Re: [Debconf-team] meeting minutes?
Hi,
We met last Monday after too long since our last well-attended meeting
and with a too much ambitious agenda.
http://meetbot.debian.net/Manual.html#hints-on-how-to-run-an-effective-meeting
The meeting ran over for almost an extra full hour and at times
certain ideas seemed to gain momentum when indeed they did not have
full support, which make the logs very confusing (as many of the
'AGREED' entries were due to the inexperience and agreed-happy finger
of the chair).
http://meetbot.debian.net/Manual.html#hints-on-how-to-run-an-effective-meeting
A summary is of course an imperfect artifact and contains the opinions
and views of the summarizer. Please contribute with anything I so
chose not to include in this summary. I have written everything I
could in passive voice, because I suffer a "rhetorical-testosterone
deficit"[1].
http://meetbot.debian.net/Manual.html#hints-on-how-to-run-an-effective-meeting
We managed to get ourselves intertwined in never-ending bickering on
the following topics:
* T-shirts
There was plenty of discussion about what to do with role-based
t-shirts and people who fall into multiple roles. Initially it was
discussed to have only one attendee t-shirt plus one role t-shirt
(where roles are orga, v-t, volunteer, etc).
Of particular attention was the video team t-shirt, that seems to be
used as a "cheap bribe" to get more v-t volunteers. The v-t team
people attending stressed the usefulness of having a separate t-shirt.
Other people weren't particularly moved, but the v-t team people made
their point.
The meeting was unable to decide between the max-1 and max-2 options.
In the max-1 option, orga/v-t/volunteer will get an orga/v-t/volunteer
(or generic 'staff') t-shirt and no attendee t-shirt. In the max-2
option, they will get the extra t-shirt plus the regular attendee
option.
* Budget
The budget.ods file was scrutinized, including recent errors that make
some numbers there better than they actually are. The overall numbers
looked like $185k on food/accom, expect $74k in attendee fees, have
$164k other fundraising/surplus. That's without Queue B and without
extra Debian funds. The fundraising/surplus is further split into $74k
attendee fees, $75k surplus, $82k fundraising this year, $6k debconf
newbies.
Later during the meeting Ana produced an adjusted budget.ods with no
formal dinner and updated t-shirt numbers that left us with a $5k
surplus (rev. 1489).
* Budget cuts
Conversation then become winding and start discussing possible budget
cuts including Formal Dinner and Day Trip. Cutting the formal dinner
seemed to be agreed upon.
[After the Day Trip funding]
Ana brought up the issue of compressing the schedule to the regular
university hours to save money in cleaning ( / security?). People
thought the idea was doable and it will save money so they (seemed) to
go for it.
* Day Trip Funding
During the budget cuts, Jimmy brought up a proposal for funding the
Day Trip with a "package" deal of $20 including discounted subway fare
+ discounted baseball ticket (which will leave us with some money to
sponsor whomever requests it). That didn't seem to pick up steam and
they'd prefer costs were truthful and transparent to our attendees.
Later on a proposal of not spending DebConf money on the day trip and
let the day trip organizers figure it out seemed to reach consensus
and it was wrongly noted as agreed. Clint and Micah pointed out it
wasn't the case and talked about the value of having as many attendees
together during the day trip, a goal strengthen by having it
sponsored. The discussion got lengthy and people got very upset, so
the moderator tried to conclude the discussion with a vote for
preferences over three options (fully funded / funded for whomever
requested it / completely unfunded). The vote finished the discussion
but it felt silly.
* Day Trip in general
There were some discussions about the "goodness of fit" of a baseball
game given the audience. The local team made the case that the day
trip was more than just the baseball game (a day at the beach...) and
that baseball games are inherently community-oriented as there's
plenty of time to chat during the game. There was plenty of discussion
about the total number of potential attendees to the baseball game
itself, with guesses ranging from 80 to 200 people.
* Bursary and Queue B
The meeting concluded with a discussion on travel funding. The main
issue discussed was whether we can notify people in the Queue A about
their funding situation and whether we can fund Queue A at a different
percentage below 100% to free-up money for people in Queue B. Many,
many options were proposed (Micah counted up to six). An important
subject raised was the fact that after funding the travel queues,
DebConf needed some money (between $5k-$10k) to have as a "cushion"
for unexpected expenses. The elephant in the room was of course asking
Debian for money (represented by Zack in a pachyderm suit), a topic
that was avoided till the very end. Nevertheless, at the end of the
discussion two proposals stood up: remove sponsored day trip, fund
Queue A at 80 % and Queue B at 50%; the second proposal was to ask
Debian for ~$7k and then to fund Queue A at 100% and Queue B at 70%.
The two proposals were left up for discussion after the meeting.
Initially for an emergency meeting but then it was pointed out that
funding Queue A at 80% was in the intersection so that was to be acted
upon with deciding between these two proposals for the next meeting.
Have fun next meeting and don't forget to read
http://meetbot.debian.net/Manual.html#hints-on-how-to-run-an-effective-meeting
before volunteering for chair ;-)
[1] http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2427
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