Communications Sub-Committee
Posted by Rollo Home on July 13, 2012
This is a discussion thread to cover the issues of interest to the CSC (currently Rollo, Jo, Suchith and Antony). We'll try and keep all discussions on topic (feel free to create a new thread if required) and on-line (available for all to see).
Comments
Rollo Home on July 13, 2012:
Barry raised a good point in an email today about the need to reflect the change from a bid team to a hosting team. Thus:
1. We need to refresh the website (as discussed yesterday in the telephone conference all and is in hand). I've changed the profile title, but the address remains the same.
2. We need to update the twitter feed. I’ve changed the ‘title’ of the existing account, but the name renames the same. Creating a new account is needed….but how do we carry across the existing followers. Does anyone know a good method of doing this?
3. Blog post informing people of the change. Please review this as a starter for 10: http://foss4g4uk.posterous.com/private/sxDchtrsrq
4. Create and moderate the ‘official’ channels via the OSGeo pages – we need to keep a close eye on comments etc and be responsive to questions etc..
Also:
Logo: I liked the logo from Jo, but it does need to incorporate the FOSS ‘band’ somehow. Also, I do like the idea of opening this up as a competition (perhaps with a prize?) to the community. Let’s make this the “Peoples Conference” (sorry – is that too close to the Olympics?)
This then needs to be reflected in the new website, twitter, etc…but as these things need to be started asap, there will be a time lag between them being up and running and the logo being ready (especially if we do run a competition). Not a problem I guess, but we need to address it.
Jo Cook on July 13, 2012:
1) I have a sparkly new amazon instance (purchased at the weekend) that we could put a wordpress install on asap. That would be free for the first year and then pay-as-you-go. We could transfer the site if necessary at some later date.
2) We do need to include the ribbon in any logo- I think we need to go back to the ideas we kicked around in the bid stage for starters and go from there. I like the idea of opening it up to the community better than the idea of going to one of these firms for it.
3) I don't think we'll have too much trouble recovering our twitter followers if we bag the foss4g2013 account and start tweeting away with the #foss4g hashtag. Happy to deal with the comms with the OSGeo lists and wiki etc.
If you want me (and web-designer hubby) to get the install going asap- happy to sort that this weekend and provide access to you guys to post. I'd want a quick discussion before anyone went too mad about the structure of the site though!
Thoughts?
Jo
Rollo Home on July 13, 2012:
Jo (and CSC):
1. Yes, I see no reason not to proceed with this plan. Did you get confirmation from OSGeo about the hosting requirements?
2. See this post (and comment please): http://foss4g4uk.posterous.com/private/JIevFjGalj
3. OK - I'll just do that then. FOSS4g2013 as the handle?
Picking up your other comments:
1. If you can act as main coordinator for the OSGeo channels that would be great, but please all CSC need to get involved. It's a big job
2. Hash tag: can we stick with #FOSS4G - it's the most widely accepted as Jo has stated.
Finally a comment on website design - for my money it needs to serve two purposes: a formal 'all the information you need about the conference, and how to take part' and a 'blog' element. The first part will evolve over the course of the next few months, but we can be fairly clear on what needs to be here (just see Denver for ideas). It will also be 'controlled' i.e. the information on there has to be right, and not open to change by all. Misinformation can be very damaging - as we've seen in China. The blog however is where we 'reach out' to people and engage. This needs to be easy for all of us to use and update/add posts etc...
Can this approach be accommodated easily?
Jo Cook on July 13, 2012:
I asked Peter Batty what they did last year about the website, and they used third party hosting then moved it over to the osgeo drupal install. From behind-the-scenes communications about the osgeo drupal instance, that's not an approach I would want to go for! Peter has said that there are elements of the 2011 site that we might want to reuse- which would imply going with drupal, but since we're going to be hooking out to the AGI services for the difficult stuff, I'm not sure there's much point. Happy to go for either though!
Web-designer hubby says that these days it's horses for courses- there's not much that you can do in drupal that you can't do in wordpress, and wordpress is much easier to edit. He also says that it's not that hard to transition from one to the other if you need to.
In terms of controlling content- we can do that with both wordpress and drupal, using user management and a split between site "pages" and site "posts"- posts being where we blog.
Thoughts from anyone on the whole wordpress/drupal debate?
Jo
Rollo Home on July 13, 2012:
I understand that the AGI might be migrating to WP - so there's an extra +1 there in terms of potential 'hand-holding'.
Jo Cook on July 13, 2012:
Jo
Rollo Home on July 13, 2012:
Rollo Home on July 13, 2012:
Should we also not have an official web address *@foss4g2013.com (or whatever our domain will be)? Ideally we'd have an info@ booking@ chair@ etc...
