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