[Board] Fwd: FOSS4G 2015 bidding selection process

[Bart van den Eijnden]

Not sure if everyone from the board is on conference-dev.

Best regards,
Bart

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Eli Adam <eadam at co.lincoln.or.us>
> Subject: FOSS4G 2015 bidding selection process
> Date: 4 Feb 2014 08:17:28 GMT+1
> To: Bart van den Eijnden <bartvde at osgis.nl>
> Cc: Jeff McKenna <jmckenna at gatewaygeomatics.com>, OSGeo-Conf <conference_dev at lists.osgeo.org>
> Reply-To: eadam at co.lincoln.or.us
> 
> Hi Conf-dev (and to some extent Board),
> 
> The follow views are my own, not necessarily shared by the PDX LOC or
> others.  I invite others, especially members of LOCs that were
> involved in bid selection ties (somewhat common: PDX, DC, Prague, and
> Beijing), to share their thoughts as well.
> 
> Perhaps the board should make an expression of financial viability and
> risk preference (if any) *before* the conference committee votes since
> it is impossible (or at least very difficult) to do *after* the
> conference committee has made a recommendation.  This could take the
> form of something like, "The OSGeo Board finds all these bids to be
> financially viable and of acceptably low risk and will be happy to
> approve any of them recommended by the Conference Committee"
> 
> When there are ties it means that there are great proposals.  When
> there are great proposals, lightheartedness, not overly serious
> deliberation, is needed.  A decision between great proposals is more
> inconsequential than important (either would be great events).  If the
> rare case of two very poor bids comes in, they should both be rejected
> and new bids sought.
> 
> My opinion on conference committee selection is that kicking
> irreconcilable ties to the board is a form of escalation and what is
> needed is deescalation.   It is better for the conference committee
> chair and the loc chairs sort it out. A video call with a coin flip
> would work.  I think that the chair deciding is fine too and if we are
> in a case where the chair is abstaining, then the tie breaker must be
> allotted to some other conference committee member in advance.  In all
> cases, the conference committee should come to some conclusion even if
> it is by arbitrary methods.  Escalation to the Board unnecessarily
> raises the stakes which does not benefit anyone and does not improve
> the quality of the decision.
> 
> Best Regards, Eli

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/board/attachments/20140204/5f12d05e/attachment.htm>