[OSGeo-Conf] Comments on Philadelphia 2017 proposal

[Jeff McKenna]

Dear Robert and LOC team,

Thank you for your proposal for Philadelphia, USA.  Here are
some comments from me, that I hope will help you in this final stage and 
beyond:

- Your introduction letter really helps the proposal.  I especially like 
the mention of travel grants already included in your budget, this is 
especially helpful for those not normally able to attend such an event. 
  Thank you.

- Your letter also mentions your mature community, which I tend to agree 
with.  And, your choice of words for "collaborative community 
bridges..." is quite fitting, as the tagline selected by the FOSS4G 2016 
team is "building bridges".

- I like how you mention the capitalizing on a strong momentum and 
growing Open Source geo momentum; reading this proposal I can tell that 
you really know the Open Source community situation very well.

- Your explanation of the local community is very, very impressive.

- Like I mentioned to the Ottawa team, using the Eclipse foundation as 
your PCO makes sense, but my concern is the branding.  FOSS4G Seoul 
absolutely raised the bar with this, and really made it a point to hit 
home that this event is hosted by OSGeo.  If you could explain your 
vision here, how you see branding issues handled, that would help us 
understand your vision for this event.  By the way, not to single your 
team or any other teams else out, I would hope that you had 
representatives at the FOSS4G Seoul event (yes Eddie was there, great).

- thank you for mentioning OSGeo visibility in your plans.  I do notice 
that, oddly, the words in this section almost match the words in the 
Ottawa bid's "OSGeo Visibility" section word for word.  I find that, odd 
(as any teacher reading an assignment would).

- I think you do a great job of highlighting the return to OSGeo in your 
budget.   Thank you for this contribution, or even planning for this, 
that means a lot.

-  Thank you for explaining the reasoning for the August date 
(substantial cost reduction).  I think this topic has been well 
discussed on the list already.

- Big bonus points for including a Monday night social event, as well as 
plans for a 2-day code sprint, including a host for that.  Well done.

- I must say, you have a very strong local team, the members are very 
well represented across all sectors (also good to see an academic 
representative).  Your private sector representation is top notch.

- maybe I missed this, but are your workshops to be held at the Penn 
Convention Center? Will you be renting workstations, or using 
bring-your-own, or what is your plans?


Thanks again for your proposal.

-jeff