Posted by drewish on September 21, 2007 at 3:18pm
Heck yeah, already there!
48% (24 votes)
Probably
40% (20 votes)
Not sure
10% (5 votes)
No chance
2% (1 vote)
Total votes: 50
Are you interested in a Drupal Con/Camp before OSCON in July 2008?
Group organizers
Group categories
Event type
- DrupalCamp (86)
- DrupalCon (5)
- User Group (15)
- Other (31)
Comments
Where ?
In my case it depends on where. Now if its in NYC, that's perfect. I think there is tentatively a local NYC Camp planned for Jan/Feb or was it Nov 2007? They were thinking outside the holiday block.
Portland OR
OSCON is held in Portland Oregon every year. I was going to edit the poll but it wants me to re-enter the answers.
Wrong coast
Bummer ... I was hoping that maybe it switched coasts every once in a while. At least we have a NYC Drupal camp coming :-) Its right in my area.
Thanks for getting on this
Because now is when we need to start organizing :)
I'll be glad to help out with logistics on the ground; ie, lining up meeting places, places to stay, and scheduling events.
Cheers,
Bill
FunnyMonkey
Tools for Teachers
FunnyMonkey
Excellent!
I'll definitely be taking you up on that offer. Don't forget to join the OSCON group.
CubeSpace
If we think Cubespace may be an adequate locale for this event, we might hit them up now as I think they may be the target of many 'pre-OSCON' events
Sam Keen
Good idea
I was thinking about CubeSpace but the one problem I foresaw is that all of their rooms are pretty small. If we don't have a huge number of people it shouldn't be a problem. I'm going to do a little poking to see what it'd cost to do it at PSU. The idea case would be to get some of the departments using Drupal there to "sponsor" the event and book the rooms at the internal rate. It might be a bit of a pain but the nice thing about starting now is that we've got time.
PSU
PSU is a great idea as well. There's a great auditorium style classroom in the basement of the one building that we've used multiple times for summits and conferences. We usually have that room for the big sessions and then a few classrooms for breakouts. Hallway works great for tabling, food, check-in, etc.
I think it was around $1600, including beverage service, when we used it at the internal rate.
We got a student group to sponsor the event.
Jenni Simonis
Gresham, OR
Jenni Simonis
http://www.forwardsupport.com
Or less...
With a Faculty sponsor (namely me) you may be able to get PSU space for free, up to catering. I certainly would support such an event, up to and including financially. I would love to see PSU host this. Let's do it!
Great
Wow, that's a great offer and would make for an excellent event. Thinking about Borris' comment, is there some flexibility in this offer? Would you be into a spring event or just an OSCON related event?
CubeSpace has a larger room available
FYI, since BarCamp they created a much larger meeting area by removing a number of built in desks and put a number of tables on wheels so you can arange things any which way, including out of the way.
Provisionally
Thanks for initiating this. I would be very interested in a Drupal-Camp, one were we try and get sponsorship or have a nominal attendance fee. I personally find it annoying that all the open source conferences are as expensive as vendor-run events (OSCon is a great example of an overpriced event with some good programming, but mostly mediocre or poor programming and way too many sales pitches masquerading as programming). Sam's suggestion to use CubeSpace is a good oneand can help keep the costs down, just as it did for BarCamp.
I have some experience running SF conventions. In some ways they are very different, but in reality most of these conventions are based on or related to an SF-con model that is more than 60 years old. I also offer you my help with this. I accept that if we want cheap events that are ideologically open-source then we also need to chip in and help make them happen. I'd also suggest both BarCamp-style programming and some organized programming, where we invite those amongst us with a lot of knowledge to talk on specific topics, preferably having some panels with more than one speaker at a time, allowing for multiple viewpoints and respectful debate, while also minimalising dullness and/or the impact of a poor speaker.
Further, talking to a couple of the BarCamp organisers is not a bad idea.
Thanks again,
Grant
Sala kahle,
Grant
I'm all for the idea of a
I'm all for the idea of a nominal fee. Having people lay down some money ahead of time makes it much easier to estimate attendance, and allows a higher quality event.
SF Cons
A great example is OryCon here in Portland, where one should understand that most SF cons are a pay-it-forward type events and are run by volunteers and are not for profit. They get 2000+ people and they bring in paid guests. Membership is cheaper the further out you buy it, but even now just a couple of months before the event they charge only $45 membership for a 2.5 day event (note that a membership and a ticket are not the same). Compare that to OSCon. Add open evening parties galore, much better programming, free writers' workshops, a dealers room, much more to see and do, etc, -- i.e. far more on show and far better organization and a example of how cheaply this can be done by volunteers, and it's hard to understand why anyone would ever see OSCon as compatible with the open source community, nor why they would even go unless their company paid for it (which is probably true of 90-95% of their members). I'm guessing a Drupal con will (at least initially) get far fewer members (maybe less than 100?) but the concept is the same, keeping costs down by using volunteer labour, and paying for things either through a nominal membership or sponsorships (in Finland an SF con has 5000 people and is paid for entirely by sponsors).
