Re: [Linux-aus] linux.conf.au in January

[Bret Busby <bret@busby.net>]

On Tue, 8 Feb 2005, Mary Gardiner wrote:

> On Tue, Feb 08, 2005, Craige McWhirter wrote:
> > Another flipside to this is that in IT roles, because there is a high
> > demand for leave it is often quite difficult to get leave at this time
> > (January). That may be my particular IT support / sysadmin experience
> > but there was a squable over leave and coverage every December and
> > January.  How much that affects LCA attendence is anyone's guess :)
>
> Yeah, my development experience is that it's quite easy to get leave:
> the clients are all on leave so there's little demand for new projects.
> Same thing in a lot of desk jobs.
>
> But anyone in shift work or retail has exactly your problem.
>
> -Mary

Now, I know of someone, who has attended previous Linux conferences, 
sent to the last one as a professional attendee by the person's 
employer, but the conference this year, coincides with professional 
exams, so this year's conference is out, and there is no way that the 
employer would send the person overseas to the conference, and the 
person cannot afford to attend an overseas conference, so next year's 
conference has been made out of the question for that person.

The discontuity of being able to attend the conferences, can also lead 
to disenfranchisement.

Maybe it is time to use the power of the Internet, and of ADSl, and make 
the conference an Internet, rather than an in-person, event, so that 
more people who want to, can attend.

--
Bret Busby
Armadale
West Australia
..............

"So once you do know what the question actually is,
 you'll know what the answer means."
- Deep Thought,
  Chapter 28 of
  "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:
  A Trilogy In Four Parts",
  written by Douglas Adams,
  published by Pan Books, 1992 
....................................................