[OSGeo-Conf] Event rotation

[Peter Batty]

I was going to make the same point as Dan. While helping organizing teams
plan is one aim of the rotation, I would have thought that the primary aim
is to make sure we have more consistent accessibility for attendees in
various parts of the world, and avoid the situation we have just had where
we have gone 4 years without a conference in the Americas (for example). If
it ended up in Europe 3 out of 4 years that seems to go against the aim of
making it more accessible to the global community.

I think another factor in managing things is that the selection needs to be
made earlier, so we are not scrambling in a situation like this. For 2010,
Barcelona was selected in December of 2008, so they had 21 months to
prepare. For 2011, the process started later, and Denver was notified in
June 2010, giving us 15 months to prepare. For 2012, the process started
later again, and whoever is selected (assuming the date remains similar)
will have 12 months or so to prepare. FOSS4G has grown large enough that 12
months is really not a lot of notice to organize it. We need to get further
ahead of the game on selecting the location for future events, which will
also help in the broader planning process (to be able to have more time to
seek alternatives in the originally planned locations, etc).

So anyway, there are various factors to consider, but overall I think that
the primary consideration is the community, not the convenience of the
organizers (though we want to help them too of course), and so I lean pretty
strongly against doing it in Europe 3 out of 4 years.

Cheers,
    Peter.

On Tue, Jul 12, 2011 at 8:01 AM, Daniel Ames <dan.ames at isu.edu> wrote:

> I think it is important not only for the bidders but also (perhaps more
> importantly) for the broader community to maintain a somewhat predictable
> rotation.  It's useful to remember that a lot (most?) users are attracted to
> FOSS because of financial reasons. Hence if FOSS4g is a "user conference"
> then it probably needs to move around to where the users are.
>
> - Dan
> --------
> Daniel P. Ames Ph.D.
> Idaho State University Dept. of Geosciences
> dan.ames at isu.edu
> --------
> Sent from my Droid
> On Jul 12, 2011 7:36 AM, "Bart van den Eijnden (OSGIS)" <bartvde at osgis.nl>
> wrote:
> > I fully agree with Dave here.
> >
> > Best regards,
> > Bart
> >
> >> Hold on -- is that really fair? We established a process here so that
> >> local groups could plan accordingly with full expectation that we will
> be
> >> in Europe for 2013. Why are we penalizing groups that are doing the hard
> >> work to plan a bid for 2013? by changing the rules on the fly, we
> provide
> >> no predictability, lose credibility, and will certainly reduce the
> quality
> >> of bids in the future.
> >>
> >> We setup a process -- the reality was that there were no LOIs by the
> >> deadline for non-EUR/NA, and we're following our own established and
> >> publicized rules to go to the next stage.
> >>
> >> Please consider the ramifications of the changes you are suggesting --
> >> they aren't insignificant.
> >>
> >> Dave
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On 2011-07-12, at 1:39 AM, Paul Ramsey wrote:
> >>
> >>> Agreed. We should probably give not-EUR/NA another chance, then move
> >>> back to NA.
> >>> P.
> >>>
> >>> On Mon, Jul 11, 2011 at 9:49 PM, Cameron Shorter
> >>> <cameron.shorter at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>> Jeff, I think that Tyler's question is very important.
> >>>> If Europe is selected for 2012, then I think Europe should not be
> >>>> selected
> >>>> for 2013.
> >>>>
> >>>> On 12/07/11 10:11, Jeff McKenna wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Hi Tyler,
> >>>>>
> >>>>> I'd prefer to wait to discuss 2013 until the committee has the 2012
> >>>>> decision (I'd like 2012 to take the priority of the committee's time
> >>>>> now).
> >>>>>
> >>>>> -jeff
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> On 11-07-11 6:33 PM, Tyler Mitchell wrote:
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> Just curious if the committee has thought about what the 2013 bid
> >>>>>> target
> >>>>>> region would look like if one of the European bids are selected, or
> >>>>>> if the
> >>>>>> planned rotation will be taken into consideration this year or not.
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> I was talking to a handful of potential Euro. (and non-Euro) bidders
> >>>>>> who
> >>>>>> were holding out for 2013 since 2012 wasn't expected to be in their
> >>>>>> region,
> >>>>>> yet they weren't ready/able as a "backup" for this round.
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> I guess putting it the other way, if Vietnam is not chosen, will the
> >>>>>> rotation just act as if the planned region was skipped? Probably
> >>>>>> making a
> >>>>>> mountain out of a molehill, but had to ask.
> >>>>>>
> >>>>> _______________________________________________
> >>>>> Conference_dev mailing list
> >>>>> Conference_dev at lists.osgeo.org
> >>>>> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/conference_dev
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> --
> >>>> Cameron Shorter
> >>>> Geospatial Director
> >>>> Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050
> >>>> Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254
> >>>>
> >>>> Think Globally, Fix Locally
> >>>> Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open Source
> >>>> http://www.lisasoft.com
> >>>>
> >>>> _______________________________________________
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> >>>>
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