[OSGeo-Conf] Re: [Board] Preliminary Survey Results

Sun Sep 25 13:08:23 EDT 2011

I agree, that the this could be good concept to have global conference like
developers meeting and regional conferences more towards user communities.
It is question, if the best is to organise for all US or Europe, or better
will be to cover smaller regions.

Also these local conferences could be more focused on some concrete
products. I think that also it could be advantage.
Karel

From: conference_dev-bounces at lists.osgeo.org
[mailto:conference_dev-bounces at lists.osgeo.org] On Behalf Of Lisa Sweeney
Sent: Saturday, September 24, 2011 6:09 PM
To: Mark Lucas
Cc: foss4g2011-private; conference; OSGeo-Board List;
christopher.schmidt at nokia.com
Subject: [OSGeo-Conf] Re: [Board] Preliminary Survey Results

My observation is FOSS4G has been focused on osgeo developers - providing a
great opportunity for a wide variety of projects being developed in the
osgeo realm to have some great face: face time and relationship building.
This is reflected in the numbers Peter put out earlier: 

46% answered 5 to the question how heavily do you currently use geospatial
open source, remainder split fairly evenly between 1-4.

61% were software developers as main job function, 18% end users, 20%
managers

I've heard FOSS4G started as a 'gathering of the tribes', so this makes
sense. 

Talk of possibly having a FOSS4G in Beijing next year and an osgeo
conference in North America could create an opportunity to expand the
audience. FOSS4G international could stay developer focused and the osgeo N.
America conference could be focused on connecting with a broader audience
that is more user focused. It could be more of a showcase of the great
options in the osgeo realm and how to integrate them into one's
organization/classroom/etc, with presentations geared towards users in
education, government, the private sector, etc., as well as a chance for
developers to connect with each other and be available to interact with
general users. This could also be an attractive type of event for open
source consulting businesses to showcase to the users/managers how they can
help make integration of FOSS happen easily in the exhibitor area.

Broadening the target market beyond a focus on developers provides an
opportunity to increase the number of conference attendees, users, and
potential future sponsors. From my read about the OSGEO foundation this
seems like it could reasonably fit under OSGEO's purview:  "OSGeo also
serves as an outreach and advocacy organization for the open source
geospatial community" - http://www.osgeo.org/content/foundation/about.html

If this seems like an idea worth exploring I'd be willing to work with
whoever else is interested to help think through what this may look like and
test its viability, possibly by using surveys sent out through the
education, government, and business realms.

-Lisa Sweeney

On Fri, Sep 23, 2011 at 8:17 AM, Mark Lucas <mlucas17 at mac.com> wrote:

Chris,

Good point, but I'd expect that we could rubber stamp the Denver conference
and match or exceed this year's number.  Colorado is a geospatial center for
the US.  I think the break even target for this year was somewhere around
500, so it would be prudent to target that or slightly higher.  As
government budgets get whacked I'm expecting a lot more interest from
government agencies.  In any case, it was a very successful conference and
this years attendees will help spread the word.

Mark

On Sep 23, 2011, at 7:13 AM, christopher.schmidt at nokia.com wrote:

On Sep 22, 2011, at 10:37 PM, ext Mark Lucas wrote:

Yep, and that is just returning attendees.  67% were new attendees for 2011.
So it would seem we could easily duplicate the 900 attendees at this years
conference.

I don't think it works like that.

FOSS4G was in the US for the first time in a long time; the space itself has
changed
drastically since 2004 (or even 2007) when it was last practical to attend
the conf. for a lot of people.

I think that the new market for attendees was huge this year, but I don't
think it's fair to extrapolate that it will *always* be that big;
I think that imagining the market/space will grow by as much between 
2011->2012 as it did between 2007 and 2011 is a pretty big 
expectation.

I would start with mpg's numbers and go up slightly, unless you believe
there
is somehow a very large untapped potential that Denver did not address; 
I think that imagining a 25% growth of new attendees is reasonable, but
expecting *two thirds* new attendees again would be excessive.