Jo Cook on July 13, 2012:
Re Dropbox- there are ways and means: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/5-ways-send-files-dropbox-dropbox/
Not sure how much disk space we have with this basecamp account?
Yes we should be able to sort out official email addresses once the domain and site are set up- though I think we need to get some communication from the OSGeo webcom team as well (and they are being conspicuous by their absence at the moment- I suspect holidays)
Jo
Barry Rowlingson on July 13, 2012:
It really needs to be a vector format (SVG), and we might want colour and b/w versions as well as PNGs rendered in various sizes. Obviously we have to make sure we have the rights to any clip-art and fonts used too.
I suggest that we use the PNGs as a filter and request scalable vector sources once we see some nice ones.
Jo Cook on July 13, 2012:
PS don't forget the t-shirts- we need a design that looks good on a shirt!
Peter Batty on July 13, 2012:
Couple of items ... we used CrowdSpring to do our logo for Denver, cost a few hundred dollars but you get loads of designers submitting entries. We had about 70 entries in total I think. You can pick up to 10 and put them out for a public vote, which we did and I thought it was great for generating some interest in the community. I also find it's a good way to do it in general - the tricky thing about logos is everyone has different ideas and if you hire one person it can be hard to tell them you don't really like what they did. So overall I pretty strongly recommend CrowdSpring. But it's your deal so do what you want! The logo MUST include the "FOSS4G ribbon", this is not up for debate.
You can see previous FOSS4G logos here:
http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/FOSS4G_2011_Logo
Also one thing that I thought worked out well on our web site was the searchable schedule. This alone is probably not worth using a version of our site. But it was a lot of manual work for us managing abstracts ... you get them submitted through one system, there is a system that Paul Ramsey runs for community voting and they get loaded into that, you get results back in a spreadsheet and then have to make changes to the community results, and then notify everyone and get them into a schedule and on the web site. There was lots of manual work and lots of scope for error. I felt with a little more work we could turn the drupal based system into an end to end system for handling the abstracts from submission to voting to final selection to scheduling to publication on the web site. That's not all there, but the foundations for it are (using a Drupal conference module). I could check with the contractor who worked on this for us if you're interested in exploring further. But if you want to go in a different direction that's fine too of course :).
Jo Cook on July 13, 2012:
Welcome! In short- I think we have plans to use the AGI system for abstract submission, only with a crowd-sourced voting component a la Victoria but all of this is open for discussion. I think the general feeling is to move towards wordpress- we have a tame web-designer (my hubby) who's happy to handle most of the complexities of wordpress and most people felt we'd rather use that than drupal unless there was a compelling reason why not.
I think we've also decided to put the logo comp out to the community- there have been tweets about that already and I think Rollo is putting together a post to explain the rules- we were just debating how to get people to submit them (eg an email -> dropbox approach or something similar). Everyone's worrying about the ribbon, but we know the rules so that will be fine :-)
I think the aim with the website is to get something up super quick so that people are reassured it's happening- so we had plans to pop a wordpress site up on my sparkly new amazon instance this weekend unless anyone had a massively better idea...
Jo
Rollo Home on July 13, 2012:
2. Ribbon issue is addressed in the post.
3. Website - let's get something up asap. What we do now is not an irreversible decision.
Peter Batty on July 13, 2012:
Jo Cook on July 13, 2012:
Antony Scott on July 13, 2012:
Jo Cook on July 13, 2012:
Jo
Rollo Home on July 13, 2012:
Good luck.
Steven Feldman on July 16, 2012:
I presume everyone has picked up that we have "acquired" the login details for the @foss4g twitter account and have started posting on that account. We announced the shift on @foss4g4uk and the posterous site but will probably need to mention a few more times before abandoning @foss4g4uk
Antony Scott on August 25, 2012:
Have been looking at the WP site and propose to extend using Denver as a model and using the notes here https://basecamp.com/1920286/projects/762306-foss4g-13/documents/1019641-website-content (btw please edit/annotate this as appropriate) as a guide. However I think I need more editing priviledges than I currently have to do this - Jo, are you OK to up my level?
thanks
Antony
Jo Cook on August 28, 2012:
I've increased your level to administrator on the blog, so hopefully that's sufficient. If you still have problems it's likely to be due to file permissions on the server or similar, so let me know and I'll sort. As it's a plain-vanilla ubuntu server occasionally it's missing libraries for php/mysql/apache but that's easy for me to fix. Less so for other people as it's ssh access at the moment!
Jo
Antony Scott on September 6, 2012:
Antony Scott on September 6, 2012:
Jo Cook on September 6, 2012:
Cheers
Jo
Antony Scott on September 7, 2012:
If you can't make this, please suggest an alternative on Mon-Wed of next week.
thanks
Antony
Jo Cook on September 7, 2012:
Jo
Rollo Home on September 7, 2012:
Antony Scott on September 9, 2012:
Rollo Home on October 15, 2012:
Apologies for my drop-out in the conference call. After I lost audio, my PC froze. Attempted to update the Programme element of the document, but that was about all I could do.
