[FOSS4G2016] FOSS4G organizing issues

[Till Adams]

Dear FOSS4G2016'ers,


last friday I had a meeting with Klaus Greve, reagrding the issue with 
EARSeL and FOSs4G. We agreed, that we won't make it bringing both 
conferences into one event.

One problem is the timeline, as EARSeL tends to be early and wants to 
start in June and FOSS4G month is traditionally september. Second, some 
EARSeL guys got cold feet regarding the different size of EARSeL (350) 
and FOSs4G (1000). That's a pitty, but not to change for the moment.


In general we thought of creating a kind of "roof" on top of both 
conferences (Bonner Geo-Summer or s.th like that) and "connect" the 
events by having a FOSs4G track @EARSeL and a Remote sensing Track 
@FOSS4G. Having this, we want to talk to the city hoping to get some of 
the discount, they promised us in advance. I am absolutely sure, that 
both communities may benefit from each other.

On the other hand, this makes our plannings easier, as we can focus on 
ourselves.

To give an overview about what is happening by this week:

1. First of all, I want to fix the conference date this week.- I have to 
time frames offered by WCCB. One is end of August as mentioned in the 
roposal, a second potential time could be 5th-9th of september. I will 
talk to WCCB this week and will see, I guess, we get easier discount 
when taking the August time-span.

2. I have a meeting with our PCO tomorrow where we want to fix our 
collaboration and make a rough planning of what should happen when.

3. We definetely need some "heads" for several working groups/themes.

For now we already have:

- Franz-Josef Beer as chair of scientific track
- Volker Mische as chair of program committee


Of course we need more than just the chairs here! Feel free to raise 
your arms here or for the below listed themes:


a) Workshop organization
Marco already offered his help and also Pirmin said, that he would like 
to help with the OSGeo-live DVD. Having a local here for aquisicion of 
Workshop rooms and contact person to university would be very helpful.


b) financial issues
Torsten Brassat, who helped at earlier FOSSGIS conferences offered some 
help here. Also I guess that Fred Ramm as our treasurer might contribute 
a little here, if he wants to. More people welcome.


c) "social-event-organizer"
The frame of the social events are set, but I think we need one or two 
heads caring for gala event and ice breaker especially.
This may laso include some offerings of field trips for the saturday.


d) sponsorship & exhibition
Sponsorship is a source where we can generate early income, so to start 
this process early is a major part. Also I guess, that most companies 
are planning their financial budget this year, so it is important to let 
them know about the possibilities of sponsoring FOSS4G.


e) public relations
I talked to Textkoch this FOSSGIS and he offered his help together with 
Monika Resch here (of course not for free :-(). Public relations work 
may play a major role to get many people attending our conference. So 
for this issues we need a group of people and also ideas on how to 
structure this. Klaus Greve also said, that we might talk to the public 
realtions office of the university first.


f) Family weekend
An idea brought in by the irish proposal was to make a family weekend 
before the conference. Peter, the chair of the Dublin team offered his 
help here, but he definetely needs a helping local hand here.


g) Code sprint
We need an organizers of the code sprint. The group cares for room, 
snacks and acts as contact persons for this event.


h) Techniue
There are competent people from WCCB, but we definietely need a group of 
persons taking care of the conference technique ingeneral.


i) Co-operation with WCCB, caterer, PCO etc.pp.
I guess, this will be my part as I started this already for the 
proposal. Help welcome ;-)


This is it for know, did I forget anything (surely: yes!).
I will take care for getting a WIKI/Ticket system on our 
FOSSGIS-architecture ASAP, so we can switch more into the WIKI.


Regards, Till