[UN] Budget proposal 2019
Cameron Shorter
cameron.shorter at gmail.com
Thu Jan 17 03:34:18 PST 2019
Hi Serena, which I acknowledge the value of your points, I'm inclined to
agree with Bruce's points that the OSGeo volunteer organisation
shouldn't be subsidising a funded organisations such as the UN (who I've
heard are able to find money to purchase ESRI licenses).
It is hard to teach an organisation like the UN that they should pay to
gain the value of Open Source if we keep diverting our budget toward
giving them a free ride.
Warm regards, Cameron
On 17/1/19 7:48 am, Bruce Bannerman wrote:
> Thanks for the more detailed information Serena.
>
> I understand the issue of supporting young and not so young OSGeo
> volunteers. This is also behind the point that I was trying to make.
>
> There is a principle here, that as a volunteer organisation OSGeo
> can’t afford to be subsidising other organisations’ use of open
> source. These organisations need to be encouraged to contribute back
> to the community, whether through funding, or in kind contributions of
> staff time and effort, etc.
>
> However, I will not pursue my intervention further at this stage. I
> appreciate the work that this team is doing and do not wish to derail
> that effort and good work.
>
> Kind regards,
>
> Bruce
>
>
> On 16 Jan 2019, at 22:48, Serena Coetzee <serenacoetzee at gmail.com
> <mailto:serenacoetzee at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>> Dear Bruce,
>>
>> thanks for the constructive comments.
>>
>> OSGeo is a partner in the UN Open GIS initiative and, as partner,
>> OSGeo has to support the project. Participation in the initiative is
>> done by volunteers (from OSGeo) and we can't ask the volunteers to
>> pay with their money. This is the reason for the first request. OSGeo
>> partnering in the UN Open GIS initiative should benefit you and all
>> other OSGeo members. Let us know if there anything that the person
>> travelling to Sudan can do to also improve your case.
>>
>> About the development of training material, this raises awareness of
>> open source software for geospatial and contributes to capacity
>> building in OSGeo. It is a way to support young OSGeo members. Such
>> challenges are common place in industry. The mentors are working for
>> OSGeo as volunteers, increasing the visibility of OSGeo within the UN
>> and beyond.
>>
>> Regards,
>> Serena
>>
>> Serena Coetzee (GPr GISc 1245)
>>
>> University of Pretoria
>> Director: Centre for Geoinformation Science
>> Professor and Head of Department Geography, Geoinformatics and
>> Meteorology
>> Geography Building 3-5, Hatfield Campus, Lynnwood Road, Hatfield,
>> 0083, South Africa
>> email: serena.coetzee at up.ac.za <mailto:serena.coetzee at up.ac.za> ·
>> Web: www.up.ac.za/ggm <http://www.up.ac.za/ggm> · Mobile: +27 82 464
>> 4294 · Tel: +27 12 420 3823
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Jan 16, 2019 at 2:16 AM Bruce Bannerman
>> <bruce.bannerman.osgeo at gmail.com
>> <mailto:bruce.bannerman.osgeo at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>
>> Hello Maria,
>>
>> I do appreciate your passion towards this initiative and the
>> outreach work that you do.
>>
>> However, I am very uncomfortable with the approach outlined in
>> the proposal below.
>>
>> The UN should appreciate the value of open source spatial
>> software by now and be willing to contribute back to the open
>> source community.
>>
>> Therefore, I believe that the activities suggested below should
>> be funded by the UN and not OSGeo.
>>
>> Regarding the items in the proposal below:
>>
>> Item 1) If this is for a UN Project and they value OSGeo
>> representation, then that should be a UN Project cost and not an
>> OSGeo cost.
>>
>> Item 2) I’m not sure what this is, but I interpret it to be for
>> the preparation of QGIS training material specific for UN staff.
>> If so, then again this should be a UN funded activity. The UN may
>> wish to view this as a voluntary contribution that they make to
>> the QGIS Community in part recognition of the benefit that they
>> are receiving from the use of the QGIS Open Source software. This
>> is also an activity that could be undertaken by an commercial
>> organisation that specialises in working with this type of open
>> source software.
>>
>> Item 3) I’m not sure what this is, but it also sounds like an
>> activity that would be for UN benefit. If so, then again, they
>> should be paying.
>>
>> IMO, we need to push back against the expectation that open
>> source is free (as in free beer). There is always a cost to
>> produce and maintain open source and I would like to see those
>> who benefit from using the software to be encouraged to
>> contribute back to the open source communities.