Anyway, we need to meet this week to resolve a few issues. My schedule this week is hectic. I'm out of the office Tues - Thus, but could join in via a mobile at some specific points (not ideal). Otherwise it's Friday for me, or you proceed ahead without me on this one?
Action: Jo, I've posted this ( http://foss4g4uk.posterous.com/we-have-a-winner ) on the old FOSS4G4UK website (as that's where the competition was originally announced). Can you copy and paste (with the appropriate edit) to the official site please?
Suggestion: Can we stick to this thread for Comms discussions? I think I'm missing a lot of things across some of the other threads...or is that just me?
Antony Scott on October 15, 2012:
Jo, I am happy to update the website unless you've done it by the time I've got there.
Threads - agree I think, though I have started a few threads against 'To do' items which is quite useful as it tracks a specific job. I think I've included Comms group people in all those, the 'select people' thing in Basecamp makes it easy to do that. An item for our call I guess.
Also - the discussions recently have involved Barry but not Suchith. Barry, do you want to be in and Suchith, do you want to be out? A good point to agree either way, before we get into the next round of website stuff.
Antony
Antony Scott on October 15, 2012:
Antony
Barry Rowlingson on October 15, 2012:
Jo Cook on October 16, 2012:
Antony, happy for you to update the website with the results of the logo comp.
Jo
Jo Cook on October 16, 2012:
There has been an update to the twitter plugin, which required adding the social plugin as well. That seems to need the twitter account details again- which I can't remember. Is there any chance that you can either remind me of the account details, and/or add them in? (Or if anyone else can, that would be great)
Thanks
Jo
Barry Rowlingson on October 16, 2012:
http://blog.somsip.com/2012/02/using-fail2ban-to-protect-wordpress/
I've only ever used it to block ssh dictionary attacks.
Antony Scott on October 16, 2012:
They are In Basecamp here https://basecamp.com/1920286/projects/762306-foss4g-13/documents/1027329-communications
Also – you could remove the poll plugin, to see if that helps. Crashes seemed to increase after I installed.
Antony
Rollo,
There has been an update to the twitter plugin, which required adding the social plugin as well. That seems to need the twitter account details again- which I can't remember. Is there any chance that you can either remind me of the account details, and/or add them in? (Or if anyone else can, that would be great)
Thanks
Jo —
Jo Cook on October 16, 2012:
@Barry- we're blocking attacks using htaccess and better wordpress security- to be honest the issue is one of resources on the amazon instance rather than anything else. I'm going to look into the costs of giving it more oomph when I get chance later today.
Jo
Suchith Anand on October 16, 2012:
As I couldn’t get any time sofar to contribute to Comms Sub-Committee, could I request that I am removed from the sub committee. I can then concentrate on the academic theme. Thanks.
Suchith
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Jo Cook on October 16, 2012:
Jo
Jo Cook on October 16, 2012:
We might need to start a new thread to avoid spamming Suchith
Jo
Antony Scott on October 16, 2012:
@jo the widget must have been update-related, didn't touch it honest :-)
Antony Scott on October 19, 2012:
Antony, Jo, Rollo (apols from Barry)
Jo Cook on October 23, 2012:
Steven Feldman on October 23, 2012:
Jo Cook on October 23, 2012:
Barry Rowlingson on October 25, 2012:
Jo Cook on October 25, 2012:
Thanks
Jo
Barry Rowlingson on October 25, 2012:
http://pkp.sfu.ca/software
Do we need both? I'm not sure until I've had a chance to check them out
thoroughly. I don't think OCS provides sufficiently blind and anonymous
reviewing for the Academic Track papers, which we have to treat as
submissions to a journal, hence the need for OJS. OCS might not even be
sufficient for the Main Track paper review system (but I think we'll have
to roll our own community vote system for that anyway).
I think they need PHP with nothing much special beyond database access.
Jo Cook on October 26, 2012:
I've kind of changed my mind about moving the site to a different package, as I'm totally snowed under and can't really afford the day to do that, so I'm going to scale up the amazon instance for a limited time to see a) if that resolves the issues and b) how much it costs. I don't mind covering the costs for a bit while I experiment (I'm not expecting it to cost much). So... there will be a short down-time (minutes- you might not even notice) while I bring the site down so I can change the instance type.
Barry- if I give you the Amazon .pem file, would you be happy installing OCS and OJS on the instance? It's a standard 64-bit Ubuntu server. Otherwise it will be next week some time before I get chance.
