On Mon, 30 Jul 2012, Mark Struberg wrote:
Folks, I know no single conference where the speakers have to pay for
the conference itself. That's just ridiculous.
There are quite a few out there. It's starting to look like some people
are finding the idea normal, others are shocked, depending on what other
conferences you've spoken at recently...
The ride and hotel could be handled via the travel-help as we don't have
the budget of other big conferences - but tickets must be included.
<change-of-hat>
TAC won't just carte-blanche hand out plane tickets to all speakers,
sorry. Typical TAC recipients are students, people out of work, people
just starting out in work, people who work in very low paid sectors etc.
There is a strict judging process, and giving lots of preference to
speakers, above and beyond others, risks problems with our charitable
status. Some speakers will get help, certainly, and many have been
helped out in the past, but by no means can TAC fund them all....
</change-of-hat>
Unless someone is able to find a hefty chunk of sponsorship down the back
of their company sofa, the budget as it currently stands doesn't let us
both comp speakers, and offer them free hotel accomodation.
So, we come back to the earlier question once more. For those people who
won't be fully funded by their company no matter what, which is more
important to you being able to come?
* Would it be better for you two pay a couple of hundred euros towards
your ticket (say, something like half price), and get accomodation?
* Or would it be better if your ticket was completely free, but you
have to arrange and pay for your own accomodation?
We've had a few people already vote for the latter, but is that the case
for everyone? Which is the one we should be concentrating on trying to
make happen?
Thanks
Nick
