[OSGeo-Discuss] [location-iwg] 2015 North American conference

[David William Bitner]

Alex,

As a goal to differentiate different bids I 100% agree.

Sadly, fact of the matter is that nobody else has expressed any interest.
Sometimes it takes the prodding of someone else stepping up to spur on a
group to come together. Barring that, we are already one year from the
ideal target dates for an NA event. This is already pushing the envelope
for planning an event like this.

I think given the rational for the density of Feds and the halo effect that
has in DC that 2015 would actually be a prime year to bring this back to DC
having had the 2014 Global Event in Portland and the 2013 Event in
Minneapolis. I think there is enough specific pull to DC that every third
year is not too much. I would like to see this event reach Mexico/Canada as
well and it might be good to start trying to groom a city (or cities) to
try to explore a 2016 bid now.

David


On Fri, Apr 4, 2014 at 4:41 PM, Alex Mandel <tech_dev at wildintellect.com>wrote:

> Yes and no. I was at the DC Fossg4NA. Location did matter for the set of
> attendees there, but choice of location also prevents attendance. If the
> goal is penetration into the Federal market, DC is important. If the
> goal is to foster Foss4g around North America then it needs to move
> around so that people in small non-profits, state agencies, tech
> start-ups can also make it. Also it's not just travel restrictions but
> price - DC isn't the cheapest place to fly or stay depending on dates.
>
> Basically, there are some states with plenty of Federal employees
> (regional staff) and plenty of State employees who also face travel
> restrictions. There's almost 0% chance a state employee from California
> can get to DC for a conference. Not sure what the situation for New
> York,Texas, Colorado, Oregon, Washington are either. That's a huge chunk
> of potential missing. That doesn't even cover Canada or Mexico, which I
> can't really speak for at all.
>
> Thanks,
> Alex
>
>
> On 04/04/2014 02:31 PM, Jody Garnett wrote:
> > The travel restrictions offer quite a strong direction don't they? Do we
> > have anyone who can speak about the previous FOSS4G-NA event?
> > --
> > Jody
> >
> > Jody Garnett
> >
> >
> > On Sat, Apr 5, 2014 at 8:02 AM, Andrew Ross <andrew.ross at eclipse.org>
> wrote:
> >
> >>  Hello Everyone,
> >>
> >> Please excuse the cross post between OSGeo's discuss & conference_dev
> >> lists as well as LocationTech's discussion list. I'm hoping to enable
> >> inclusive discussion about an idea.
> >>
> >> Bit of background, this coming May (19-21), LocationTech Summit is
> >> co-hosted with Location Intelligence in Washington D.C.<
> http://www.locationintelligence.net/>.
> >> Travel restrictions for Federal Government employees for instance meant
> >> holding this in D.C. was important in 2014.
> >>
> >> We have started planning for 2015, and I wanted to reach out and see if
> an
> >> idea might be of interest to the greater community.
> >>
> >> The idea is to co-host LocationTech Summit, FOSS4G North America, and
> >> EclipseCon next year in the spring.
> >>
> >> For those that haven't been:
> >>
> >>    - EclipseCon is a great  developer conference & covers topics that I
> >>    feel may be a really nice complement such as Science, Internet of
> Things,
> >>    Automotive, Software development best practice, and more. While
> there are
> >>    some awesome talks in the area, it's not just about the IDE. :-)
> >>    - FOSS4G NA is the regional sibling of FOSS4G Global, also a great
> >>    developer conference, and focused on geospatial technologies. It is
> a must
> >>    attend event if you're into web mapping or looking for open source
> GIS
> >>    solutions.
> >>    - LocationTech Summit is new (first one this May), similar to FOSS4G
> >>    however perhaps has a stronger focus on high performance
> geoprocessing
> >>    technologies and new technologies like GeoGit for instance.
> >>     - My feeble attempt at contrast aside, I think these last two will
> >>    see a lot of the same speakers & audience.
> >>
> >> A few thoughts:
> >>
> >>    - We believe a combined event could likely be done to prioritize
> >>    camaraderie which is so important for open source projects &
> community.
> >>    i.e. avoid anyone feeling lost in a huge event.
> >>    - We feel the mutual outreach to people across communities would be
> >>    really useful, interesting, and spark wonderful ideas we can't
> predict.
> >>    - The logistical work can be done by full time conference organizers
> >>    who organize EclipseCon each year. The program is up to the
> communities to
> >>    set.
> >>    - For those seeking suppliers, partners, & customers, this should
> make
> >>    for more opportunities.
> >>     - Profit sharing with significant participating groups is doable.
> >>    We're glad to help figure out a fair and amicable solution.
> >>     - Ensuring each group are well served is a priority of course. We
> >>    think this combined event might attract people who might not
> otherwise come
> >>    to any of them. But we'll have to try and see.
> >>
> >> Thoughts? Comments? Suggestions? Is this a good idea? Interested?
> >>
> >> Kind regards,
> >>
> >> Andrew
> >>
>
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-- 
************************************
David William Bitner
dbSpatial LLC
612-424-9932
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