Also, if we now have a finalised sponsorship document, could I get someone to pop it up on the site? (I'm only in for half a day today)
Thanks
Jo
Barry Rowlingson on October 26, 2012:
Is the .pem file a private key? Isn't the right way to do this for you to
create a user for me with sudo rights? If you don't want to use passwords
I've got a public key somewhere.
Jo Cook on October 26, 2012:
I'm just creating a snapshot of the instance before upgrading it... what fun
Jo
Steven Feldman on October 26, 2012:
If it is going on the web site can you include a contacts link to me so that interested parties can contact me.
Jo Cook on October 26, 2012:
Jo
Antony Scott on January 19, 2013:
There's a few things we need to tackle at the moment (some of which are in progress) - pushing the call for papers/workshops (which is nearly ready), getting the news on the website regularly updated, publicizing sponsors etc. Shall we have a call to make sure we've got everything covered (my preference) or shall we do it through basecamp? I think we should try start getting stuff out this week and probably every week if we can.
Antony
Rollo Home on January 20, 2013:
Update: we should have a working CfM (maps) by middle of this week (with Ken). Seeing Jeremy tonight/tomorrow to discuss CfP (presentations).
Antony Scott on January 20, 2013:
Antony Scott on January 22, 2013:
I think we are just about ready to go with the CfP link, Claire is going to add the subject areas. Could it now go on the website? The link is here, assume it will go at the top of the CfP page.
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/foss4g2013callforpresentations
Also - we need to get out this consultation on the community voting system, which lists should it go on? Would one of you be able to put it out if we get some text together?
Antony
Franz-Josef Behr on January 23, 2013:
conference_dev@lists.osgeo.org
discuss@lists.osgeo.org (hopefully)
marketing@lists.osgeo.org
several LinkedIn groups
Franz-Josef
Antony Scott on January 30, 2013:
We now have a call for presentations http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/foss4g2013callforpresentations site and a call for workshops http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FOSS4G2013Callforworkshops site ready to roll (thanks Claire). Could Barry or Jo get the links up on the website? We can then start pushing out some publicity. I can have a crack at this at the weekend unless anyone has time before.
Paul Ramsey has offered to run the community voting system (see https://basecamp.com/1920286/projects/762306-foss4g-13/documents/1664910-programme-stage-1 for details), so we are going to go with that - we'll just need to put up a link after the submission deadline.
Antony
Jo Cook on January 30, 2013:
We're going to put up the links as soon as the discount on early bird sponsorship is out of the way so we have a free widget on the home page. I have an action to deal with all of that so no worries- if I run out of time I'll give you a shout :-)
Jo
Steven Feldman on January 31, 2013:
Is it time to get a press release out about the massive support for FOSS4G? We can use the quote that I have up my sleeve from Peter ter Haar and I can come up with something cheesy from the chair.
Time to get the Call for Presentations and Call for Workshops on the home page widget and start publishing on the mailing lists, twitter and press releases. Some blogging would be good (hint to self). Please can we get the CfP and CfW live tomorrow, Feb 1st seems a symbolic date.
Jo Cook on February 1, 2013:
Jo
Antony Scott on February 1, 2013:
I have suggested to the programme group that we put back the deadline for the call for workshops - end Feb is not very long away... will let you know.
Antony
Barry Rowlingson on February 1, 2013:
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/www/click.html
Jo Cook on February 1, 2013:
Franz-Josef Behr on February 2, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on February 2, 2013:
Also on the comms front, the 'news' box on the home page is looking a bit like old news... does this need some blog posts on the site or something?
Jo Cook on February 2, 2013:
2) news comes from blog posts on the site so feel free to update I just haven't had time.
Jo
Franz-Josef Behr on February 2, 2013:
Franz-Josef Behr on February 2, 2013:
Ands I wonder if there should be a *contact email address*.
-fj
Steven Feldman on February 2, 2013:
Antony Scott on February 2, 2013:
I guess we should do a press release on the CfP too?
Rollo Home on February 5, 2013:
Antony Scott on February 5, 2013:
Jo Cook on February 5, 2013:
Jo
Rollo Home on February 5, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on February 5, 2013:
Rollo Home on February 6, 2013:
Twitter - deleted (I have the archive should anyone want it)
Blog - set to private. Let me know if you want access and I'll add you.
Regards
Franz-Josef Behr on February 9, 2013:
submissions" has an uncommon style (§ sign):
Can anybody check this (and fix it)?
Regards Franz-Josef
Barry Rowlingson on February 9, 2013:
Will fix on Monday unless someone else beats me to it.
Antony Scott on February 9, 2013:
Antony
Rollo Home on February 18, 2013:
Any thoughts?
Barry Rowlingson on February 18, 2013:
Seems to be free...
Antony Scott on February 22, 2013:
Rollo Home on February 23, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on February 23, 2013:
I have a meeting in Birmingham and then treating myself to a two-day city
break staying on the 18th floor of the Rotunda...
