True!
Jacques Le Roux wrote:
It's better than TV :p
Jacques
From: "Ruth Hoffman" <rhoff...@aesolves.com>
David:
I think this thread is just about dead.
Regardless of what others think, I found ambiguity in your original
statement concerning the profit motive of the ApacheCon organization.
I now understand what you said. No more ambiguities. Thanks for that
clarification.
Regards,
Ruth
David E Jones wrote:
You're right to be suspicious Ruth. The traffic volume on the
private list is at least twice the volume on the dev list. Also, you
should have seen the thread about you we had a couple of weeks ago!
Seriously though... what are you talking about? There seems to be
some sort of implied issue here and I don't get it.
-David
On Apr 2, 2010, at 2:45 PM, Ruth Hoffman wrote:
Your point?
I asked for clarification. I got it. End of story.
Thanks for helping me out Hans. And thanks for making this mailing
list a friendlier place for all of us out here who are not privy to
all the secrets of those on the PMC.
Regards,
Ruth
Hans Bakker wrote:
perhaps next time read more carefully and think again and then reply?
On Fri, 2010-04-02 at 16:04 -0400, Ruth Hoffman wrote:
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.