[Linux-aus] LCA2014 - Next steps to get it done?

[Anthony Towns]

On 4 September 2012 14:10, John Ferlito <johnf at inodes.org> wrote:
>> Somehow I missed that part of the thread - I see it now. In that case I will leave it to the Perth team and not submit a bid.
> I'd really love you to still submit a bid.

Maybe we need to change the bid process a bit more for that to happen
-- the amount of work that goes into preparing a bid has already been
mentioned as being a lot; and when the main feedback is "okay, you
have a conference!" or "X's bid was better; you'll see why when the
their conference happens!" and your next chance to try again is a year
away (and before that conference happens at that!), that's not as
helpful as it could be...

Some ideas:

 - don't include the "surprises" in the bids at all; they're subject
to change anyway ("laughably wrong compared to the actual
conference" as Mikal described Canberra's bid), aren't crucial to
evaluating whether the conference will work, and prevent the bids from
being made public so that future teams can benefit from past teams
work

 - make the "expression of interest" phase a bit more useful to
bidding teams, like helping them get introduced to speakers/ghosts, or
other folks who might be able to help out organsing. "we are
interested in running lca in 2014 in Broome; would interested folks
mind joining us on irc on friday at 6pm WA time to ask us any
questions and/or offer help? thanks!";

 - have the preliminary round of bids be a bit more interactive -- two
or three weeks where actual detailed plans for the conference come in
for review by the council, linux-aus subscribers, and other teams
("broome? how are we going to get to broome???"); including the
ability for teams to ask questions ("is our budget realistic?"), steal
good ideas from each other, or make suggestions, etc. ability for
random folks to say "err, the bid doesn't include A/V stuff? did you
just forget or is it really missing? 'cause me and Bobby-Joe would be
happy to take care of that if needed?" too.

 - include the teams in the decision making for the final round of
bids rather than just the council/ghosts; we're all meant to be one
big community and, at least in the past, teams have been okay with
saying things like "oh, okay, give it to Adelaide this year, we'll try
again next year".

Cheers,
aj

-- 
Anthony Towns <aj at erisian.com.au>