>>
>> I have been working actively for many years within one of the UN
>> Agencies and am making some real headway towards this agency
>> accepting the value of an open source approach to a specific
>> problem that they have. I can’t discuss this publicly yet. I’m
>> sure that you’ll appreciate that the wheels can move quite slowly
>> at times as people become comfortable with what is in reality a
>> new approach for them and they have internal processes that need
>> to be followed.
>>
>> If I have misunderstood the intent of the proposed items in your
>> email, then I apologise in advance.
>>
>> Kind regards,
>>
>> Bruce
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> On 16 Jan 2019, at 06:03, Maria Antonia Brovelli
>>> <maria.brovelli at polimi.it <mailto:maria.brovelli at polimi.it>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Dear All
>>> it is time to make the proposal to OSGeo Board for the
>>> activities of the UN Committee in 2019.
>>> We have the UN Open GIS Initiative entering in its third year of
>>> activities; many people of the UN staff have been trained in
>>> QGIS and PostGIS (more than 100) thanks to volunteers of GeoForAll.
>>> Currently, there is the third edition of QGIS (Victoria
>>> Rautenbach chairing the initiative; Thomas Mueller and Cameron
>>> Green mentoring)and the second one of PostGIS (Ivana Ivanova
>>> chairing, Paolo Corti, Oliva Martin Sanchez, and Gregory
>>> Giuliani mentoring).
>>>
>>> About UN Open GIS Initiative the request will be:
>>> 1) support for attending a couple of project meeting and
>>> training - (one will be probably in South Sudan) 5000$
>>> 2) one UN OSGeo Challenge (similar to what we organized last
>>> year) to prepare a new training material course on PostGIS (the
>>> one we are using, which is a Boundless one, has to be updated
>>> and re-built considering the experience of the trainees and
>>> trainers). The budget for this initiative will be 3000 $, the
>>> same as the initiatives of last year. In case we got financed,
>>> Ivana Ivanova and I can be the mentor of the winner of the
>>> Challenge.
>>> 3) Moreover, we can ask some budget for another training course
>>> about SDGs and open data/open software. Last year Codrina Maria
>>> Ilie was the winner and the training material is almost ready
>>> and will be released soon (it is about the computation of SDG
>>> indicator 9.1.1 using QGIS). The budget can be 3000 $, the same
>>> as last year and Serena Coetzee and I can be the mentor.
>>> Obviously if you there is somebody who wants to offer
>>> her/himself as a mentor, they are more than welcome!
>>> Please let me know if you have comments. If none, I will
>>> proceed with the proposal.
>>> Bets regards,
>>> Maria
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Please pay attention to these two opportunities:
>>>
>>> A new IJGI Special Issue
>>> "State-of-the-Art in Spatial Information Science"
>>> (deadline for submissions: 1 may 2019)
>>>
>>> http://www.mdpi.com/journal/ijgi/special_issues/ISPRS_2020_Nice
>>>
>>> A new Transaction in GIS Special Issue
>>> "Open Source Geospatial Science, Software and Education"
>>> (deadline for abstract submissions: 15 february 2019)
>>> https://wol-prod-cdn.literatumonline.com/pb-assets/assets/14679671/Open%20Geospatial%20Science%20Software%20and%20Education.pdf
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *----------------------------------------------------*
>>> *Prof. Maria Antonia Brovelli*
>>> Professor of GIS and Digital Mapping
>>> Politecnico di Milano
>>>
>>> P.zza Leonardo da Vinci, 32 - Building 3 - 20133 Milano (Italy)
>>> Tel. +39-02-23996242 - Mob.+39-328-0023867,
>>> maria.brovelli at polimi.it <mailto:maria.brovelli at polimi.it>
>>> https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3161-556
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> UN mailing list
>>> UN at lists.osgeo.org <mailto:UN at lists.osgeo.org>
>>> https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/un
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> UN mailing list
>> UN at lists.osgeo.org <mailto:UN at lists.osgeo.org>
>> https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/un
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> UN mailing list
> UN at lists.osgeo.org
> https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/un
--
Cameron Shorter
Technology Demystifier
Open Technologies and Geospatial Consultant
M +61 (0) 419 142 254
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/un/attachments/20190117/3c0ebb9f/attachment-0001.html>
More information about the UN
mailing list