| **** BEGIN LOGGING AT Tue Apr 28 20:05:36 2009 | ||
| *Now talking on #asia-summit | Apr 28 20:05 | |
| *Notify: sankarshan is online (GimpNet). | Apr 28 20:05 | |
| *terral (~wlashell@ip207-101-254-242.z254-101-207.customer.algx.net) has joined #asia-summit | Apr 28 20:09 | |
| emily | hi all | Apr 28 20:10 |
|---|---|---|
| terral | heya emily, everyone :) | Apr 28 20:11 |
| *sankarshan looks around and says hallo :) | Apr 28 20:13 | |
| emily | hello sankarshan terral, stormy muriel BLUG_Fred | Apr 28 20:15 |
| stormy | hello | Apr 28 20:15 |
| BLUG_Fred | emily: hi | Apr 28 20:15 |
| BLUG_Fred | hi stormy | Apr 28 20:15 |
| stormy | hi, BLUG_Fred | Apr 28 20:16 |
| emily | You are stay late, BLUG_Fred | Apr 28 20:17 |
| sankarshan | hmm ... should we begin ? | Apr 28 20:19 |
| terral | emily: is alfred coming? | Apr 28 20:20 |
| emily | No | Apr 28 20:20 |
| emily | I can ask for his opinion tomorrow | Apr 28 20:20 |
| emily | terral | Apr 28 20:20 |
| *terral nods | Apr 28 20:21 | |
| emily | <sankarshan>: Do you have agenda for this meeting ? | Apr 28 20:21 |
| terral | emily: it's safe to say we can guess at it. ;) | Apr 28 20:21 |
| sankarshan | emily: Primarily I wanted to discuss two things (and, they aren't new because we have had mails on this on the list) : [1] What are the expectations from the event and, following that [2] a discussion about the issues that the local folks see on the ground here. | Apr 28 20:22 |
| BLUG_Fred | emily: i was actually planning to go to bed ;-) | Apr 28 20:22 |
| terral | BLUG_Fred: heh | Apr 28 20:22 |
| BLUG_Fred | terral: hi! | Apr 28 20:22 |
| *sankarshan is apologetic that the timezones did not end up suiting us all. | Apr 28 20:23 | |
| terral | (btw, for all that don't know, I am Will LaShell) | Apr 28 20:23 |
| sankarshan | so, yeah .. that's what i was hoping we could discuss | Apr 28 20:24 |
| terral | sankarshan: I think all the parties that are coming, are already here, if you want to go ahead and voice your points. I think we have covered them in emails but lets get it started :) | Apr 28 20:24 |
| sankarshan | terral: Sure. Thanks | Apr 28 20:25 |
| *sankarshan muses that it would have been nicer to have that gnote-d but, bear with the staccato typing for a while. | Apr 28 20:25 | |
| emily | <sankarshan>: can you send the chat history to list after the meeting ? Just pick up the most improtant points | Apr 28 20:26 |
| sankarshan | The GNOME "community" in India is somewhat small. Well, to be really brutal, it *is* small. Primarily a mix of contributors to the GNOME Translation Project and, a smattering of folks who do a bit of development. | Apr 28 20:26 |
| sankarshan | The expectations from organizing an event is somewhat along the lines of - [i] providing a structure so that one can build up the participation into GNOME and FOSS from India, [ii] pull in the ignored_till_now groups viz. OEMs, IHVs and ISVs to understand the values of participating in GNOME and Freedesktop technologies and, looking at providing them ways to contribute | Apr 28 20:28 |
| sankarshan | I expect that considering that we are looking at diverse crowds and different strata of participation, it makes sense to look at how best it is made relevant to all those who want to understand their paths to involvement | Apr 28 20:29 |
| sankarshan | emily: Sure I can do that .. | Apr 28 20:29 |
| emily | sankarshan: May I ask a question, How many GNOMER you know in India, where are they working at ? | Apr 28 20:30 |
| sankarshan | emily: Personally, I'd be knowing around 19 people. Precisely | Apr 28 20:30 |
| sankarshan | Of them 13 work on GTP, the remaining work on getting GNOME work on OpenSolaris | Apr 28 20:31 |
| emily | About 20, 30 or 50 are really working in GNOME ? Like people from Novel or SUN ? | Apr 28 20:31 |
| sankarshan | There aren't many from NOVL or Sun working on GNOME. Especially NOVL at this point in time. | Apr 28 20:31 |
| *sm|CPU (sankarshan@72.20.2.58) has joined #asia-summit | Apr 28 20:32 | |
| emily | How about the Linux Users Group? What's their scale ? | Apr 28 20:32 |
| sankarshan | please ignore sm|CPU for the moment, comes in as a handy chat logger | Apr 28 20:32 |
| *alolita (~asharma@121.247.141.89) has joined #asia-summit | Apr 28 20:32 | |
| sankarshan | At the last count there are around 300 *registered* *UGs | Apr 28 20:32 |
| emily | hi alolita stormy | Apr 28 20:33 |
| alolita | hi all! hi emily! | Apr 28 20:33 |
| stormy | hi alolita and emily | Apr 28 20:33 |
| emily | Welcome , we are just start | Apr 28 20:33 |
| alolita | emily: great | Apr 28 20:33 |
| emily | Is it possible to work with Linux Users Group or other group to co-organize this event ? | Apr 28 20:34 |
| sankarshan | So, to put in perspective, the quantum of participation into GNOME from India is significantly small. | Apr 28 20:34 |
| emily | Because most Linux users are natural GNOME users and KDE users | Apr 28 20:34 |
| BLUG_Fred | well isn't the conference meant to increase this participation? | Apr 28 20:34 |
| emily | What's the expected number of participants of this summit in Indian? | Apr 28 20:35 |
| BLUG_Fred | i don't see that as an issue. | Apr 28 20:35 |
| sankarshan | We are already collaborating with a LUG (the Pune LUG) as part of the organization. | Apr 28 20:35 |
| terral | sankarshan: just a point though, this is not different from other areas where we have targeted to make and impact. | Apr 28 20:35 |
| sankarshan | For what it is worth, the PLUG organizes GNUnify - about which alolita rather than me would be a good person to talk | Apr 28 20:35 |
| emily | Cool, sankarshan. It is great that you worked with LUG | Apr 28 20:35 |
| emily | For the first GNOME Summit in Beijing, at first, we only expected 100 people to come | Apr 28 20:36 |
| sankarshan | The last time there was a "GNOME"y event - that was the GNOME Project Day at FOSS.IN, we had around 120 participants of just users. | Apr 28 20:37 |
| sankarshan | Aside from the group who already contribute and, used the event as an excuse to meet up. | Apr 28 20:37 |