Can we do a meeting via skype?
Jo Cook on February 25, 2013:
Jo
Antony Scott on February 25, 2013:
Jo Cook on February 25, 2013:
Jo
Rollo Home on March 1, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on March 1, 2013:
us?
Do we get a text channel as well?
Antony Scott on March 1, 2013:
Notes from Comms Group call 1/3/13: Barry, Rollo, Antony, Jo
Jo Cook on March 1, 2013:
"I was sure to make announcements on workshops, keynotes, exhibit space, registration deadlines, preliminary program availability, and any other unique feature or outreach effort. Tying the event to government objectives or newsworthy issues is always key. An emphasis on free, given the financial crisis, will certainly resonate."
Might be worth focusing on those milestones for our press release schedule.
Jo
Rollo Home on March 1, 2013:
I was thinking that it could be a 'forum' for people who were going to all three and wanted to work share the logistics of doing so....but it doesn't really function like that. Any thoughts before I delete?
UPDATE: deleted
Antony Scott on March 1, 2013:
The first on the list is the keynotes if we are ready to announce these (which we should if can), and also flag up looming deadlines.
Claire, we are working on the assumption that if we (probably Rollo) puts the PRs together, you will be able to distribute, so please shout/liaise with Rollo if any of these dates are problematic for you.
Antony
Antony Scott on March 1, 2013:
Rollo Home on March 1, 2013:
Dates look good - that's a handy list.
Claire Gilmour on March 1, 2013:
Antony Scott on March 1, 2013:
That’s fine, the dates are definitely moveable by the odd day – best if Rollo coordinates with you direct on the timing for each as they come along.
Claire Gilmour on March 6, 2013:
Jo Cook on March 11, 2013:
When you do send out your press releases, could you add the following names to your list:
Matt Ball mattball@vector1media.com
Alexandre Leroux (Slashgeo) alexandre.leroux@ec.gc.ca
Thanks
Jo
Jo Cook on March 11, 2013:
We've got a list of print magazine connections- and some additions that Cameron Shorter sent through. Should we simply add them to the list that Claire uses for sending press releases to, or should we contact them and ask if they would like to be media partners for the event?
Jo
Steven Feldman on March 12, 2013:
Rollo Home on March 13, 2013:
Barry: where has the page gone with the FOSS4G logo details? I could understand if you've decided it wasn't wise to make this public - is it possible to have a link for use in the Editors Notes?
Barry Rowlingson on March 13, 2013:
Steven Feldman on March 13, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on March 13, 2013:
Steven Feldman on March 13, 2013:
Antony Scott on March 14, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on March 15, 2013:
here.
Barry
Rollo Home on March 15, 2013:
Antony Scott on March 15, 2013:
Our next scheduled call is Good Friday - how about Thur 28th at 10?
Rollo Home on March 15, 2013:
Antony Scott on March 15, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on March 16, 2013:
Steven Feldman on March 17, 2013:
I like the use of the term "mappiness" on SotM
Jo Cook on March 18, 2013:
Thoughts?
Steven Feldman on March 18, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on March 18, 2013:
Or would the 'Media' tab mean getting rid of the News tab?
I'm slightly concerned about the menu items with no drop downs - its not entirely obvious that the menu headings are clickable. Maybe links should underline on hover..
Jo Cook on March 18, 2013:
Antony Scott on March 18, 2013:
Rollo Home on March 18, 2013:
Example: http://archive.directionsmedia.net/banner.specifications/example/sites/right.column.php
Barry Rowlingson on March 18, 2013:
http://2013.foss4g.org/Style/banners/
Rollo Home on March 18, 2013:
Steven Feldman on March 21, 2013:
This echoes with my own niggling anxiety that we are not making our voice heard sufficiently. We only have 24 papers and 20 workshops in to date, you can see the running totals at https://basecamp.com/1920286/projects/762306-foss4g-13/documents/2312091-running-total-of
I know submissions usually come in at the tail end and workshops close on 31/3 and presentations on 12/4 but I think we need to making a bit more noise and a bit more regularly. I will do a mail to the sponsor targets who even if they haven't sponsored us yet are strong candidates to attend the event and to present. What else can we do? I think pushing up our submissions for the program is our top priority in the next week or so.
steven
Jo Cook on March 21, 2013:
We can certainly remind people again that the call is open- and I think your idea of mailing the sponsors is good, but I'm not sure what else to suggest other than "more of what we're already doing"
Claire Gilmour on March 21, 2013:
Rollo Home on March 22, 2013:
Jo Cook on March 22, 2013:
Steven Feldman on March 22, 2013:
Jo Cook on March 25, 2013:
Jo
Antony Scott on March 25, 2013:
Antony
Rollo Home on March 25, 2013:
Jo Cook on March 25, 2013:
Antony Scott on March 25, 2013:
Jo Cook on March 26, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on March 27, 2013:
Antony Scott on March 27, 2013:
Antony Scott on March 27, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on March 27, 2013:
http://ma-wwwprod.lancs.ac.uk:8080/wordpress/
note also I have been looking at updates for WP - the test site is
currently running the latest version of the parent theme which did mean
some changes to the child foss4g theme customisations. I've not tried
updating WP yet on the test site.
