1 <emily> It is UTC 14:00 now, time for our GUADEC IRC meeting 
   2 <yippi_> hi
   3 <emily> Meeting agenda is here: https://live.gnome.org/Upcoming%20Meeting%20Agenda
   4 <emily> I also just send out an email about today's agenda minutes ago 
   5 <emily> Shall we start the meeting now or waiting for more people ? 
   6 <yippi_> i think we can start
   7 <emily> yippi_>: can you help to upload the meeting IRC log, I can help to write minutes 
   8 <emily> Let's start our meeting 
   9 <yippi_> okay
  10 <emily> 1. Contact potential GUADEC organizer 
  11 <emily> Update: 
  12 <emily> We have send email to people list here: 
  13 <emily> https://live.gnome.org/GUADEC/2012/Bids
  14 <emily> We got several response 
  15 <emily> they are: Jonathan Blandford, Tomas Bzatek, zaffo80 from Alto Vicentino Linux User Group, Dave Neary
  16 <emily> We also got two bids: 
  17 <emily> the first one: Brno as host for GUADEC 2012 : http://www.eischmann.cz/GUADEC_Brno.pdf
  18 <emily> The second bid: A Coru?a, Spain for GUADEC 2012: http://blogs.igalia.com/chema/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/bid_guadec_akademy_coruna_2009.pdf
  19 <andre> uh, the latter is from 2009?
  20 <emily> yes, andre 
  21 * andre wonders why it's called a bid then
  22 <emily> They are interested in host GUADEC again 
  23 --> abharath (~abharath@59.92.143.58) has joined #guadec
  24 <andre> the definition of "bid" probably varies then :)
  25 <emily> It seems that some people still working on the proposal and need more time to work on it. 
  26 <emily> Do we make the decision the postponed the deadline ? 
  27 <yippi_> yes, a number of people have asked for more time.
  28 <emily> that make sense. 
  29 <emily> How much time do you think they need ? 2 weeks ? 
  30 <emily> Two weeks later is July 4th 
  31 <yippi_> on the other hand, the bid from Brno seems very well done and prepared
  32 <yippi_> if we decide to extend it, 2 weeks seems fine to me.  The fact that the deadline is a U.S. holiday should not be an issue
  33 * emily is looking at the detail of Brno's bid 
  34 <emily> The next IRC meeting was expected to be on July 4th 
  35 <emily> We might choose another meeting time 
  36 <yippi_> i won't be able to attend a meeting on that day, but I may be the only american on the committee
  37 <yippi_> we could meet in 3 weeks
  38 <emily> sounds good 
  39 <yippi_> but if we extend the deadline we should extend it so that we meet on the same day as when the bids close
  40 <yippi_> so, perhaps we should consider extending the deadline 3 weeks?
  41 <emily> How about deadline is July 8th and next meeting is July 11 
  42 <yippi_> you think we should meet after the deadline?
  43 <emily> So that everyone can take a look at current bids 
  44 <yippi_> okay, that sounds good
  45 <emily> We have enough to review all bids then 
  46 <yippi_> that makes sense
  47 <emily> that will be more efficient if we prepared 
  48 <emily> How about other people think ? Deadline on July 8 and let's meet on July 11th ? 
  49 <yippi_> does anybody aside from me and emily have any thoughts about whether we should extend the bids?
  50 <emily> andre, how do you think ? 
  51 <yippi_> it seems reasonable to extend the bids to me.  
  52 <andre> I'm biased as I support one proposal so no comment :)
  53 <abharath> emily: the dates seem good
  54 <yippi_> it would be nice to have more of a selection
  55 <yippi_> but it may upset those who submitted their bids on time if we extend it
  56 <abharath> yippi_: If extending the deadlines, gives people enough time to prepare better bids, then yes we should, but its sad for the ones who already have submissions
  57 <abharath> yippi_: right
  58 <yippi_> I should mention that at the last board meeting, the board delegated the responsibility to decide if we should extend the deadline to this IRC meeting
  59 --> txenoo (~chema@97.165.117.91.dynamic.mundo-r.com) has joined #guadec
  60 <yippi_> Brno does seem a good choice, and it is a new location for GNOME
  61 <yippi_> for GUADEC I mean
  62 <emily> andre, you support Brno bid ? 