| sankarshan | Ideally, I'd probably say that if we are looking strictly at users, there isn't much value that we'd end up offering than the usual LUG meets | Apr 28 20:37 |
| stormy | emily, how many GNOME people did you know in China when you started organizing the conference? | Apr 28 20:38 |
| stormy | I thought GNOME.Asia 2009 had several goals. Bring more users to GNOME and bring more developers. | Apr 28 20:39 |
| emily | start from several people(start from 3 people), then get in touch with BLUG, | Apr 28 20:39 |
| stormy | So it's not just a conference for existing GNOME developers. | Apr 28 20:39 |
| terral | stormy: you are correct. | Apr 28 20:39 |
| emily | Then work with other community, from 3 people - 50 people - 300 people | Apr 28 20:39 |
| emily | in 300 people, majority of them are users, it is no problem | Apr 28 20:40 |
| BLUG_Fred | the purpose is actually to attract non-gnome users, or the passive ones... | Apr 28 20:40 |
| emily | <BLUG_Fred>: Yeah, it proved work well | Apr 28 20:41 |
| emily | GNOME is a health community, it has value to attract more people to join | Apr 28 20:41 |
| BLUG_Fred | exactly.. and following the conference, the conference leaders started a Gnome UG which meets monthly now | Apr 28 20:42 |
| BLUG_Fred | and it caters at a different audience than a LUG will... | Apr 28 20:42 |
| *PockeyLam (~pockey@114.240.64.253) has joined #asia-summit | Apr 28 20:43 | |
| emily | For the Beijing Gnome UG monthly meeting, generally 20 people attend, And they are technical people and studnets | Apr 28 20:43 |
| emily | Hi PockeyLam, so haapy to see you | Apr 28 20:43 |
| PockeyLam | emily: hi | Apr 28 20:43 |
| emily | A little late, PockeyLam, but I am so happy to meet you here | Apr 28 20:43 |
| PockeyLam | emily: yes, i m a bit late, got some problems with my new born lizards, please continue your discussion | Apr 28 20:44 |
| emily | sankarshan: What's the ideal participants number in your mind and what's the actualy participants number from your guess ? | Apr 28 20:44 |
| sankarshan | emily: That is a difficult question to answer because we have not yet figured out the expectations. The audience # and profile would be shaped by the expectations and, the form that the event takes based on such expectations. | Apr 28 20:46 |
| emily | If the Summit is only 100 people, how do you about it ? | Apr 28 20:46 |
| sankarshan | The somewhat pertinent issue now would be to figure what would attract the non-gnome users or the passive ones to join, participate - that is, why should they end up spending 2 whole days ? What would they expect to be valuable ? | Apr 28 20:47 |
| emily | That's good questions | Apr 28 20:47 |
| emily | What we can bring to the audience | Apr 28 20:47 |
| emily | From the GNOME.Asia Summit 08 | Apr 28 20:47 |
| sankarshan | And, in a way, the same yardstick applies to the GNOME users - why should they come to a GNOME conference - they are already using it ... and, since they stick with it, they love it evidently | Apr 28 20:47 |
| stormy | For what it's worth at GNOME.Asia 08 I got asked a lot how to get a job related to GNOME. There were a lot of students there. | Apr 28 20:48 |
| PockeyLam | sankarshan: there are a lot of ways, e.g. university students can be one way, 1st we draw volunteers from universities, we hosted panel discussions for different universities students to meet to talk about their open source club in their colleges | Apr 28 20:48 |
| BLUG_Fred | well they could learn more about 'its insides', meet the local community making it happen, learn how to make it better | Apr 28 20:48 |
| emily | 1. We have 40 speakers talk and 40+ differenct sessions | Apr 28 20:49 |
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| sankarshan | BLUG_Fred: The local community is really a bit too local so as to need an event to bring them together ;) | Apr 28 20:49 |
| BLUG_Fred | learn how to do translation, how to write gtk applications, etc | Apr 28 20:49 |
| emily | 2. Show what is the GNOME community, how is organized, I think people are interested | Apr 28 20:49 |
| stormy | But the local community is larger than the existing developers. | Apr 28 20:49 |
| emily | 3. Most students are interested in Google Summer of Code, and GNOME is a big organization under Gsoc | Apr 28 20:50 |
| stormy | sankarshan: I'd get the 19 people you know involved in planning the event. | Apr 28 20:50 |
| BLUG_Fred | and they can present what they know (do a bit of research ahead of their presentation) | Apr 28 20:50 |
| stormy | Then they are all sure to show up and share what they've learned. | Apr 28 20:50 |
| emily | It is a good topic "What attract people to GNOME.Asia Summit 09 in India" | Apr 28 20:52 |
| sankarshan | stormy: well, 13 of them are already involved in it. And, since these are the 13 who contribute to l10n for a boat load of other upstream projects, they are fairly active in sharing their focus, learnings and concerns | Apr 28 20:52 |
| BLUG_Fred | what are you afraid of? | Apr 28 20:52 |
| PockeyLam | it's just a matter of brainstorming ideas and make it happen, we did it in beijing, china with a lot of help from GNOME community and its board members, and you can do it in india ;) no? | Apr 28 20:52 |
| terral | emily: That's a fun topic, an interesting one to use. | Apr 28 20:52 |
| emily | I think everyone can write their idear about "What attract people to GNOME.Asia Summit 09 in India" | Apr 28 20:53 |
| terral | sankarshan: you have the existing Summit committee to help do things. You really aren't alone in doing this. | Apr 28 20:53 |
| sankarshan | I am afraid, let me go back a bit. The GNOME "community" in India is somewhat in pockets and, mostly employed at either RHT or, NOVL and Sun. | Apr 28 20:53 |
| PockeyLam | terral: exactly | Apr 28 20:53 |
| emily | Like PockeyLam said, a brianstorming. I think it is worth to spend time on answering this question well | Apr 28 20:54 |
| emily | <sankarshan> , the same in China | Apr 28 20:54 |
| terral | sankarshan: but that's why we even do these things. To show what GNOME and the Free desktop can offer to people who know -nothing- about it. | Apr 28 20:54 |
