[foss4g2014] Institutionalized aspects of FOSS4G (was: Work Party?)

Tue Feb 4 07:31:40 PST 2014

I was the Program Chair for FOSS4G NA 2013, and I am very willing to help
provide some continuity and any information that we collected and learned
in putting that event together.  I am pretty sure that David Bitner has
given you access to the lists of sponsors, media partners, etc. that we
created.  If not, let us know.

I have been on the list for several months now and I have been waiting for
the program-related activities to ramp up.  I am hoping to get more
involved and would be happy to work more on the program solicitation,
collection, and selection. There are definitely opportunities for improving
our process, but would be very happy to share what we did.  We had a
handful of people who did a majority of the work, including Michael Terner
and Paul Ramirez, who I know are on this list already.

For the selection process, we decided to do a first cut based on blind
selections from 'the community'.  We then did some non-blind selections to
help round out the program.  I think that we learned a lot with that
process and I came out of it thinking that there are a few potential
advantages to blind select, but that it will probably lead to a skewed
program.  I am also not sure if we enticed anyone to present that wouldn't
have submitted an abstract to a non-anonymous process.

I think that the people who participate in the community voting represent
an important part of the population that will attend the conference, but
you may miss people who you want to attract to the conference.  In addition
to the core developers and users of OS Geo warez, we also wanted to bring
in people who may not be using it now, but could be convinced with some
good business cases.  Because of the strong use of geospatial tech in state
and local government in Minnesota, we also saw the conference as an
opportunity to bring in local people who might not travel to a conference
like this.  For them, we looked for government business cases.

I completely agree about the lack or continuity and sharing of tools (aside
from Boundless' abstract submittal app).  I am here to help where needed.

David.

On Mon, Feb 3, 2014 at 11:14 PM, Eli Adam <eadam at co.lincoln.or.us> wrote:

> Changed subject to try and not distract people from the work party...
>
> On Fri, Jan 31, 2014 at 12:24 PM, Darrell Fuhriman <darrell at garnix.org>
> wrote:
> > Yes, I believe so. We're working on consolidating a list.
> >
>
> Previous LOCs and chairs have been very helpful and kind and shared
> all resources requested.
>
> > I've been wondering if it wouldn't make sense to have a shared CRM that
> all
> > FOSS4G-related events could use.
> >
> > (The lack of resources carrying automatically from year to year
> > independently of the LOC is a big gripe I've had lately... The
> hodgepodge of
> > sponsor and attendee information being prime examples..)
> >
>
> I've thought about this too (in the time that I've spent establishing
> media partners), "Shouldn't there already be a FOSS4G media partner
> list?"  I've almost written conference-dev about several items but
> have avoided that since it may turn into a long discussion when I need
> to be completing tasks.
>
> Occasionally FOSS4G chairs and LOCs go quiet after the conferences.  I
> was thinking of having a past LOCs BOF to see how much agreement there
> is within various past LOCs about 'how things should be done'.
>
> If there is strong agreement, then work with the conference committee
> to establish these.  If LOCs can't agree Mail Chimp or Constant
> Contact, Basecamp or TeamworkPM or wiki or shared google drive, or
> other items then we don't have to talk about it and folks can
> reminisce about their stories of past years and recommend to the
> conference committee, "you can't herd cats".
>
> From my personal perspective on our LOC, I encourage Darrell to make a
> list and save it for later and devote his time to other LOC things.
> From my personal perspective as an OSGeo Community member, I encourage
> Darrell/us to work on establishing some more institutionalized FOSS4G
> items that pass from PDX to next year and hopefully continuing.
> Sometimes the perspectives align and we achieve both goals, other
> times they conflict and then we have to weigh time and tasks.
>
> One way to achieve continuity of accumulated knowledge is to give a
> longer lead time on bids.  I wish I had been on the Nottingham LOC,
> not that I am anywhere near the UK, in an appropriate time zone for
> interacting, or anything else, but that I could have learned all the
> details as it went along and then just continued some aspects into
> this year in PDX.  I'm hoping that the next bid goes out and is
> decided shortly.  I'd like one or more members of the next LOC to join
> PDX and learn and continue whatever aspects are worthwhile.
>
> Eli
>
> > d.
> >
> > On Jan 31, 2014, at 11:32, David William Bitner <bitner at dbspatial.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > Darrell,
> >
> > Just checking, we've given y'all contacts for FOSS4GNA sponsors, right? I
> > think we got those to Eli a while ago.
> >
> > bit
> >
> >
> > On Fri, Jan 31, 2014 at 1:31 PM, Darrell Fuhriman <darrell at garnix.org>
> > wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >> Eli and I are planning a work party tomorrow. We'd love to have some
> more
> >> attendance.
> >>
> >> Is anyone interested? We're thinking about 10 or 11am PST.
> >>
> >> We have a lot of work todo on sponsors, both identifying and writing
> >> letters to big past sponsors as well as several writing tasks.
> >>
> >> Eli will be working remotely, so we can do a Hangout for those folks who
> >> aren't local.
> >>
> >> Darrell
> >>
> >>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> Foss4g2014 mailing list
> >> Foss4g2014 at lists.osgeo.org
> >> http://lists.osgeo.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/foss4g2014
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > ************************************
> > David William Bitner
> > dbSpatial LLC
> > 612-424-9932
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> > Foss4g2014 at lists.osgeo.org
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