[OSM-talk] SotM11 will be held in Denver.

Serge Wroclawski emacsen at gmail.com
Sat Oct 23 00:38:51 BST 2010


On Fri, Oct 22, 2010 at 4:35 PM, Julio Costa Zambelli
<julio.costa at openstreetmap.cl> wrote:

> Henk,
>
> I do not want to argue since this just a personal opinion from someone
> that has gone just to one SOTM and only thanks to the OSI Scholarship,
> but:
>
> What was the election criteria? I guess easy access by public
> transport, low-budget airlines, and visas for the OSI+OSMF Scholarship
> beneficiaries are not in the list.

The planning committee's notes are here:
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/State_Of_The_Map_2010/Organisation/Meetings

>   I know the cost of getting to Europe
> for many of us is huge, but the truth is that most of the people that
> goes to the event is from Western Europe, and that it is not because
> the event is done near them, but because those are the countries with
> the biggest and most active communities (again some may argue that
> they have those big and active communities because events like this
> one are made near them).

If that were really true, they'd all be in Germany; not Spain, not the
Netherlands.

> So we can not expect to have the event near
> us at the cost of most of the people interested in participate paying
> more to get to it or just no going to it.
>
> Can we expect the Department of Homeland Security to be any less
> "obstructive" with the scholarship beneficiaries than the agencies in
> Europe?

As mentioned by someone else, the visa issues last year were mostly
due to the citizens of the countries themselves, with very few
exceptions.

> I do not want to make an stereotype of the officers of this
> agency, since they have treated me so well every time I have gone to
> the states, but to be honest if the Spaniards denied 7 visas, I will
> bet money that this guys will deny the same or more.
>
> I agree in the fact that the US market/community needs to be
> developed/encouraged, and that the sponsorship of American companies
> may be a strong argument to take the event there, but complicating
> things for most of the most active community members does not sound as
> the wisest step to me. My two cents*

Julio, I don't disagree with any of your substantive points and I've
expressed by opinions on where I'd like SoTM to be privately, but the
time for lively debate is before the decision is made. The decision
making process was widely advertised and public. Once the decision is
made it's not the time to undermine the process by criticizing the
choice, and my extension the organization and the people who are doing
their best.

Just my .02.

- Serge



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