| PockeyLam | sankarshan: well, before the gnome.asia summit in beijing, i think it's not better in china. that's the purpose of hosting it in Asia | Apr 28 20:54 |
| emily | The realy Gnome Developer are only in SUN, Novel | Apr 28 20:54 |
| sankarshan | My fear is that unless we really nail down whether looking at ISVs, IHVs is for our benefit, we would end up having a small get together of folks who end up knowing each other and, end up going back to the daily grind. Without doing much by the way of leaving the legacy of an organization that can help start a process of participation | Apr 28 20:55 |
| PockeyLam | sankarshan: and now a lot more people involved in china, as emily said, we even have a monthly GNOME user group meeting in beijing :) | Apr 28 20:55 |
| stormy | So should we specify a target audience? | Apr 28 20:55 |
| sankarshan | PockeyLam: A GNOME UG is probably specifically what I am not looking at. Unfortunately. | Apr 28 20:56 |
| emily | stormy: good question | Apr 28 20:56 |
| stormy | I think for GNOME.Asia '08 it was potential developers (mainly students) and users. Is that right, emily? | Apr 28 20:56 |
| terral | Last year we had two targetted audiences. The first were students, the second was local businesses | Apr 28 20:56 |
| alolita | stormy: what is the target audience you are looking for | Apr 28 20:56 |
| terral | we did -really- well last year on the first. and really not so well at the second. | Apr 28 20:56 |
| stormy | alolita: it's not who I am looking for. It's who the group is looking for. | Apr 28 20:56 |
| emily | Yes, GNOME.Asia '08's targerts: 1. Users 2. developers 3. students, 4. communities | Apr 28 20:56 |
| alolita | stormy: i understand - i should rephrase - what is the gnome foundation looking for as a target audience in india | Apr 28 20:57 |
| BLUG_Fred | i think meeting people at that Gnome conference will help you to make something out of it. the follow up will not happen just by itself | Apr 28 20:57 |
| stormy | that's what this group is deciding | Apr 28 20:57 |
| alolita | emily: thats a good list :-) | Apr 28 20:57 |
| stormy | One side note: although the conference is in India and will most likely be all people from India, I think we should continue to target all of Asia and invite many people from other Asian countries. | Apr 28 20:58 |
| alolita | in the world of users, students - there is no distinction in India between Linux and its desktop (gnome or kde) | Apr 28 20:59 |
| alolita | the developers do differentiate | Apr 28 20:59 |
| alolita | and these developers are a close knit group as sankarshan mentioned earlier | Apr 28 21:00 |
| emily | stormy: I hope several people from China can join GNOME.ASia 09 in Indian | Apr 28 21:00 |
| terral | One mistake we made last year was not doing enough promotion soon enough, doing better about that was one of the goals for this year. | Apr 28 21:01 |
| sankarshan | Unless there is a virtuous cycle whereby developers doing things can become role models for students to be 'desiring' to do similar things, the uptake of GNOME and, the resultant increase in participation by the students is not going to happen. | Apr 28 21:01 |
| stormy | emily: excellent. The travel budget should probably give priority to other Asians as opposed to European or American speakers. | Apr 28 21:01 |
| stormy | sankarshan: I don't quite understand the pessimism. Are you saying we can't get more GNOME developers and users in India? | Apr 28 21:02 |
| emily | <sankarshan> & <alolita>: In oder to attrack more speaker, you can think about provide travel subsidy for speakers | Apr 28 21:02 |
| alolita | emily: and who is to provide the money for the travel subsidies and other costs :-) | Apr 28 21:03 |
| emily | Annouce the travel sponsor rule ealier and more people will apply for it and think about come to India | Apr 28 21:03 |
| stormy | alolita: the sponsors that you are going to find :) | Apr 28 21:03 |
| sankarshan | stormy: It isn't "pessimism". I'd like to think of it as pointing out that the functioning of the communities and, value processes currently are different | Apr 28 21:03 |
| terral | alolita: Fundraising is an important part of what the Summit committee and local team must do. | Apr 28 21:03 |
| alolita | stormy: the sponsors have to be interested in the event | Apr 28 21:04 |
| terral | sankarshan: but it is not different than what we faced last year. | Apr 28 21:04 |
| alolita | terral: i understand that :-) | Apr 28 21:04 |
| BLUG_Fred | or what we face at every community driven event | Apr 28 21:04 |
| stormy | alolita: you have to make them interested! At least all the ones from last year have already shown interest so you have a huge headstart over last year. | Apr 28 21:04 |
| BLUG_Fred | but if you have doubts yourselves, it'll be hard to convince others | Apr 28 21:05 |
| emily | <sankarshan> & <alolita>: At the Summit 08, it is un-beliveable to raise money in the very beginning | Apr 28 21:05 |
| PockeyLam | alolita: one thing is to identify speakers and start approaching them, plan for the two days' schedule, goodies, starting making a website, then promote it | Apr 28 21:05 |
| stormy | I too have the same concerns. The coordinators of an event have to *believe* in it. They have to be the most enthusiastic, optomistic and gun-ho of anyone. | Apr 28 21:06 |
| PockeyLam | alolita: with these, you can attract sponsors, and speakers and audiences as well | Apr 28 21:06 |
| emily | <sankarshan> & <alolita>: After the website is building ,everything is published (Sponsorship brchure), email send out to potencial sponsors, we got more money than we needed | Apr 28 21:06 |
| emily | stormy just say what I am trying to say: Belive in GNOME | Apr 28 21:06 |
| emily | It is more attactive than you expected | Apr 28 21:07 |
| stormy | emily: and you did a great job of planning the event and approaching sponsors. I think using your model (speakers, website, promotion) will help alolita and sankarshan have an easier time. | Apr 28 21:08 |
