[OSM-talk] Community Conference

[Michael Reichert]

Hi Steve,

Am 2015-12-02 um 22:23 schrieb Steve Coast:
> I’ve heard from a few people thinking of organizing an OpenStreetMap conference focused on the community, very different from what SOTM has become.

I have counted 20 talks by companies and universities out of 40 talks at
all at SotM 2014. (You can argue if HOT is a company or not ;-) )
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/State_Of_The_Map_2014

There were 19 talks by larger companies at SotM-EU 2014 (Small companies
like Omniscale have not been counted as companies). There were 39 talks
in total. http://www.sotm-eu.org/en/program

Conclusion: Both conferences had almost the same ratio of commercial and
community talks.

Maybe the SotM-EU had a more community-like image because lots of the
"commercial talks" were also topics the community is interested in. I
doubt if talks like this "OSM on Wheels" are very interesting.
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/SotM_2014_session:_OSM_on_wheels
I filmed the German version at FOSSGIS 2015 and I found it – sorry – boring.

A conference can become a real community conference if it is located at
the center of the community, i.e. in Europe. Having a conference at a
remote location, i.e. Buenos Aires, might be good to boost the local
communities but it is not profitable.

I think that organizing a second conference which just tries to be a
competitor of SotM is a waste of time and workforce. Every conference
needs to be organized (venue, catering, program committee, website,
registration etc.). Having a second conference just takes power away
from the volunteers organizing SotM. (I do not want to say that regional
conferences like SotM Scotland or SotM-EU or FOSSGIS Conference are a
wast of time – I myself helped at two of these conferences)

If the focus of SotM is wrong, it should be changed. It is the power of
the program committee which decides which talks will be held. It would
be better to join SotM Working Group and/or program committee to make
things change. Maybe there are too much company employees member of the
program committee?

Best regards

Michael

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