Hi David:
This says it all. No need to defend anything. My comments weren't not
meant as an offensive move on my part. I only want to understand the
dynamics of the conference and the ASF.
Regards,
Ruth
David E Jones wrote:
Ruth,
Yeah, that's the point, I wrote: "ApacheCon is a for profit effort with some of the
proceeds going to the foundation".
You wrote: "David has made a statement that the ApacheCon organization is a for
profit organization".
I guess my problem is I don't know how to defend a statement I didn't make.
You're the one who confronted me to challenge a statement that you said I made.
Sorry, I guess I just don't know how to respond. Any hints?
-David
On Apr 2, 2010, at 1:44 PM, Ruth Hoffman wrote:
Hello David:
I simply would like clarification on your statement: "ApacheCon is a for profit
effort." No need to get confrontational.
Regards,
Ruth
David E Jones wrote:
Ruth,
I challenge you to quote where I said that.
-David
On Apr 2, 2010, at 12:53 PM, Ruth Hoffman wrote:
Hi Scott:
Thanks that has been my understanding.
However, David has made a statement that the ApacheCon organization is a for profit
organization. I want to make sure that I'm operating under the correct assumptions when I
make my decisions relative to this conference. There is a HUGE difference between an
organization taking in more money than expenses and an organization operating as a
"for profit" endeavor.
I'd like to know what David really means by his statement.
Regards,
Ruth
Scott Gray wrote:
Apache is non-profit, but the foundation does "profit" from ApacheCons in the sense that
their takings exceed expenses. This "profit" goes back into the foundation account to be
used for other expenses involved in running the foundation.
Regards
Scott
HotWax Media
http://www.hotwaxmedia.com
On 2/04/2010, at 12:32 PM, Ruth Hoffman wrote:
Hi David:
Where have you seen it documented that ApacheCon is an organization with a "for
profit" tax status?
Everything I see says that ApacheCon is the "Official User Conference of the Apache
Software Foundation". This implies that it is sanctioned by ASF and that it is a
non-profit organization. Please, if you know for sure where it is documented that
ApacheCon is a separate, for profit, organization, I'd like to know.
Regards,
Ruth
David E Jones wrote:
It would be nice if it were that way, but that's just not the case.
ApacheCon is a for profit effort with some of the proceeds going to the
foundation (in theory). In other words, the ASF gets money from ApacheCon and
does not generally invest any money in ApacheCon. In 2009 I think the
foundation did invest some money in marketing (for the anniversary) that also
benefitted ApacheCon (since they had a party there for it), but that's the
closest thing I'm aware of to what you are describing.
Also consider that the majority of the participants in the OFBiz events have
been people who already know about and are already using OFBiz. Even in 2008
with the enormous investments in the conference by OFBiz contributors, much of
which was supposed to go into promoting the conference but the PR consulting
company messed up that year (which caused them to be replaced), and so even
then most of the people attending sessions were presenters at other sessions.
Even in the pre-ApacheCon OFBiz Users Conferences there were far more
developers and contributors attending than users, and typically the users were
people who happened to live close to the conference and who attended to check
out what was going on.
We need something else to attract end-users and better meet their needs.
-David
On Apr 2, 2010, at 11:58 AM, Ruth Hoffman wrote:
Hi Ean:
Nice, but I think you might be missing my point.
ApacheCon is all about telling the world about OFBiz and using the immense
resources available to the Foundation to do that.
IMHO it isn't really about socializing with the small and (getting smaller by the hour)
OFBiz community. ApacheCon is for our end-users. Or rather, our potential end-users. This
should be the place where we showcase our wares and not "vacation with a
purpose".
Just my 2 cents.
Regards,
Ruth
Ean Schuessler wrote:
I think DebConf is a good example that this can be done and done right. I know
HP helps out with the expenses of DebConf but part of that is helping fly in
developers from countries where the currency exchange rates make attendance
impractically high. We may simply not be able to do that or we may come to some
agreement about how we would share those expenses for speakers with something
especially important to contribute.
Given the relatively small size of our community, we have a lot of flexibility
about where we choose to meet. In my mind, the accommodations should be
purposefully modest yet interesting and fun. There are lots of options like
that in all kinds of places. We can think of it as a collaboratively planned
vacation with a purpose.
David E Jones wrote:
I'm not sure if you meant this or not Ruth, but as it was addressed to me I
should clarify: I did speak up here, but I am not taking a role in organizing
anything as I did in previous years. In other words, I'm not committing to
anything on behalf of the project and I'm not trying to recruit speakers and
I'm not volunteering to speak or do training either.
Quite frankly in the past it has required a lot of time and money and liability
with no real benefit. I hope someone profited from those past efforts, perhaps
the for-profit organizers and maybe some attendees as well. About that, I don't
know. ApacheCon was a mess in '08 because people were paying a lot to attend
(both the training and the conference) and yet none of the money (not a penny)
went to any of the presenters or trainers. In other words, the presenters and
trainers were paying to be there and so were the attendees. This culminated in
some fascinating personal attacks from people who attended and who were not
satisfied that what they got was worth what they paid for it.
Just in case anyone is wondering ApacheCon is not the only one that ended up
this way. In another conference I did some pre-conference training and made
almost nothing doing it because the conference organizers mixed the funds for
the training with the funds for the conference, and so basically I offered
training and most of the proceeds went to subsidize the conference. My guess is
that this happens a lot with conferences.
So, taking that on just so other people can make money? Well, I'd like to say
that I learned my lesson and that's why I'm not interested (that would
incorrectly make me look experienced and intelligent and somehow remotely good
at business dealings), but the fact of the matter is that even if I wanted to I
don't have the weeks of time and thousands of dollars to even participate in a
bare minimum way. If someone else does, I'm sure many people will benefit from
their contributions and they should certainly step up and go for it.
Anyway, sorry if any bitterness bled through in this text. I think it's really
just human nature that expectations of EVERYONE involved with such things have
expectations dramatically inconsistent with reality.