| emily | GNOME.Asia is the same as GUADEC, the found is from sponsors, rasied by local orgaznizor , not provied by GNOME foundation | Apr 28 21:08 |
| emily | <stormy: I will share all the documents, email and brochures with <sankarshan> & <alolita> after today's meeting (I have sent them most of the part ) | Apr 28 21:09 |
| emily | I plan to send them one by one, finish the most important documents as early as possible | Apr 28 21:09 |
| emily | But now, I am thinking about share all the them , and priority the most important ones | Apr 28 21:10 |
| BLUG_Fred | sankarshan & alolita: you need a plan and you need to believe in it... | Apr 28 21:11 |
| emily | <sankarshan> & <alolita> : It is not different to do the second Summit | Apr 28 21:11 |
| BLUG_Fred | the rest will come all by itself | Apr 28 21:11 |
| sankarshan | I do find it interesting that my inputs are concluded to be pessimism. We should appreciate the fact that in India, this is one of the worst years of economic recession and, there isn't money in the system unless we make it interesting enough for players who are at the fringe and, see value in being part of a Freedesktop and especially a GNOME event. | Apr 28 21:11 |
| emily | We alreay build a committe and most of people are willing to help , even we are not in India | Apr 28 21:11 |
| stormy | sankarshan: what do you need? Do we need to talk about how GNOME.Asia will provide value to our target audience? | Apr 28 21:12 |
| BLUG_Fred | sankarshan: economic recession is everywhere | Apr 28 21:13 |
| emily | Found, sponsorship and interests is their concern | Apr 28 21:13 |
| emily | I can understand | Apr 28 21:13 |
| terral | sankarshan: The economic crisis just means you do a smaller summit and are more frugal about yoru spending. It does not have to change the goals you are trying to achieve. | Apr 28 21:14 |
| sankarshan | emily: Not specifically. The concern is that the players who "do" GNOME are not so present in India and, the ones who could end up doing GNOME - we haven't found a sticky factor to give to them to sponsor, participate and sustain contribution | Apr 28 21:14 |
| BLUG_Fred | at SFI we lost some sponsors, it doesn't mean SFD will not happen this year... | Apr 28 21:14 |
| BLUG_Fred | sankarshan: you need to write a plan into which you believe and you can "sell".. then they will come | Apr 28 21:15 |
| *stormy is so glad we aren't planning an event in the next month or two, given swine flu! | Apr 28 21:15 | |
| sankarshan | BLUG_Fred: I take it that there is an acceptance that for some reason there is a lack of "belief" inside of the local them. | Apr 28 21:15 |
| terral | stormy: no kidding | Apr 28 21:16 |
| sankarshan | I find that somewhat unnerving. | Apr 28 21:16 |
| emily | stormy : haha | Apr 28 21:16 |
| BLUG_Fred | sankarshan: from the emails and your discussion that what I feel.. but I speak for myself | Apr 28 21:16 |
| PockeyLam | indeed very strong | Apr 28 21:16 |
| stormy | sankarshan: you pretty much have come back and said you can't make GNOME.Asia a success. If that's not what you meant, I apologize and I'm listening! | Apr 28 21:16 |
| terral | sankarshan: As we all are. We truly are here to support and help. | Apr 28 21:17 |
| emily | sankarshan: It is not that difficult as you imagined | Apr 28 21:17 |
| emily | Community is bigger than your think. It is out of imagination the first day of GNOME.Asia opened | Apr 28 21:18 |
| sankarshan | stormy: "I" have not. The folks who are local have the same conclusion - unless we involve more companies, partners ; it is somewhat difficult to really pull off an event that is professional, allows business interests around GNOME (especially the Foundation) and, provides a means to coach students into participating in the process. | Apr 28 21:19 |
| stormy | We are very excited that GNOME.Asia 2009 will happen in India and that you and Alolita are willing to work on it. | Apr 28 21:19 |
| sankarshan | And, if we are really looking at a small event - then the infrastructure details (for example, how would the sponsors pay up monies - to which body) would be somewhat mind boggling. | Apr 28 21:19 |
| emily | <sankarshan> & alolita : find the sponsors first | Apr 28 21:19 |
| stormy | sankarshan: I'm not questioning your judgement. I'm just saying that you (plural) have come back and said GNOME.Asia will not be a success. This group hasn't bought that. | Apr 28 21:19 |
| emily | Not waiting the sponsor , company will find you | Apr 28 21:20 |
| stormy | We think you can do it! | Apr 28 21:20 |
| alolita | emily: the india market of sponsors is pretty shrewd - they want value and are not generous | Apr 28 21:20 |
| terral | alolita: Chinese businesses are as well. ;) | Apr 28 21:21 |
| stormy | alolita: that is true everywhere | Apr 28 21:21 |
| emily | sankarshan & <alolita>: We are not only find local sponsor, we are reaching out to most Head Quater of international company | Apr 28 21:22 |
| emily | Nokia, Motoroal and Sun are not local sponsor | Apr 28 21:22 |
| emily | We only have one local sponsor and one local media partnet | Apr 28 21:22 |
| terral | emily: ;) which we could have done better on if we had started sooner. | Apr 28 21:23 |
| emily | How about send out email to potencial sponsor from now on | Apr 28 21:23 |
| terral | sankarshan: Also think too, that a company does not have to sponsor a -lot- of money. Even a small amount helps pay for things. | Apr 28 21:23 |
| emily | Last year, Googel and Canonical said inform them ealier, they will plan the budget for GNOME.Asia 09 | Apr 28 21:24 |
| stormy | and shows support. and gives them access to potential developers. | Apr 28 21:24 |
| PockeyLam | first work on a plan , with some sound speakers :) | Apr 28 21:24 |
| emily | Why not email them from tomorrow | Apr 28 21:24 |
| sankarshan | I have a suggestion - it is still early days - would it be possible to look at Sun (because of the fact that they have the largest footprint) to be hosts which would take out some of the logistical hassles ? | Apr 28 21:24 |