  63 <abharath> yippi_: we should mention that the submissions till now, can rework on their bids if they'd like to, but we appreciate their submission being on time. Should go down well with them
  64 <emily> <abharath: agree, we can provide feedback to those people who already submit bids. they can ask us more detail questions
  65 <yippi_> should we extend the deadline, or only allow those people who have told us a bid is coming to submit one within 2 weeks?
  66 <abharath> emily: yup that'll make them happy that we have looked through their proposal and went them to better it if there are loopholes
  67 <abharath> yippi_: extend it to all if we plan to extend it
  68 <emily> yippi_: let's make it open to all 
  69 <yippi_> should we vote on extending the bid?
  70 <emily> yes, let's do it 
  71 <emily> +1 for extend deadline to July 8th, and open to all  
  72 <abharath> +1 for the same thing ^^^
  73 <yippi_> +1 from me, also
  74 <yippi_> who will send the announcement to the guadec-list?
  75 <emily> abharath, can you help to draft this email ? 
  76 <abharath> emily: sure, I'll draft one and send it to you and yippi_ for review
  77 <emily> great, thanks abharath 
  78 <yippi_> yes, thanks!
  79 <emily> AI for <abharath>- Draft email about the deadline extended announcement 
  80 <emily> do we have a template for bid ? 
  81 <emily> Some people asked about template and budget 
  82 <abharath> emily: I don't remember seeing one for GUADEC, but can they use the GNOME.Asia templates? I found them very helpful and very well drafted
  83 <abharath> atleast it has a nice flow
  84 <emily> sure, that's a good idea 
  85 <emily> We can ask GNOME.Asia team to if they are willing to publish this template 
  86 <sesivany> when we were making the Brno proposal we used a template based on past GUADEC budgets.
  87 <sesivany> as one of those who's been working on the Brno proposal I'd like to ask for some feedback.
  88 <emily> please sesivany 
  89 <abharath> sesivany: sure. We will ask the experts to review it and provide feedback on it. yippi_ , emily and pockey_lam are some of the best ones who can provide constructive feedback
  90 <sesivany> great
  91 <abharath> sesivany: you meant overall feedback or any particular section of it?
  92 <sesivany> well, I mean to point out parts which are not clear, need to be more specific etc. and why.
  93 <abharath> sesivany: yes sure
  94 <abharath> emily: AI?
  95 <abharath> for the core team
  96 <emily> we can discuss this bids through email, and every core member provide feedback 
  97 <abharath> yes sounds good
  98 <emily> AI for core team - we can discuss this bids through email, and every core member provide feedback
  99 <sesivany> sound good, postponing the deadline is a bit disadvantaging for us, especially after we've published the proposal, so I'd like to get some advantage out of the situation.
 100 <emily> <sesivany>: feel free to ask questions in the mail list and IRC 
 101 <yippi_> sesivany, overall I think your bid looks very well prepared and very thorough
 102 <emily> sesivany: You have more time to improve your bid and discuss with GUADEC core team. 
 103 <yippi_> the costs also seem reasonable.
 104 <yippi_> if I were to recommend making your bid even stronger, I would suggest adding some information about the volunteer team
 105 <sesivany> the costs was the part we were struggling the most with. It's hard to estimate e.g. printing cost in the phase.
 106 <yippi_> for example, how much structure does it have?  Do you have people who can commit to helping do certain things?  The bid could introduce us a bit more with the volunteer community.  
 107 <yippi_> sure, but everyone understands that a bid includes estimates
 108 <yippi_> perhaps, for example, if the volunteers come to a meeting, you could take some photos and the bid could include some headshots of the main organizers and pictures of the meeting and a brief overview of what the volunteers are doing.
 109 <sesivany> ok, we can describe our team more, our advantage is that those who work for Red Hat will be freed from their duties (of course partly) to work on GUADEC.
 110 <yippi_> in general, having a strong volunteer community on the ground is a very significant aspect of how bids get decided, and something that bids often do not go into much detail about
 111 <yippi_> though your track record on page 5 is nice
 112 <yippi_> and does communicate some of this, but it is a bit impersonal.
 113 <yippi_> after reading the bid, I don't feel like i've been much introduced to the community there
 114 <sesivany> ok, we will improve that part.