Barry
Antony Scott on March 27, 2013:
Rollo Home on April 10, 2013:
Antony Scott on April 10, 2013:
Jo Cook on April 10, 2013:
Antony Scott on April 10, 2013:
Antony Scott on April 10, 2013:
Rollo Home on April 10, 2013:
Antony, are you also able to check with Paul how he needs to receive the data from Claire?
Claire, if you are able to provide the daily updates for today/Thurs/Fri that would be excellent. 2011 received 89% of their 289 papers in the last three days......
Claire Gilmour on April 10, 2013:
Antony Scott on April 10, 2013:
Clare, subject to extensions, would you be able to get the spreadsheet to Paul on Mon 13th?
pramsey@cleverelephant.ca
See below for details of the community voting (from Paul):
Respondents see all proposals, in a personal random order (each person gets their own order, but their order remains the same if they do multiple sessions). They can score as many or as few as they like. Scoring is 0, 1, 2, with 0 being the default, "don't care", 1 being "some interest" and 2 being "very interested". This allows folks to just troll down the list and pick off items of interest, they don't have to carefully ranking the entire set.
It is not easy to administer (sql commandline on the database!), but I'm volunteering to run the process, which just involves sending me the spreadsheet of abstracts and presenters to load into the database. Then I'll send you back the score totals. The system was used by 2007, 2011, foss4gna 2012, and will be used for foss4gna again this year.
Rollo Home on April 10, 2013:
Antony Scott on April 10, 2013:
Claire Gilmour on April 11, 2013:
Our email is down until probably Monday because our servers are being relocated. Is anyone able to send confirmations to anyone submitting papers? I can send the emails and the confirmation to whoever, alternatively I can send it from my gmail account.
Jo Cook on April 15, 2013:
I've caught up with adding all the press releases to the website (3 of them so far). They are blog posts, with a category of "Press Releases" which means they automatically get added to the News/Press Releases part of the top menu. I understand we're still waiting for the Met Office one to be approved.
@Barry it would be nice if we could remove the "Blog Archives" heading that appears in both News and Press Releases. I can't see anything simple in the wordpress dashboard, so I was wondering if it was something that could be easily hidden/removed in the template. Don't worry if it's a big hassle though, I'm sure it's not a deal breaker!
BTW thanks to everyone for looking after things last week while I was travelling- I very much appreciated it.
Jo
Rollo Home on April 15, 2013:
Hi Rollo
Hope you are well. Just want to check with you the following outstanding items:
eNewsletter: Providing sponsorship slot on monthly eNewsletter (suggest April, June - each £150 (50% discount), which goes out to over 14,000 email addresses: Rollo wrote: we’ll hold on the April newsletter in preference for June as that would align nicely with our early bird dates. I’ll confirm on that nearer the time. Highlight the event in eNews of May, July. thanks. We will be sending out May eNews at end of April, June eNews at end of May, please let me know if you would like me to save a spot for your event.
Web Banner on Events Section, we will provide you a 40% discounted price which will be £108 per month. A typical web banner on GeoConnexion.com gets over 1,000 clicks and 466,719 impressions each month. Rollo wrote: Can we revisit this nearer the time? Our budgets are fairly limited.
Rollo wrote: I don’t see a problem with the distribution list, although this puts a ‘cost’ on you for postage. We can ‘give’ a copy to every delegate as they register. It’s just that we’re not providing a bag as the feedback has become very negative of them in recent years. Please let me know how best we can get a copy of the magazine to every register? if we leave a pile of magazines at the event, I doubt many will remember to pick up and take home. I was proposed that you supply us a list for one time usage so we will ensure that everyone receives a copy. What's do you think Rollo.
Best
Any interest in the conference banner or email blast? Costs associated.
Antony Scott on April 26, 2013:
cheers
Antony
Antony Scott on May 9, 2013:
Antony
Barry Rowlingson on May 9, 2013:
If not then some thoughts, comments for discussion:
1. I'm working with Rollo on the timetabling and general conference management system.
2. Do we need a protocol for handling email to info@2013? I just feel things may get lost or handled twice (with possible contradictory responses) if we dont sort this soon, as the volume (currently 1 every day or two) will probably ramp up shortly.
3. Related to 2. do we need more targeted email aliases? e.g. registration@2013 that goes straight to Claire, volunteer@2013 that goes to Abi and so on?