| terral | sankarshan: Many small businesses find value in the advertising. If nothing else as a self interest for that company to attract developers for all the things they offer. | Apr 28 21:24 |
| stormy | I agree with emily, I think we could email potential sponsors now. | Apr 28 21:24 |
| BLUG_Fred | 1. plan 2. budget 3. find & convince sponsors and speakers | Apr 28 21:24 |
| emily | <BLUG_Fred>: good points | Apr 28 21:25 |
| terral | sankarshan: what logistical issues? | Apr 28 21:25 |
| stormy | (GUADEC approaches sponsors after they know the venue but before they have speakers or website.) | Apr 28 21:25 |
| sankarshan | terral: for example, how to receive the monies from sponsors and pay for local expenses | Apr 28 21:25 |
| emily | that's easy | Apr 28 21:26 |
| stormy | sankarshan: is it not easy to set up a bank account in India? | Apr 28 21:26 |
| terral | indeed. | Apr 28 21:26 |
| sankarshan | stormy: no | Apr 28 21:26 |
| stormy | The GNOME Foundation can also collect money from sponsors. | Apr 28 21:26 |
| BLUG_Fred | sankarshan: being in India you should know what's possible and what are the legal requirements... | Apr 28 21:26 |
| emily | It is also find to transfer to your own account, but I suggest you can find vendor to in charge of the money | Apr 28 21:26 |
| alolita | emily: did sun china pay the sponsorship or sun usa? | Apr 28 21:26 |
| emily | Sun Ireland | Apr 28 21:27 |
| stormy | I feel like we've changed subject drastically ... | Apr 28 21:27 |
| terral | I do too | Apr 28 21:27 |
| emily | They paid the sponsorship to the vendor of GNOME.Asia | Apr 28 21:27 |
| alolita | emily: interesting - thanks | Apr 28 21:27 |
| sankarshan | stormy: yes, but that means that since the Foundation does not have a legal presence in India, it would still be a wire transfer of foreign funds. Expensive and taxation nightmare | Apr 28 21:27 |
| stormy | alolita, sankarshan, I thought the main concern was who would come and making sure we attract them. However, you seem to be concerned about money (too?) | Apr 28 21:27 |
| stormy | I think money is less of a concern. | Apr 28 21:28 |
| terral | These really seem to be more logistical issues, than an issue of whether or not we can attract people to the Summit. | Apr 28 21:28 |
| emily | From my experience, it is good to find a vendor, who can do printing, designing , T-shirt produce and collect money for you as well | Apr 28 21:28 |
| sankarshan | terral: I don't think so - I see it as level setting in terms of what kind of event we are looking at. If we are looking at a small event, it is perhaps best to look at one of the companies and ask them to be hosts | Apr 28 21:28 |
| stormy | sankarshan: GF didn't pay for anything in Beijing. The money we collected ended up not being needed. | Apr 28 21:28 |
| stormy | In the case of GUADEC, we transfer money to the local acct. | Apr 28 21:28 |
| emily | manage the money is easy | Apr 28 21:29 |
| sankarshan | stormy: We are still concerned about who would come, but I read that somewhere in the middle the conversation changed to whether we believe in GNOME and, whether we are actually competent in pulling anything off. | Apr 28 21:29 |
| terral | ....... | Apr 28 21:29 |
| stormy | What do we think our target size should be? | Apr 28 21:29 |
| stormy | sankarshan: I don't doubt your competence at all. I think you have doubts about whether GNOME.Asia will work but I don't doubt your abilities in pulling off a conference. | Apr 28 21:30 |
| emily | 100 is find, 200 is good, 300 is great | Apr 28 21:30 |
| emily | 100 is fine | Apr 28 21:30 |
| stormy | emily, were there 300 last year? | Apr 28 21:30 |
| emily | more than 300 | Apr 28 21:30 |
| sankarshan | And, yet I am not really interested in sheer numbers of participants | Apr 28 21:30 |
| terral | stormy: registered yes. we have more walkins | Apr 28 21:30 |
| terral | sankarshan: but why not? | Apr 28 21:31 |
| stormy | We have to have a plan. And we can't say we can't get those numbers if we don't know what the number is ... | Apr 28 21:31 |
| terral | sankarshan: all it takes is for even a percentage of those people to become interested in GNOME and free software to make everything worth it. | Apr 28 21:31 |
| sankarshan | What interests me more is whether we make it a valuable meet for businesses - startups and ISVs so that they can consume the tooling and artifacts within GNOME. Why them ? Because they don't actually get brought to the table and, they have the developer resources to do cool stuff. | Apr 28 21:31 |
| emily | For the 08, we have 500 people registered, finally 300 people actually attend | Apr 28 21:31 |
| sankarshan | emily: GNUnify on a bad day has 900 walk-ins. So, # of footfalls isn't a good measurement in India | Apr 28 21:32 |
| terral | emily: (I was only counting those who had marked yes I will go) | Apr 28 21:32 |
| PockeyLam | emily: but with some people walkins without registration | Apr 28 21:32 |
| terral | emily: remember we closed registration well before conference open. | Apr 28 21:32 |
| alolita | registration would be free in india | Apr 28 21:33 |
| emily | It is OK to be free | Apr 28 21:33 |
| terral | alolita: it was free last year as well :) | Apr 28 21:33 |
| terral | So I think something interesting has been said now a couple of times. | Apr 28 21:33 |
| emily | What ? for example ? terral | Apr 28 21:34 |
| terral | Sankarshan's target audience is not the same as what I think the rest of us have percieved it to be. | Apr 28 21:34 |
| sankarshan | and, that would provide a crux to whether that is an audience that makes much sense to the team | Apr 28 21:35 |
| stormy | So emily has described her target audience from last year. Sankarshan, why don't you describe the audience you'd like to target this year. | Apr 28 21:36 |
| emily | <sankarshan> , stormy: yes, start from the GNOME.Asia Summir proposal /Plan first | Apr 28 21:37 |
| stormy | I heard "businesses - startups and ISVs" | Apr 28 21:37 |
| PockeyLam | sankarshan: and what are the objectives of the GNOME.Asia summit? | Apr 28 21:38 |