 115 <yippi_> i didn't say that right.  
 116 <yippi_> by community i meant volunteer community.
 117 <abharath> yes the same feeling here. A sneak peek into the team and motivation, would go miles to make a great bid
 118 <yippi_> the bid does a great job of communicating local culture
 119 <yippi_> and local facilities
 120 <yippi_> which could be considered "community" too I guess.  :)
 121 <yippi_> another thing.
 122 <yippi_> often at GUADEC, the network turns out to be a real mess
 123 <yippi_> either the network doesn't work well and people can't connect
 124 <sesivany> we've gotten even more volunteers after we finished the proposal, so it will be a good opportunity to add them too.
 125 <yippi_> or setup turns into a mess or something
 126 <yippi_> so, explaining that you have a real handle on making the network function for the conference would be useful.
 127 <sesivany> the university has assured us several times that the wifi has a large capacity, hundreds of connected devices, usually every student there brings his laptop,  but anyway we will make sure it will work.
 128 <yippi_> do you have the right volunteers committed and to do the network setup, for example?  Is any needed hardware already on hand?  Does stuff need to be rented?  
 129 <yippi_> if the university is going to guarantee us network access, a letter from the university included in the bid would be good.
 130 <emily> it is good to know the univeristy is one of the ogranizor team and the cost for the venue is low. That's a strong point
 131 <sesivany> we have a letter from the university signed by the dean.
 132 <yippi_> in the past, some bids have included letters from the mayor inviting us to their city, for example.
 133 <yippi_> is the letter included in the bid?
 134 <yippi_> I don't remember seeing it
 135 <yippi_> that is the sort of thing that makes a bid look professional
 136 <yippi_> letters from people who are going to help make it happen letting us know that they are in support. etc.
 137 <sesivany> well, we didn't include it in the proposal, thought it was enough to state we had a deal with the university.
 138 <sesivany> anyways good point
 139 <yippi_> i'm just saying that including stuff like that in the bid makes a bid look better
 140 <yippi_> is there anything more on the agenda?
 141 <sesivany> we will have necessary hardware rented (free of charge) by the university and Red Hat office (e.g. conference devices)
 142 <yippi_> providing more detail about things like that in the bid, would make it stronger
 143 <yippi_> also, The GNOME Foundation needs a meeting room with phone facilities
 144 <yippi_> the bid doesn't mention how hard it is to get one
 145 <yippi_> is one included in the venue?
 146 <sesivany> this meeting was really much of help for me. Thanks for that. I will be more than happy to receive more feedback via e-mail.
 147 <yippi_> ideally phone conferencing
 148 <yippi_> thanks for the bid.  it is well prepared
 149 <emily> thank you for the bid sesivany. we will ask more feedback in mail list 
 150 <emily> yippi_: can you write a summary about ur feedback just now and reply to mail list to invoke more feedabck for Brno's bid ? 
 151 <abharath> emily: I think we should have a private mail thread between the core team, and each potential host?
 152 <yippi_> +1
 153 <emily> do we create a new mail list or just include core member in private emails ? 
 154 <emily> we need to set up a bid review team 
 155 <abharath> emily: just include them in a mail thread should be fine. But have a subject which says which team this is for. like [Brno] etc
 156 <emily> sounds good 
 157 <abharath> emily: well yippi_ , you and pockey_lam are already on it :) so should be ok
 158 <abharath> the bid review team I meant
 159 <emily> Is pockey_lam joined us ? 
 160 <abharath> I don't know. I was away for a few weeks :( so really catching up now
 161 <emily> pockey_lam said she is busy with GNOME.Asia
 162 <emily> But we can ask for her help on review the bids and provide feedback 
 163 <yippi_> sounds good
 164 <abharath> emily: sure
 165 <emily> Ai for Emily - Invite GNOME.Asia people to help on review bids 
 166 <emily> It is 1 hour already 
 167 <emily> We will meet on July 11 for the next meeting 
 168 <emily> Do we have any other thing to talk about ? 
 169 <emily> https://live.gnome.org/GUADEC/GUADEC-2011-0620  Here is today's minutes 
 170 <emily> yippi_: can you help to upload the IRC log ? 
 171 <emily> If no more topic, our meeting is done