[OSGeo Oceania] FOSS4G Hobart - Elephant in the room ESRI

[eli]

Thanks to Andrew and everyone else who has contributed to this discussion.
It seems to have stirred quite a reaction in the community, and it’s
important to address it.

As Alex pointed out, the committee's decisions are somewhat separate from
the board. That said, I personally supported this initiative. Like many of
you, I’ve been ‘burned’ by ESRI regional distributors, who in some
countries actively try (and sometimes succeed) to poach potential clients.
This creates significant damage to small companies like mine, all for a few
thousand dollars that likely don’t even cover their Christmas party
expenses.

However, I was thrilled to have Kate Fickas as one of our (all female)
keynote speakers. In my opinion, she’s an amazing person who genuinely
cares about community building, as demonstrated through her Ladies of
Landsat group and her ongoing activism on social media. She’s also a
long-time friend of FOSS4G OO, having been a keynote speaker at our online
2021 conference, waking up at an ungodly hour to help us deliver quality
content during a challenging time. It’s also worth noting that she was
selected and agreed to be a keynote speaker for the Hobar conference before
anyone considered having ESRI as a sponsor.

>From what I understand, Kate played a pivotal role in encouraging ESRI to
sponsor the conference, as one of her roles is community building. I
recognise that some may view this as an attempt from ESRI to interfere in
our community, and I don’t want to be naïve and discard that possibility.
Nevertheless, I tend to value and trust individuals over large
organizations. My experience has shown that we shouldn’t judge people’s
intentions and behaviour based solely on the companies they work for.

We have talented, passionate members in our community who work for
‘questionable’ big companies, and we embrace them. If we cut off ESRI,
should we also discuss those other companies? Perhaps, and I’d be happy to
contribute to that conversation. But if we accept contributions from other
companies, why not try to build a bridge with ESRI, which is undeniably
doing good things with GDAL and in the OSM world? Additionally, having ESRI
at our conference could attract to the OS world people and countries that
primarily use ESRI software, like the Cook Islands.

For these reasons, I was pleased that the committee decided to explore this
bridge-building opportunity at the conference. I thoroughly enjoyed Kate’s
keynote address and our discussions, as she had many interesting and
practical ideas for empowering specific members of our community, including
women and non-native English speakers.

That said, what matters most to me is our community. I want it to thrive,
grow, and feel comfortable and safe above all else. I’m more than willing
to advocate against ESRI sponsorship in the future if the majority feels
it’s a threat rather than an opportunity. OO exists because of all of you,
and your needs always come first in our decisions. Let’s continue this
discussion and see where it leads us.

Cheers,

Elisa


Il giorno gio 21 nov 2024 alle ore 10:32 Alex Leith via Oceania <
oceania at lists.osgeo.org> ha scritto:

> Hi Andrew
>
> Thanks for raising this, and I'm glad we're having the discussion.
>
> The local organising committee for FOSS4G SotM Oceania operates
> independently of the Board, even though some on the committee may be Board
> members. And as a committee, we talked a lot about decisions on keynotes,
> making sure we were bringing the right influence to the event, the right
> "vibe". We talked less about sponsors, really, and that was mostly
> delegated to the sponsorship team (which was mostly Nick Forbes-Smith and
> me).
>
> So, there are two separate items here, as you note. Kate Fickas was
> invited as a keynote speaker because she's been an incredible advocate for
> women and I think her keynote was really good. She spoke about specific
> initiatives, like how she worked with others in the USGS to get Virginia T.
> Norwood recognition as the person who actually invented Landsat!
>
> The Esri sponsorship came up separately, though I think Kate may have
> encouraged it. And Esri were able to justify their sponsorship internally
> due to their support for the SotM component of our conference. Kate
> acknowledged in her keynote that Esri uses open source software in their
> applications. It's worth noting that Esri supported the GDAL Barnraising
> efforts in a significant way (https://gdalbarn.com/.)
>
> Now, I know that some have been burned by Esri resellers doing things that
> are not good, and there's a lot of hard feelings around. I don't discount
> that at all. But I feel as a community we should keep the gate open. We
> need support from business to make the conference happen, and we'll need it
> for the global event next year in a big way. Other organisations that may
> sponsor may or may have imperfect reputations in some areas, but good
> people work in all of these organisations. I believe it’s reasonable to
> welcome sponsorship from any organisation, provided they agree to our code
> of conduct and other reasonable conditions set by the community.
>
> My honest personal take is that we should expect sponsors to not be
> anti-open source and not be anti-competitive. But I think we should hold
> ourselves to similar standards. The era of militant anti-proprietary
> software movements has largely passed, and in many ways, we’ve already won.
> As I mentioned during the “pitch a future” session at the conference, the
> open movement feels inevitable. Microsoft’s journey from labeling open
> source a “virus” to embracing it wholeheartedly is a prime example. Should
> we have rejected Microsoft's contributions to past events?
>
> Kind regards,
>
> On Thu, 21 Nov 2024 at 02:53, Andrew Jeffrey via Oceania <
> oceania at lists.osgeo.org> wrote:
>
>> Hi All,
>>
>> I hope everyone that was able to attend the FOSS4G SOTM Oceania Hobart
>> conference had a great time. I'm still very much bummed that I wasn't able
>> to make it down there and my only start at the OO conference remains
>> Melbourne in 2018. I plan on improving my numbers as best I can into the
>> future, but from the outside looking in, it looked like all those that
>> attended had a blast - well done conference committee and OO board.
>>
>> I am writing to the list because I have a question that has been bugging
>> me ever since I talked to a colleague who attended the event. That question
>> is "What's the deal with ESRI being a sponsor?". I have genuine
>> curiosity when it comes to the decision process in having them on board. I
>> understand these things take money to put on and the conference needs to
>> turn a profit, a healthy conference makes for a healthy OO which allows the
>> organisation to do many of the great things that they do. However, I think
>> this sponsorship from ESRI should be reconsidered in the future.
>>
>> Just to be clear, I am not opposed to speakers who work for ESRI coming
>> and talking, from all reports the keynote from Kate Fickas was amazing (as
>> were all the keynotes from what I hear) and these are the industry people
>> that we all crave to hear from - top job in landing that line up! But as
>> for sponsorship I feel that ESRI is putting their brand on a community that
>> a lot of us turned to when looking for refuge from them.
>>
>> I acknowledge that my opinion on this is biased as a QGIS advocate and
>> trainer. But something about this just feels off! I don't see what's in it
>> for the FOSS4G community having ESRI involved in our conferences, to me it
>> looks more of a cheap way for them to buy some good news without doing
>> anything to improve the relationship with the FOSS4G community.
>>
>> However, I know I wasn't there, and I could be wrong about the whole
>> thing. Maybe the overwhelming opinion is that it's a good thing and this is
>> a step in the right direction? I would be interested in hearing what people
>> think and even hearing from someone on the conference organising committee
>> that has more knowledge about this. Is this something the conference would
>> do again? Is there a limit to their involvement? What would have happened
>> if they were a platinum sponsor and got the primary logo placement + verbal
>> mention at opening and closing of the event?
>>
>> Thanks
>> Andrew
>> _______________________________________________
>> Oceania mailing list
>> Oceania at lists.osgeo.org
>> https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/oceania
>>
>
>
> --
> *Alex Leith*
> m: +61 419 189 050
> https://auspatious.com
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