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<p>Hi everyone,<br>
</p>
<p>One of the things I'm observing here is people wanting news on
future open source events from Linux Australia. What I am *not*
observing are folks putting up their hands to volunteer to help
run those events. We've seen PyconAU 2022 not go ahead (quite
rightly) to ensure sustainability and prevent (further) volunteer
burnout. OSDC was last held in 2015 (fantastic event by the way,
thanks Morgan and Tim and team), for similar reasons. <br>
</p>
<p>Having been involved in running a few* open source events now,
they happen in one of a few ways (think of this as a rough
typography of open source events):<br>
</p>
<p>The first is where a dedicated, volunteer team develops and
unites around a vision, pulls together, overcomes obstacles,
floods (looking at you Brisvegas, and Gold Coast, and oh, G-town),
norovirus (kia ora, Dunedin), bushfire reconstruction delaying the
opening of Penguin Dinner venues (Yama, Canberra), airport buses
not showing (hey Ballarat), and always manages to deliver a
memorable experience for hundreds of delegates. The costs are
generally low, because the event relies on volunteer labour -
which is essentially offsetting the labour cost of the event. <br>
</p>
<p>The second is where event management professionals are engaged to
run part or all of the event, necessitating increased costs. Those
paid professionals may be in areas such as event management, audio
visual, sponsor engagement, communications and marketing and so
on. <br>
</p>
<p>The third is where a commercial enterprise that has an interest
in engaging the open source community runs an event. These can be
either free or low-cost, with the downside that the content is
usually sponsor-flavoured or heavily skewed to the company's
interest in putting on the event - think "make X easier with our
product Y" or "Hero TM stories featuring our product Y but not
explicitly referencing our product Y". If they are higher cost,
then the aim of the company is to derive a profit from the event.
The event is a profit generation mechanism. Sometimes they can be
both - sponsor-flavoured and profit-generating.<br>
</p>
<p>Linux Aus events (LCA, PyConAU, OSDC back in the day, GovHack for
a couple years, HealthHack, a few BarCamps and such) have tended
to move from type 1 to type 2 as they have grown in size and
complexity, but I think are definitely not in type 3 territory.
Sure, there are often profits from LA events, but they go back
into a) the event itself with b) 6% going to LA to cover things
like insurance and filing taxes and adminis-not-trivia. <br>
</p>
<p>Even if events run as type 2 events - with lots of
professionally-paid skills on board, they still require type 1
event volunteers to set direction and take ownership of the event.
Without this, events are type 3 events - where the event is run as
a commercial endeavour. <br>
</p>
<p>My point is this - LCA, PyConAU and similar events simply don't
run if we don't have volunteers to run them. And if the events
weren't fun, or worthwhile, or high value, we wouldn't have people
missing them. In a perverse way, it's a good thing that we're
missing LCA and PyConAU - because it's highlighted the invisible
labour, the taken-for-granted volunteers and the thousands of
hours of time and passion that go into these events. We've gotten
comfortable expecting an LCA every January or a PyConAU every
September. Because the work of delivering them has been hidden -
behind maturity, behind dedicated people, behind better processes
and systems and technology and communications. <br>
</p>
<p>Without that passion, that time, that labour, these events don't
happen. So, if you want an open source event to happen in 2023,
you know what to do. Patches welcome.</p>
<p>Kind regards, <br>
</p>
<p>Kathy Reid <br>
</p>
<p>* BarCamp Geelong 2011, LCA 2012, GovHack Geelong 2015 &
2016, LCA2016, and a bunch of years on LA Council<br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
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<div>I haven't seen any further announcements - has there been
any further progress on this?</div>
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