[OSGeo-Discuss] Costly FOSS4Gs

[María Arias de Reyna]

On Wed, Oct 18, 2017 at 7:57 AM, Ravi Kumar <manarajahmundry2015 at gmail.com>
wrote:
> GFOSS.. Commercial Support.. +1 for this.
> But.. now that this has come to a boil..
>
> WHY NOT THE BOARD AND WOULD BE BOARD COME OUT CLEAR ON THIS..
> SURE THIS WILL HELP THE CHARTER.. WHOM TO VOTE..
> 'Free and Open Source'.. has brought to where we are.. This is a community
> effort.
>
> Is there a solution to OSGeo FOSS4G events, that are affordable to
> Users/Developers/Students..
>
> Ravi Kumar
>

Hi Ravi,

I think we have mentioned several ideas to fix this.* The Travel Grant *program
may not be very big right now, but it is growing year by year. Also, yes,
we are workinig on making the cost lower for attendants, have you checked
the current call for venues[1]? Have you checked the current *early bird
prices* for next FOSS4G[2]? Remember that some of them have a room already
included!

Maybe the problem is that you think this event should be free for
attendants? What is the price you would think it is reasonable for
attending FOSS4G? (This is a tricky question: whatever the price you say,
there will be people who will claim it is too high... unless it is free.
And then they will say travel costs are too high... you will never make
everyone happy unless it is a free event on their doorstep.).

And also remember what many of us had said: there are very good local and
regional events who have no reason to envy FOSS4G. As they are smaller, it
is easier to keep them cheaper.

There is another issue: we can lower insanely the price of the FOSS4G
ticket, but travel costs are still there. If you cannot afford to travel,
maybe you should look into your closest FOSS4G local event. Is there none?
Then look for your fellow osgeo members living near you and start one! How
do you think all this events started? A small group of people who wanted to
meet without having to travel much or wanting to talk about regional
specifics. That's it, there's no other secret.

[1] https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/FOSS4G_2019_Bid_Process
[2] https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/foss4g-2018-dar-es-salaam-tic
kets-36995828519#results
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