-- Chris

Mark

On Sep 22, 2011, at 9:34 PM, Michael P. Gerlek wrote:

For "likely to attend a FOSS4G in NorAmer next year" (#19), the responses
were

1: 10%

2: 10%

3: 25%

4: 20%

5: 35%

Let us assign probabilities to the 1-5 scale like this:

1: 0% (will not attend)

2: 20% chance of attending

3: 40%

4: 60%

5: 80%

Assume 900 attendees at this conference.  Then, we can project the
attendance at the postulated local NorAmer conference to be

.10(900) * 0 + .10(900) * .20 + .25(900) * .40 + .20(900) * .60 + .35(900) *
.80

= 0 + 18 + 90 + 108 + 252

= 468

Check my math, but we could be looking at a ~500 person gig.

-mpg

From: board-bounces at lists.osgeo.org [mailto:board-bounces at lists.osgeo.org]
On Behalf Of Peter Batty

Sent: Thursday, September 22, 2011 6:02 PM

To: foss4g2011-private; board at lists.osgeo.org; conference

Subject: [Board] Fwd: Preliminary Survey Results

Hi all,

Thought I would share a few preliminary results from the post-FOSS4G survey.
As James says below, we'll get the data in a better form for analysis once
we close the survey. But we got responses from 1/3 of attendees within 24
hours, which is great!

A few things I'd highlight:

67% of attendees were at their first FOSS4G

46% answered 5 to the question how heavily do you currently use geospatial
open source, remainder split fairly evenly between 1-4.

61% were software developers as main job function, 18% end users, 20%
managers

Overall rating of FOSS4G was 4.31 on a scale of 1-5, which is impressive!

Highest ranked function was the Wynkoop reception at 4.55.

Quality of presentations was ranked at 4.07.

72% answered 1 or 2 on how likely they are to be in Beijing, 14% answered 4
or 5.

57% answered 4 or 5 on attending a "local FOSS4G" if there was one in North
America next year.

Of various possible options proposed for future FOSS4Gs, the one involving
an annual local conference in North America was the highest rated by some
margin (though obviously a sample skewed towards North Americans).

We need the more detailed spreadsheet to get scores and comments for
individual workshops, I think that will be another important thing to look
at in planning for next year.

Lots of interesting stuff in the comments too that we can use to make future
events better.

Cheers,

   Peter.

---------- Forwarded message ----------

From: James Sakamoto <jsakamoto at gita.org>

Date: Thu, Sep 22, 2011 at 3:36 PM

Subject: Preliminary Survey Results

To: Peter Batty <peter at ebatty.com>

Cc: Bob Samborski <bsamborski at gita.org>, Libby Hanna <lhanna at gita.org>,
Patricia Essex <pessex at gita.org>

Hi Pete,

Thought we would share the preliminary survey results.  It is still very
early but, so far, you almost have 300 (285) responses which would be nearly
33%!!!  That is a tremendous response.  Generally we get about 10-15%.

This is just the summarized PDF synopsis.  When the survey closes we should
be able to provide you with an Excel formatted report that you can
manipulate as you please.

Thanks,

James

James Sakamoto

Senior Education Coordinator

GITA

14456 East Evans Ave

Aurora, CO 80014

(720) 496-0484 <tel:%28720%29%20496-0484> 

jsakamoto at gita.org

October 24-26, GIS for Oil & Gas Pipeline Conference, Houston, TX
www.gita.org/oilgas

<image001.jpg>

_______________________________________________

Board mailing list

Board at lists.osgeo.org

http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board

_______________________________________________

Board mailing list

Board at lists.osgeo.org

http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board

_______________________________________________
Board mailing list
Board at lists.osgeo.org
http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board

__________ Informace od ESET Smart Security, verze databaze 6489 (20110923)
__________

Tuto zpravu proveril ESET Smart Security.

http://www.eset.cz

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/conference_dev/attachments/20110925/0d9747f1/attachment-0001.html