Jo Cook on May 9, 2013:
1: Yippee :-)
2: I think as long as the person that responds also cc's info@ so we all know someone has replied, then it's OK at the moment.
3: Yes, probably
@rollo- did you get those forwarded emails that I sent about people who wanted their speaking slots on particular days? If not, shall I find somewhere on basecamp pop the information?
Antony Scott on May 9, 2013:
Rollo Home on May 9, 2013:
Jo: yes, I did get those emails - not that I've taken account of them as yet.
Info@ : I think Jo's solution is potentially simpler - people wouldn't use the right email anyway, and unless we have a 1-1 relationship between person and address, we get a potential duplication issue anyway. So it would be adding complication without solving the problem.
Agenda items:
- 'marketing collateral': this seems to have fallen to us as of the F2F, correct? I need to be brought up to speed on this (conference bags??!)
- PR: are we hitting the mark? Do we need to revise our campaign?
- Programme: not one for this committee, but if Barry is on the phone it would make sense to discuss this.
- Room requirements: need to be able to firm up on the rooms needed asap to Jeremy
Meeting via Skype?
Rollo Home on May 10, 2013:
Jeremy Morley on May 10, 2013:
Please use the text doc as the master list of rooms outside EMCC.
I'd suggest particularly thinking about the profile of rooms needed day by day (Tues / Weds/ Thurs / Fri / Saturday / Sunday) to see that we have the right mix (e.g. we have fewer seminar rooms on Tuesday).
Antony Scott on May 10, 2013:
Notes/actions
Antony Scott on May 13, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on May 14, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on May 14, 2013:
"""
This is the hackathon which delivers on "Geo For All". Do you fancy using OSGeo tools to build something useful and help with humanitarian projects worldwide? The GeoCamp at FOSS4G, in Nottingham is the venue.
This is a two-day event, register your interest on Eventbrite.
FAQ
Do I have to attend both days?
Who is sponsoring the hackathon?
What are we going to produce?
"""
- can the hackathon ppl please QUICKLY write some answers and supply any other copy text and I'll make this live TODAY.
Ian Edwards on May 14, 2013:
Ian Edwards on May 14, 2013:
* *
This is the hackathon which delivers on "Geo For All". Do you fancy using
OSGeo tools to build something useful and help with environmental and
humanitarian issues worldwide? Perhaps you’re keen to find out about the
latest sources of open data, or just interested in meeting new people and
helping to design useful and innovative solutions to some of the world’s
most pressing problems?
The GeoCamp at FOSS4G in Nottingham is the venue. This is a two-day event,
register your interest on Eventbrite.
FAQ
Do I have to attend both days?
- No, hackathons are very flexible and we expect that a number of people
may wish to experience the event without committing to both days. Just let
us know which days you are attending when you register.
Is the event restricted to software hackers?
- If you like writing code then it’s true that this is the event for you!
But the most successful hackathons have a very diverse range of people,
from experienced programmers to people who have no interest in writing code
but have a passion for developing solutions. Previous hackathons led by
the same hosts have had a very diverse range of people - some teams have
worked with plasticine, lego and 3D printing; we also expect to have
hardware hackers with remote sensors and Raspberry Pis.
Who is sponsoring the hackathon?
- The hackathon is sponsored and led by the UK Met Office with other groups
also actively involved. The Met Office has held a series of successful
hackathons around the country and they also offer additional open source
software and open data into the mix.
What are we going to produce?
- Before September we will release a set of problem statements that will
guide the majority of projects, but the results of the event will depend on
the unique mix of people who attend. Common solutions include web and
mobile apps, plugins, graphics and art, hardware solutions, sensors etc.
Steven Feldman on May 14, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on May 14, 2013:
Ian Edwards on May 14, 2013:
it become available?
Barry Rowlingson on May 14, 2013:
http://2013.foss4g.org/wp-login.php
and recover your password, email is iedwards.pub@gmail.com
Steven Feldman on May 14, 2013:
Jo Cook on May 24, 2013:
Jo
Rollo Home on May 24, 2013:
Jo Cook on May 24, 2013:
Antony Scott on May 24, 2013:
Rollo Home on May 24, 2013:
Main actions to have ready for next meeting (June 7th 10am)
- Clipboard options to be presented by Jo
- T-Shirt design options to be presented by Barry
- Lanyard design options to be presented by Rollo
Antony Scott on May 31, 2013:
Rollo Home on May 31, 2013:
Attached is a the design and the invoice (company: FireLabel - they were very helpful), but in summary:
http://www.firelabel.co.uk/t-shirts/mens/crew-neck-t-shirts/61212-fruit-of-the-loom-heavy-cotton-t-shirt.html
Steven Feldman on June 1, 2013:
Anyone ever got a thermos type travel mug or water bottle at a conference? Quite useful
Jo Cook on June 7, 2013:
Rollo Home on June 7, 2013:
Jo Cook on June 7, 2013:
Rollo Home on June 7, 2013:
Rollo Home on June 7, 2013:
1. Lanyards
2. T-shirts
3. 'gift' (i.e. bag/clipboard/whatever)
4. conference programme
5. Communications - review of announcements
Jo Cook on June 7, 2013:
Rollo Home on June 7, 2013:
The registration pack so far includes:
1. programme booklet (hopefully a nice keep sake in it's own right)
2. t-shirt
3. lanyard (also hopefully nice enough to want to keep)
