\title{FOSS4G 2007 Sponsors \& Supporters}
\subtitle{Reflections from two supporters}
\maketitle

The Free and Open Source Software for Geospatial Conference (FOSS4G), with
the involvement of the Open Source Geospatial (OSGeo) Foundation, has become
the premiere event for the open source geospatial community. This year I was
asked to provide a "wrap up" as part of the closing session. These are the
themes I presented, which all neatly fall under an overarching theme of
``maturity.''

The experiences of the last few years (from the development of projects, to
the creation of OSGeo, among other things) have given the FOSS4G community a
confidence that I didn't feel in the past. While I've missed a few meetings
in this series, notably the last edition of this event, the 2007 event
struck me as a ``real'' conference. I see a change in the answer to this
question, which I've posed to attendees over the last few years: ``What
software stack are you working with?'' I suggest that the proportion of
attendees new to GIS or new to geospatial was rather high. The FOSS4G
community is ``just like'' the rest of the GIS community. I would identify the
pursuit of effective business models and development funding as far ``calmer''
than in past years. The demand for open source geospatial education is
growing. 

\address{Adena Schutzberg\\Executive Editor, \href{http://directionsmag.com}{Directions Magazine}}

\hrulefill
	
The Open Planning Project wishes to thank FOSS4G 2007 conference organizers and especially attendees for making a terrific event.  We had a great time connecting with colleagues and meeting new users of our collective technologies.

We were particularly excited to see the increasing popularity of GeoServer and OpenLayers, and enjoyed the opportunity to demonstrate the new feature development that we have been supporting in those projects.  We look forward to another great year of advances in the open geo-stack and will be back with more exciting developments at the next conference.

\address{Chris Holmes, \href{http://topp.openplans.org}{The Open Planning Project}}

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