[Debconf-team] minutes from the DebConf and Debian BoF
Hi,
Attached are the minutes from the DebConf and Debian Bof. I took initially
the minutes during the meeting and they have been completed later by Richard
Darst, while watching the video.
I am not planning to start the discussion here, I hope zack will start and
lead this discussion in september when everybody is back from vacation.
But please, if something you said is incorrectly written, feel free to answer
this email and correct it.
Ana
- main question: "how does Debian relate to DebConf", long outstanding question.
- not having an answer makes some questions difficult.
- title is wrong: it should be why DebConf is acting as a fork?
- there is forked things like press team(!)
- why infrastructure is separate?
- need list of what is fork
zack: I like to think of them as the same thing, since people giving to DebConf do it because it "is Debian." DebConf would not be as much if the name of Debian couldn't be used to fundraise for it. this doesn't mean the leadership. DebConf exists because of Debian and to support Debian. The difficult part is how to manage money. I think DebConf should be amortized zero-budget (self-sustainable long-term). So the question is when/how can Debian money be used to support DebConf. This year some people thought any amount of money could be used for this year.
holger: decisions at DebConf shouldn't be taken without the usual Debian process. I would like to talk about a process to make decisions and stuff. I would also like to talk about why we do this.
vorlon: DebConf goes around asking for funds in Debian’s name, so it should be integrated into Debian, so this painful bug should be fixed. maybe also consolidate interpersonal politics.
moray: objects to title, title implies DebConf is a fork of Debian, but I think it's more "why do people act as it's a fork?". Really DebConf just does what it's needed to do, e.g. different fundraising team since debian doesn't have one. but still, merging wherever possible is best.
holger: yes, title is wrong, brings up 2007 delegations by aj. (No mentioned in the bof, you can see this in bug##592170)
vorlon: agreed about "not a purpousful fork", but it is a bit annoying that the infrastructure is duplicated.
zach: ACTION: is there a list of what is forked and what isn't? It's probably historical, but can be merged where possible.
pablo: .... something about fundraising and last's year money surplus. DebConf is an amortized zero-budget conference (because this year is only using dc9's surplus)
zack: from the outside it is not clear what is Debian money vs DebConf money. After become DPL, Debian money was suddenly accounted as DebConf money to his surprise (zach thought dc7 surplus was debian money, it wasn't clear, so just needs to be written down/accounted for somehow)
And he is not the only wondering about that.
pablo: suggests separate accounts would help with this surprise thing.
holger: wonders who is DebConf team because it is not defined. Localteam changes every year, they work hard but they do not get the full picture. Localteam needs global team/previous orga team explaining them (he comments about problems with schedule and no time between talks). Want experienced people able to override the localteam.
pablo: things can not go thru full Debian burocracy, DebConf teams needs to act in some stuff quickly.
vorlon: It's just that there doesn't *seem* to be much accountability. ask about numbers. how much surplus?
pablo: we fundraised more money
ana: we spent more than we fundraised
vorlon: are we deficit spending?
ana: we aren't deficit spending
[edit: but it's not in deficit when you consider last year's surplus]
zach: it's just communication
sledge: Every year, people think there's going to be a big deficit, but it always makes do somehow. When we decided to come here, we knew it would be more expensive [.?.?] next year it would be cheaper because bosnian govt?
zack: 1) Separate banks acounts goes against DebConf being part of Debian. 2) DPLs in past have given money to DebConf, if this money flow continues then it really isn't a amortized zero-budget conference. Somewhere it was figured that 50k have flowed debian -> DebConf for all time. 3) DebConf money should be used for Debian in extreme measures (all servers dying or being sued)
rra: *all* conferences attached to open source projects have run deficits in the last two years. Also, it is really hard to finalize budgets/expenses/reports for conferences.
moray: last year's surplus was larger than typical. not all surplus _should_ be considerd DebConf money (some should be considered Debian's). various decisions have also been made increasing costs without reporting back to debian.
ana: some numbers: this year: raised 92k from sponsors, dc9: USD 120k from sponsors+40k in stuff from extremadura, dc8: 120k raised from sponsors. this year: ~100k in housing+food, 30k in travel
blars: we change of country every day, this make us play with different accounts, so that makes it more complicated.
zack: we have money around the world in different acounts/country/concurrency, it's not new.
someoneidontknow: something about using one account and draw lines of what money belongs to that.
holger: money is not the root issue, it is a sympton of the problem who decides for the money and how it is spent. e.g. we spent more money on housing and it hurts video team since there aren't guards. so one issue is how decisions and stuff are made
fil: there is always a crunch point a month or so out where we think we don't have enough money. also, travel sponsorship is bad since people have to wait far too long until they can know if they can buy tickets or not, we need some way for people to know at the beginning if they can be sponsored or not.
vorlon: sure, it is normal for conferences to be hard to manage, that is why Debian should be there to oversee things.
zack: agrees money is a sympton and no the problem. A couple of agreements to be ratified in the mailing list:
-do we agree DebConf is part of Debian? seems to be agreement
asleesh: but DebConf should be open for all people to help with
holger: it is important to clarify DebConf should be open, as should Debian.
gunnar: next DebConf will be organized by people who is not DD, and so it was last year (dc9)
zack: do we agree that DebConf should be amortized zero-budget?
moray: surplus does not need to be in the 'DebConf' name, if there DebConf raised a vast amount more than needed then it should be Debian money
brian: it is DebConf money (the surplus)
ana: anto/cesar fundraised the money to Debian last year and their opinion abotu the surplus was: "oh, you have extra money, you can use it to improve debian".
pablo: all we need to improve is the communication between Debian and DebConf. also, don't go back and retract what we thought about surplus money being used.
fil: net flow is Debian->DebConf, so you can't really argue it's DebConf's money, not Debian's
vorlon: yes, any surplus is came from stuff Debian put in. we need communication and stuff.
somebody_with_an_ubuntu_pin: how DebConf organization should report to the DPL? if DebConf is Debian, what does "how should DebConf communicate with debian" is sort of nonsensical.
holger: who is the DebConf team? a very important question. how we should formalize this? is a GR a good idea?
gunnar: sponsor are not interested in DebConf, they are interested in making Debian better. but DebConf money could be kept as different line items and stuff.
zack: what is the formal delegation in Debian? there is something old from aj. need to have 2-3 delegation then does not make sense to the remain of the team. Is it a good idea to renew these delegations (fair number of hands raised). What could be the content of this kind of delegation?
zack: we can't have all developers decide everything about each DebConf, not feasible.
vorlon: what is delegated? There should be deleation but what kind?. Delegate no decide to withdraw money from Debian for DebConf.
No sure what is the proper delegation.
moray: delegations may perpuate forking, leads to engraining those who are there. e.g. people doing travel sponsorship do not need to be the same than doing dorm / food stuff?
zach: how do we find what should be delegated?
moray: how can we keep people involved?
aslessh: how can we have holger's concerns be handled in good time? have a few people who are responsible for addressing concerns.
sledge: umm, we don't have a Debian fundraising team. fundraising with a target (DebConf) means that it actually does get done, it's a motivation. also, for a delegation, who do you delegate to? who would take such a degelation? we do have outstanding delegations, but they are mostly forgotten and that's probably one of the strengths of it (spreading load).
ana: delegation is also important for to decide where is next DebConf, and coordinate thru the years.
holger: no micromanage, 2 delegates for each task would be too bad. just some for overall. and decisions about place should not be just those delegates.
vorlon: again, what we do want to delegate here. Now I think you don't want delegates at all, just some sort of leadership/reporting delegation?
zack: let me check what you said, you think: we only have Debian money, DebConf seed money is asked from the DPL, everything else is not delegated and handled by the DebConf team.
bgupta: what about official Debian representation on the DebConf team?
fil: there are often factions in the team, should be careful to not exagerate that by delegations.
zack closing: ACK, in a couple of weeks after DebConf. restart this discussion on the lists.
holger: in the end of the year, we'll have to decide where DebConf12 will be. maybe have the decision on Debian-project, not DebConf-team ?
zack: need formalizing current positions in DebConf team. if we start on Debian-project people will comment who have no idea how stuff works. And, thanks to everyone who made this conference possible.
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