4. OSGeo Live DVD (printed with FOSS logo's?)
What can we add to this list that makes sense?
Steven suggested themos/insulated coffee cups
Perhaps wrist bands? (might be useful - different colours for those with access to social events etc.?
Jo Cook on June 7, 2013:
Rollo Home on June 7, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on June 7, 2013:
+1 for wristbands as entrance tickets.
Jo Cook on June 7, 2013:
Rollo Home on June 7, 2013:
Jo Cook on June 7, 2013:
Rollo Home on June 7, 2013:
I'll get costs for wrist bands - any thoughts on how many different colours we want?
e.g.:
workshop delegates?
for Individual social events or just...?
Jo Cook on June 7, 2013:
Steven Feldman on June 7, 2013:
Jo Cook on June 12, 2013:
I've used one company for the prices, on the grounds that their website seems nice (compared to other companies in the field), they offer eco-friendly versions of some items, which is important to me, and I hope that by using one company for everything it might be easier and they might do us a bulk discount (I haven't asked yet).
I have a couple of questions- should the programme booklet go in there as well, and if so do we have a cost per person for this yet? Secondly, with the t-shirts option I'm not sure if the amount we order can be mixed size, or whether we have to order each size separately. I'm also not sure how many female ones we would need, so those prices may change somewhat.
For many of the items I chose the 3-colour logo option where I could- in some cases if we start with a white background we might be able to go for a 2-colour logo- this will bring prices down a little as well.
Please take a look, add any additional items that you think might be nice, let me know if I should share it with anyone else (I included Claire).
Ta :-)
Jo
Jo Cook on June 12, 2013:
I should have added that the company I was looking at do a lot of event signage stuff as well- and things like table decorations. If we have an idea what we're looking at there, and the budget, I'm happy to cost that up as well
Jo
Rollo Home on June 12, 2013:
Unit price for 800:
£0.43 lanyard
£0.33 wrist band
Rollo Home on June 12, 2013:
I've some costs for the below:
A6 cards(150 x 105) printed colour 2 sides on 300gm silk and drill one hole
500 £45 + VAT (i.e. £9/100 A6 sheets)
1000 £65 + VAT (i.e. £6.50/100 A6 sheets)
( 500 x 4 = £180 + VAT)
Therefore I'd say for our needs:
800 delegates 4 cards (8 sides) one of which is laminated:
= (8 x £9 x 4)+ (8 x £4) = £320+VAT
I can get the design done at OS.
Any thoughts?
Rollo Home on June 12, 2013:
Jo Cook on June 12, 2013:
Banners- if I stick another sheet into that google doc- we can start adding the kind of things we'd like and then address it at the meeting.
Steven Feldman on June 12, 2013:
Jo Cook on June 12, 2013:
Antony Scott on June 14, 2013:
http://www.wallaceexhibitions.com/aero_feather_flags.html
Rollo Home on June 18, 2013:
- PR - latest release has been pushed back from tomorrow to allow time for the volunteer pages to be updated (Abi to advise)
- Lanyards - Steven is to talk to designer about costs of design and printing. Alternatively I could use OS resources for design and local printing connection (prices already defined)
I think that was it for me for now.
Abi Page on June 19, 2013:
Jo Cook on June 19, 2013:
Antony Scott on June 20, 2013:
Jo Cook on June 20, 2013:
Antony Scott on June 20, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on June 24, 2013:
I really cant make the logo work on black, we could do pale t-shirts in white, light blue, fawn, maybe red (although red+green...)
Steven Feldman on June 24, 2013:
Or we could have different back prints - Volunteer, Speaker, Team, Community etc
Or we could have a maptember graphic on the back (or are we having a special limited edition maptember t-shirt)
Rollo Home on June 25, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on June 28, 2013:
Will have another play with design on dark ground this weekend (hard to do with ballpoint on paper).
Jo Cook on June 28, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on July 1, 2013:
Barry Rowlingson on July 1, 2013:
Rollo Home on July 2, 2013:
I really like the design - my only concern will be whether the printer can get that near the edge of the t-shirt, but let's let them worry about that.....
Rollo Home on July 2, 2013:
Steven Feldman on July 8, 2013: