[OSGeo-Discuss] [OSGeo-Conf] regional conferences

Mon Jun 18 06:50:06 PDT 2012

Volker, I see your point - you are not writing it for the first time.

Truth is, there was strong request for FOSS4G-E during CEE event. Do you
want to prohibit it? I would better support it. Certainly it means loss
for the global FOSS4G. Does it mean win for OSGeo? I think so. We just
have to talk about the proper model.

Jachym

Dne 18.6.2012 14:44, Volker Mische napsal(a):
> Hi,
> 
> thanks Jachym for bringing up the smei-regional events. My preference
> lies towards having one global event a year and also *real* regional
> events, but no semi-regional events. Before I come to more details about
> what I think a real regional event is, I'd like to state that I think
> FOSS4G-CEE is real regional event, FOSS4G-NA is a semi-regional.
> 
> What I understand under real regional events (they are not sorted by any
> priority, I just give them numbers for later reference):
>  1. In the language of the chapter if that's possible. FOSSGIS
> (Germany), GFOSS (Italy), the conf (currently only a day) from OSGeo.nl
> (Netherlads) are examples. FOSS4G-CEE is an exception, there's no common
> language in the area, hence it's in English.
>  2. Attracting people from the region. At least at the FOSSGIS the
> audience it quite different from the global FOSS4G. The FOSSGIS attracts
> more governmental people and end users. There are even talks about
> people using the software for their work (I find them boring, as I'm a
> dev, but I think it is interesting for a lot of people).
>  3. You can hardly tell your boss to send you to the regional event,
> except you are from this region.
> 
> How's that different from a semi-regional event. Point (2) is the most
> important one for me here. If there is an NA event (and a potential EU
> one), it will attract more people, but at what price? I think you can't
> tell your boss that you need to go to a global and to a NA (resp. EU)
> event + a regional one. So you would need to chose between the global
> and the semi-regional one, which would make both of them a bit smaller.
> 
> My solution for this problem is: Don't do semi-regional events. The
> FOSS4G-NA just spans a way too big region. Many, if not even the
> majority of the Open Source geospatial development happens in the US and
> Canada. You will attract people from abroad as so many of the major
> players will be there. Just do real regional events instead. Do e.g. a
> California one. The local chapter is quite huge (I gave a talk there a
> year ago, and there were about 100 RSVP). Do this on several places in
> NA (e.g. a Midwest one).
> 
> Cheers,
>   Volker
> 
> On 06/18/2012 01:54 PM, Jachym Cepicky wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> not sure, if this proposal is the best for the scope of FOSS4G.
>>
>> As I already wrote in one of previous mails, we have to try to find the
>> balance between global, semi-regional (approx. continent level) and
>> regional (GFOSS, FOSSGIS, ...) events.
>>
>> Another working (not sure, if better) model could be:
>>
>> * Global event as it is - every year
>> * Semi-Regional events (NA, E, Asia, ...) - every year too, of course
>> not on the continent, where the global event is going be organized
>> * Regional events (GFOSS, FOSSGIS, Geoinformatics, ...) every year but
>> in e.g. spring
>>
>> Having global event every second year means implies, that OSGeo meeting
>> will take place only every second year? And what about people, who would
>> like to meet other people, but for some reason (usually financial) are
>> not able to travel to other part of the world?
>>
>> Any opinion to this?
>>
>> Jachym
>>
>> Dne 16.6.2012 13:42, Maria Brovelli napsal(a):
>>> +1. I will be happy to help Greek friends in organizing the meeting. Anyway
>>> I'm wondering if sooner or later is possible to organize a Mediterranean
>>> conference....
>>> Maria
>>>
>>> 2012/6/15 Dimitris Kotzinos <kotzino at csd.uoc.gr>
>>>
>>>> Dear all,
>>>>
>>>> I saw with great pleasure the call for organizing the 1st Latin America
>>>> FOSS4G conference.
>>>> Congrats to the friends there and let me add my offer to help in any
>>>> possible way to those who preceded me.
>>>>
>>>> The purpose of my e-mail though is a bit different. Taking into account
>>>> the fact the this year we had the North America regional conference, the
>>>> central European regional conference and now the Latin America Regional
>>>> Conference I feel that it is due time to move to a mixed scheme of an
>>>> international and regional conferences.
>>>>
>>>> Thus I propose that we have the odd years (starting from 2013) ONLY the
>>>> international event (our very successful FOSS4G conference) and the even
>>>> years (starting from 2014) ONLY the regional conferences.
>>>> Being in a world in crisis where funding for travel becomes more difficult
>>>> and where people cannot participate in too many conferences in a year I
>>>> feel that this is an acceptable compromise.
>>>> So I call upon the board to decide on this proposal and, of course, all of
>>>> you to argue in favor :) or against!
>>>>
>>>> One final note for the European participation on this list: I suggest that
>>>> we start organizing a regional European level FOSS4G (if there is agreement
>>>> also integrating in it the Central-Eastern Europe event) starting from
>>>> 2014. I volunteer Greece to host the first such event (OK, given that
>>>> things in Greece will not turn out too bad :)).
>>>> If there is an initial agreement we can organize things a bit more.
>>>>
>>>> Thanks for the consideration of both proposals,
>>>>
>>>> Dimitris Kotzinos
>>>> ______________________________**_________________
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>>>> Discuss at lists.osgeo.org
>>>> http://lists.osgeo.org/**mailman/listinfo/discuss<http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>
>>
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-- 
Jachym Cepicky
Help Service - Remote Sensing s.r.o.
jachym.cepicky at gmail.com
HS-RS: jachym at hsrs.cz http://bnhelp.cz
http://les-ejk.cz

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