| alolita | so the audience that the India team has in mind is as follows: | Apr 28 21:38 |
| alolita | 1. Businesses (large and medium) | Apr 28 21:38 |
| alolita | 2. Startups (looking at the technology) | Apr 28 21:38 |
| alolita | 3. ISVs | Apr 28 21:38 |
| alolita | 4. Channel partners (spreading the technology) | Apr 28 21:38 |
| alolita | 5. Professional users | Apr 28 21:39 |
| alolita | 6. Professional developers | Apr 28 21:39 |
| alolita | 7. Students and hobbyists | Apr 28 21:39 |
| BLUG_Fred | you want to make a business conference... interesting | Apr 28 21:39 |
| alolita | 8. the government | Apr 28 21:39 |
| BLUG_Fred | what angle will you play? | Apr 28 21:39 |
| emily | Businesses is big | Apr 28 21:40 |
| alolita | there is no value in india in doing a developer only meetup | Apr 28 21:40 |
| emily | I am thinking about consulting company | Apr 28 21:40 |
| alolita | potential members for the foundation who can fund it come from businesses and goverment (as you all know) | Apr 28 21:40 |
| stormy | alolita: can you expand on that (and GNOME.Asia wasn't developer only it was for users) | Apr 28 21:40 |
| alolita | stormy: which section should I elaborate on? | Apr 28 21:41 |
| stormy | You keep saying that a developer conference is not valuable and I think all of us come from the mind set that it is, so it would be good to get on the same page there. | Apr 28 21:41 |
| alolita | ah... ok :-) here goes... | Apr 28 21:42 |
| emily | alolita, anyone from local team know GUADEC or attend GUADEC before ? | Apr 28 21:42 |
| sankarshan | sayamindu has | Apr 28 21:42 |
| emily | GNOME.Asia is not the same as GUADEC, but it has the same model | Apr 28 21:43 |
| terral | and the same goals. | Apr 28 21:43 |
| emily | Build the community | Apr 28 21:43 |
| emily | The goal from my eyes | Apr 28 21:44 |
| PockeyLam | sankarshan: I think here objectives are very important... we can always make the gnome.asia summit adapt to our country's culture, but not changing the whole objectives... | Apr 28 21:44 |
| alolita | developers generally are not valued highly - they are not even supported to attend conferences usually - they have to pay personally | Apr 28 21:45 |
| emily | That's why host in India | Apr 28 21:45 |
| alolita | the companies where developers work are not interested in taking developers off the project to spend time at a conference | Apr 28 21:45 |
| emily | More india people will attend GNOME event without go to euro and US | Apr 28 21:45 |
| terral | alolita: you host it on a weekend. | Apr 28 21:45 |
| alolita | so developers as a group only cannot support the conference | Apr 28 21:46 |
| PockeyLam | alolita: and students, and users | Apr 28 21:46 |
| alolita | terral: a developer in india who works almost 14-16 hours a day will not spend their weekend hacking since they work a six day week :-) | Apr 28 21:46 |
| emily | <alolita>: You are right, developers from company are not main force of organizor | Apr 28 21:46 |
| emily | students and lcoal community are interseted in helping out and it is working well | Apr 28 21:47 |
| emily | they are more enthuastic | Apr 28 21:47 |
| PockeyLam | alolita: and that's why you need to plan on some attractions, e.g. good topics, speakers, gifts, goodies to attract them | Apr 28 21:47 |
| alolita | students are addicted to windows (its free in india mostly :-) and care about technologies that will bring them jobs :-) | Apr 28 21:47 |
| emily | For experienced enginner who are working company, it is better to invite them as speaker | Apr 28 21:47 |
| PockeyLam | alolita: like in 2008, we got free phones, netbooks as lucky draw gifts | Apr 28 21:48 |
| PockeyLam | alolita: in total we got more than 10 big gifts | Apr 28 21:48 |
| emily | <alolita>: People who are using Windows has less chance to get a job than students who are good at GNOME. Linux and Unix | Apr 28 21:48 |
| alolita | pockeylam: all that is ok - but not enough to get sponsors | Apr 28 21:48 |
| alolita | getting the audience is not the problem | Apr 28 21:48 |
| alolita | getting the sponsors is the main issue | Apr 28 21:48 |
| alolita | getting the speakers is also not the problem | Apr 28 21:49 |
| PockeyLam | alolita: for sponsors, the whole committee will help, u re not alone | Apr 28 21:49 |
| emily | alolita: How about start finding the sposnor from tomorrow | Apr 28 21:49 |
| PockeyLam | alolita: but the organizer has to first believe in it first, then we can help | Apr 28 21:49 |
| emily | I will send you the email format I sent to sponsor <alolita> | Apr 28 21:49 |
| stormy | but let's stick on the audience for a minute | Apr 28 21:49 |
| sankarshan | I would think that PockeyLam had an interesting comment " we can always make the gnome.asia summit adapt to our country's culture, but not changing the whole objectives.." and, that is probably what we are discussing. The way I see it, the issues/concerns brought forward would probably end up changing the objectives. And, that would probably mean we need to look if we can get a vendor who does FOSS host it in India | Apr 28 21:50 |
| emily | I like the fact that you are confidence about the audience | Apr 28 21:50 |
| stormy | alolita and sankarshan think that targetting developers is not the right thing for now. They'd rather target businesses. | Apr 28 21:50 |
| stormy | please, let's not worry about money or vendors to host right now | Apr 28 21:50 |
| stormy | we need to agree on what the conference is | Apr 28 21:50 |
| stormy | who we are inviting, attracting | Apr 28 21:50 |
| sankarshan | stormy: there is a rationale to that focus | Apr 28 21:51 |
| sankarshan | targeting business allows them to indulge in ramping up resources - creating developer demand and skills - augmenting the desire in the students/community to get involved | Apr 28 21:51 |
| emily | alolita: the target audience list from alolita is good, we have difference opinion on the "Business" | Apr 28 21:52 |
| sankarshan | I could name a host of companies who have just focused on community without providing a path to where the community would go/earn/contribute | Apr 28 21:52 |
| sankarshan | and, a host of projects as well | Apr 28 21:52 |
| stormy | But when you say "big company", you have to target someone inside the company. Developers? 1st level managers? CIOs? | Apr 28 21:53 |
| alolita | CIOs | Apr 28 21:53 |
| alolita | if the CIOs come; the developers follow | Apr 28 21:53 |
| stormy | So you want to create a GNOME.Asia that will attract CIOs. From which companies, for example? | Apr 28 21:54 |
| emily | GNOME is not a top-down community | Apr 28 21:55 |
| alolita | Infosys Wipro HCL TCS | Apr 28 21:55 |
| emily | Developer is in the core of the community | Apr 28 21:55 |
| alolita | etc | Apr 28 21:55 |
| emily | Wipro is good potencial company | Apr 28 21:55 |
| stormy | And in your experience, what attracts them to events? Access to developers? Access to customers? partners? | Apr 28 21:55 |
| emily | I was tend to contact them last year | Apr 28 21:56 |
| alolita | access to customers and partners | Apr 28 21:56 |
| alolita | developers go to them :-) | Apr 28 21:56 |
| stormy | Who are their customers? Not end users. | Apr 28 21:57 |
| alolita | no their customers are not end users | Apr 28 21:57 |
| alolita | their interest is in growing their network of partners | Apr 28 21:58 |
| stormy | From a GNOME perspective, how do (or how could) Infosys Wipro HCL TCS be a part of the project? | Apr 28 21:58 |
| BLUG_Fred | well don't you think maybe Gnome is not the best vector to make a business conference? | Apr 28 21:59 |
| alolita | They care about a larger picture where gnome is one small part of a solution | Apr 28 21:59 |
| stormy | which part of the picture is gnome? Or what is the solution? | Apr 28 22:00 |
| stormy | BLUG_Fred: if we could get customer stories about how they are successfully using GNOME, and that brought in these companies, that would be good. | Apr 28 22:00 |
| stormy | I don't yet understand who these potential customers are or how they might be using GNOME. | Apr 28 22:00 |
| stormy | But like is Nokia a potential Infosys/Wipro customer/partner? And they could talk about how they use GNOME technologies in Maemo? | Apr 28 22:01 |
| stormy | Is that the type of thing you are thinking of? | Apr 28 22:01 |
| sankarshan | BLUG_Fred: I guess that statement does sum it up nicely. The way we see GNOME fitting into the business needs and plans of the large and smaller businesses in India may not fit into the existing thoughts around GNOME.Asia | Apr 28 22:01 |
| alolita | the solutions are integrated systems using linux which are being provided by a wipro to a nasdaq | Apr 28 22:01 |
| sankarshan | or, to a local government looking at kiosks to deliver customer services for example | Apr 28 22:02 |
| sankarshan | alolita ^^ | Apr 28 22:02 |
| stormy | Linux on the server or linux on the desktop at nasdaq? | Apr 28 22:02 |
| stormy | The kiosk story would be good. | Apr 28 22:02 |
| alolita | the solutions are integrated systems with linux desktops for a 10000 point of sale units at canara bank | Apr 28 22:02 |
| stormy | sankarshan: BLUG_Fred: let's talk this out and figure out what GNOME stories/use cases we could highlight at GNOME.Asia in India that would bring companies that would bring developers. | Apr 28 22:02 |
| stormy | Then we'd all be happy, no? | Apr 28 22:03 |
| sankarshan | Or, let's say an IHV/OEM preloading netbooks with Linux making a mix of GNOME and KDE and Xfce desktops | Apr 28 22:03 |
| stormy | Those use case studies would be excellent for the GNOME project and community at large too. | Apr 28 22:03 |
| stormy | So can we put together a potential list of use case studies and approach those projects to see if they'd be willing to present (and perhaps keynote) at the conference? | Apr 28 22:04 |
| stormy | A GNOME.Asia conference ... | Apr 28 22:04 |
| sankarshan | or, since the 'hot' ticket item now is the 'web' - figuring out how GNOME3.0 bits can interest ISVs to come up with applications/tooling that best highlight the coolness | Apr 28 22:04 |
| BLUG_Fred | stormy: well there's a lot of research to do behind companies closed doors to find out what they could be eventually doing with Gnome | Apr 28 22:04 |
| stormy | But it sounds like sankarshan and alolita know of several projects ... | Apr 28 22:05 |
| emily | <stormy>: Cool idea, present use cases study in GNOME.Asia , make it as a main topic if attract more interests.How do you think, sankarshan and alolita | Apr 28 22:06 |
| sankarshan | I would still say, that from the discussions that we have had thus long, it would be a radical departure from what GNOME.Asia objectives/focus are continuing from last year. | Apr 28 22:07 |
| stormy | I think if you think that those speakers will attract companies who will attract developers, we'd end up with results that kept the old GNOME.Asia goals while adding a new focus on business and case studies. | Apr 28 22:08 |
| terral | Not necessarily. The focus is to build more GNOME developers and users. | Apr 28 22:08 |
| stormy | And if we got those developers there and said, hey, you too could have jobs like the keynote speaker talked about if you work on GNOME and here's a bunch of GNOME developers giving talks on just how to do that ... | Apr 28 22:09 |
| terral | (err, that was to sankarshan, no stormy. lol) | Apr 28 22:09 |
| emily | <terral: If more poeple are interested in users case study and business, it is OK to add new goal in India | Apr 28 22:10 |
| terral | sankarshan: It's really the same conference, its just a different way of marketing the conference to your target audience. | Apr 28 22:10 |
| stormy | I'm very serious that those case studies would be extremely useful to GNOME worldwide. | Apr 28 22:10 |
| sankarshan | terral: That's precisely - it isn't the same conference any more | Apr 28 22:10 |
| sankarshan | At least from what I see. | Apr 28 22:10 |
| stormy | That's ok. | Apr 28 22:10 |
| stormy | It can grow. We just don't want to abandon what we were trying to accomplish. Accomplishing it through new methods is good. | Apr 28 22:11 |
| *terral nods | Apr 28 22:11 | |