It's a long and complex discussion though, once you start to take money directly. You then have to either become a non-profit or a business.
I should shut up now... ;). Sorry if this comes across in an odd way. I'm not trying to be a know-it-all, and in fact I'd be asking a bunch of people many questions if I were doing this. I know several locals with experience running cons from 80-2000 people. I really know only a little.
Best,
Grant
Sala kahle,
Grant
DrupalCon Barcelona had 400+ people
I don't think it's unrealistic to hope for 200+ people if we start planning now and try to lure in the core committers. I think your ideas about doing a con on the cheap are absolutely correct.
This would definitely not be a for profit event. As far as funds go I think it'd make sense to do something like $20 fee for Drupal Association members or $50 for those who aren't and it includes a DA membership ;) That way it's also provides a benefit for the DA.
Once the dust settles from Barcelona I'll try to get a hold of the DA people and see what they think of the idea. Hopefully I'll have some details to discuss them at the October meeting. In the mean time I'd love to hear people's ideas.
Drupal Con/Camp
This sounds like a great idea to me. And we have a lot of time to be able to get things ready.
I know I've been working to get a lot of non-profits and such to see how Drupal could help them. Maybe we could include something where people who aren't Drupal developers, but are potential Drupal converts, could come and see a presentation on why Drupal is for them.
CubeSpace sounds like a great idea. We used their space during the 2006 election - it's a great space.
Panels of speakers are definitely the way to go. We've done it this way in many of the conventions and Summits that I've been involved with. It works well because you get to see a few different view points and ideas. Plus it helps keep the entire presentation from being a sales pitch from one person (I've seen that plenty of times).
Sponsorships and/or nominal entry fees sound reasonable. I know I never go to OSCon just because of how expensive it is. I'm a small developer, so those fees are way over my head. Most people I know who go work for bigger companies who pay for at least part, if not all, the fees.
I'm sure a lot of us smaller developers can kick in some funding for the event, even if it's not that much. I know I would.
Jenni Simonis
Gresham, OR
Jenni Simonis
http://www.forwardsupport.com
Drupal Association?
Is this something that maybe the Drupal Association would be interested in helping with to keep costs down? Skimming through their site they don't mention how a Belgium association can directly help/donate in the states, but I'm sure they'd be interested in some way. In another discussion it was brought up briefly. Either directly supporting a presence at OSCON or maybe a smaller group at a different venue.
Just a thought.
Jason
Definitley
On IRC webchick mentioned the same thing. She said that if I was serious about trying to do it I should write up a funding proposal for the association. I'm not sure what type of resources they'd be able to provide but I plan on getting in touch to see what we can work out.
f2f Planning session?
Sounds like we could make some headway with a f2f planning session -- maybe pick an hour toward the end of the workday?
Cheers,
Bill
FunnyMonkey
Tools for Teachers
FunnyMonkey
DrupalCon vs. Camp
OK, here are some thoughts:
* I have made it my personal mission to have an official Drupal presence at OSCON 2008 -- guess we'll use the OSCON group to organize that
* this DrupalCon Barcelona that just passed was the biggest ever...and the first one without a connection to another conference
* we can't wait until July until the next North American-based DrupalCon
* is there something in between a Con and a Camp? Not sure, but it's something that came up as we discussed this
I think Portland is a great venue city and that OSCON 2008 will be good to organize a larger Drupal-something around....but it's my gut instinct right now that a full on DrupalCon wouldn't be the best idea.
regional conferences
"More traditional" communities like Linux communities also have regional conferences in Europe at least. FrOSCon, LinuxTag and friends gather people mostly from around the region (but not only from that country). These could be possibilities considered inbetween Camps and Cons. As part of this group strategy cleanup, I'd like to define what is roughly called a Con, a Camp and so on, so we have some categories to compare events with.
definitely interested,
definitely interested, because OSCON is commercial in nature therefore hopefully my employer will be paying (airfares from New Zealand aren't cheap)
DrupalCon/Camp, where do we stand?
Sorry if I've been out of the loop, but reviewing this comment thread, I don't see that we finally settled on what to do in connections with OSCON 2008.
Is there a larger DrupalCon NA scheduled for 2008?
I'm ready to help make a PDX event happen.
Ping Pong
Hey Portland my former, and well missed, home-ish town (7+ years)... oh how I miss the rain washed streets of Portland.
I'm seeing the posts for DrupalCamp and with OSCon coming up I'd love to jump into some discussions as to what is happening in Portland. If I can help out in anyway just let me know.
-Jacob Redding
-Jacob Redding