| emily | agreen with stormy | Apr 28 22:11 |
| emily | Hi all, sorry, I need to go to sleep now | Apr 28 22:11 |
| stormy | So for next steps do we want to start approaching sponsors (perhaps emily and alolita together) and come up with a list of speakers that would attract businesses in India (sankarshan & alolita & I'm happy to help bounce ideas)? | Apr 28 22:11 |
| BLUG_Fred | me too | Apr 28 22:11 |
| emily | Before I go to bed | Apr 28 22:11 |
| terral | we use the best tools for the job. If in this case we can use a different set to make our goal. We still win. | Apr 28 22:11 |
| sankarshan | stormy: I would suggest that we take a step back. | Apr 28 22:12 |
| emily | I want to say, thank for the good job you have done so far, alolita and <sankarshan | Apr 28 22:12 |
| sankarshan | In fact, I would really request that if we are deciding to focus only on developers and communities, let's involve a local presence that is interested in doing that. | Apr 28 22:12 |
| terral | emily, BLUG_Fred: thanks guys for staying up late. | Apr 28 22:12 |
| stormy | thanks, emily, BLUG_Fred! I hope you get enough sleep tonight! :) | Apr 28 22:12 |
| sankarshan | Following up from the input from emily "From my experience, it is good to find a vendor, who can do printing, designing , T-shirt produce and collect money for you as well" | Apr 28 22:13 |
| BLUG_Fred | sankarshan: I don't understand. you're not the local presence interested in doing that? | Apr 28 22:13 |
| stormy | sankarshan: we just decided that we are *not* just focusing on developers and communities. | Apr 28 22:13 |
| emily | alolita and sankarshan: I totally understand all the concern , because I have the same question last year | Apr 28 22:13 |
| stormy | We just agreed with you that focusing on businesses would be good! | Apr 28 22:13 |
| sankarshan | BLUG_Fred: Well it is fairly obvious isn't it, there looks to be a conclusion about the "lack of belief" | Apr 28 22:13 |
| alolita | thanks to the team from china for staying up so late! | Apr 28 22:13 |
| emily | But I want to say:Believe it, GNOME is bigger than you think. | Apr 28 22:13 |
| emily | JUST DO IT | Apr 28 22:14 |
| stormy | JUST DO IT! | Apr 28 22:14 |
| stormy | We believe in you and we believe in this team! | Apr 28 22:14 |
| emily | Why not send email to potencial sposnor from tomorrow? alolita and <sankarshan | Apr 28 22:14 |
| emily | alolita and <sankarshan | Apr 28 22:14 |
| sankarshan | No, I am being serious - we'd probably stay closer to a GNOME.Asia format if we probably look at Sun in India towards hosting it. | Apr 28 22:15 |
| emily | sankarshan, already got the list of poetncial sponsors ? | Apr 28 22:15 |
| sankarshan | emily: Writing to sponsors requires a "theme" doesn't it - we haven't really agreed on what is the value proposition for GNOME.Asia09 | Apr 28 22:16 |
| stormy | Please don't worry so much about a host and money until after you've approached sponsors. | Apr 28 22:17 |
| emily | Do we have deadline for the theme ? | Apr 28 22:17 |
| stormy | (Didn't you find a university to host this already?) | Apr 28 22:17 |
| stormy | Maybe we should continue this talk later? When the China folks have had a chance to sleep? | Apr 28 22:17 |
| sankarshan | sure .. | Apr 28 22:17 |
| emily | sankarshan: I think we need to schedule for all those important things | Apr 28 22:17 |
| stormy | A schedule and a budget. | Apr 28 22:18 |
| sankarshan | let's break this out and we can continue later. However, the way I see it, the perspective of the local team and the GNOME.Asia team doesn't converge | Apr 28 22:18 |
| emily | sankarshan: The deadline for theme, proposal | Apr 28 22:18 |
| stormy | From my perspective, they converged. | Apr 28 22:18 |
| sankarshan | emily: We broke that deadline around 2.5 weeks ago (the ones the local teams set) | Apr 28 22:18 |
| terral | emily: we could use the same timeline as last year, just adjusted for the new target date. | Apr 28 22:18 |
| emily | terral: i will send the timeline to sankarshan, and all other documents | Apr 28 22:19 |
| terral | sankarshan: I too think the perspectives have converged. | Apr 28 22:19 |
| terral | emily: *nod* Now, go to sleep. lol | Apr 28 22:19 |
| emily | haha | Apr 28 22:19 |
| sankarshan | Thanks for staying up so late | Apr 28 22:19 |
| BLUG_Fred | well night everyone. i think most have been discussed. and if not, i'll get the log in my email tomorrow morning | Apr 28 22:20 |
| emily | I really exicted about talking GNOME.Asia with you guys | Apr 28 22:20 |
| BLUG_Fred | thank you... | Apr 28 22:20 |
| PockeyLam | so , let's also set up another meeting later then :) good nite and thank you | Apr 28 22:20 |
| alolita | i agree with sankarshan - the perspective still needs some work | Apr 28 22:20 |
| emily | Thank you <BLUG_Fred> and <PockeyLam> | Apr 28 22:20 |
| *BLUG_Fred has quit (Ex-Chat) | Apr 28 22:20 | |
| emily | Can alolita> or <sankarshan> sending us a meeting note to list ? | Apr 28 22:21 |
| *PockeyLam (~pockey@114.240.64.253) has left #asia-summit | Apr 28 22:21 | |
| sankarshan | yeah i'll do that | Apr 28 22:21 |
| emily | Thank you so much <sankarshan> | Apr 28 22:21 |
| emily | <sankarshan>, we are willing to help | Apr 28 22:21 |
| stormy | Thanks, everyone. | Apr 28 22:21 |
| emily | Just belive in yourself | Apr 28 22:21 |
| emily | <sankarshan> & <alolita> Let me know if you need any help anytime | Apr 28 22:22 |
| alolita | ok thanks everyone for the long session - good night! | Apr 28 22:23 |
| emily | <sankarshan: last thing, about vendor, that's the easist thing. | Apr 28 22:23 |
| emily | sankarshan: we can talk about vendor later | Apr 28 22:24 |
| emily | bye bye all | Apr 28 22:24 |
| sankarshan | :) | Apr 28 22:24 |
| emily | bye stormy, sankarshan, alolita , terral | Apr 28 22:24 |
| alolita | bye all and thanks for your time! | Apr 28 22:24 |
| *emily has quit (Leaving) | Apr 28 22:25 | |
| stormy | good night! | Apr 28 22:25 |
| *alolita (~asharma@121.247.141.89) has left #asia-summit | Apr 28 22:26 | |
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