I said last year I was going to cut back on conferences and forgot about that in the lead up to January. So far this year there’s been three conferences I’ve attended. I’ve got another 2 plus one speaking engagement and then I’m done for a bit. Of course that leaves me wondering about next year.
My typical conference experience is:
- Keynote
- Food
- Talks
- social
It’s pretty much church (if you’re in the south and you’ve been to a church it’s pretty much wash rinse and repeat).
Sometimes you skip the Keynote on Day 2 in the morning and occasionally the keynote is lunch. Possibly it is a time for the Gold/Diamond/Aluminum Sponsors to talk. I’ve wondered what would happen if you just stick everyone in a room and yell “Go”. You can talk about anything. Give a keynote long talk. Do a 20 minute talk. An entire demo. Maybe just all slides. I think these were basically “un-conferences” back when that seemed to be more popular.
About my last reason to go to a conference is to:
- See People I haven’t seen since the last conference.
- Talk about something
Over the years #1 has turned into my main reason for going. I’m going to talk at one in October – BUT – it’s about non-money making things and things I enjoy doing with Software and Data. Which I think if I continue just talking at conferences it may be more for the entertainment value vs “Hire me to do this technical thing”. Assuming I continue talking at the frequency I’ve been talking at conferences.
I’ve said this a lot as of late – I’d like to see conferences change………except I want to see people. Virtual doesn’t quite hit that spot BUT it lowers the bar for accessibility to more people. Every Hybrid conference I’ve been to have always fallen victim to Tech issues. I know that’s not the case everywhere but at the last conference we lost internet for 5 or 10 minutes. Something hiccuped and we just had nothing. Of course it wasn’t needed as this was a “on site” meeting with nothing virtual. 5 minutes isn’t long unless you’re speaking or watching. Anyway – What do do? Why Worry about it?
The topic of conversation over the last two meetings has been the QGIS Users Group. I’ve been talking to random people on this subject and the biggest problem has been me being slow about holding a meeting. That’s coming – I just have to sit and get my head on straight.
Of course all of this bleeds into whether to tackle a “virtual” qgis meeting or a in-person. I’ve done small in-person meetings and the big pain is location. I call Chattanooga a “Two Hop Town” – In other words the chances of a direct flight here are slim to none. Nashville, Memphis, Atlanta, etc – all Direct flights. That’s why the last meeting in Nashville in 2022 went so well. People flew in from a few noteworthy places. Of course I’m not insane and at this point I couldn’t tackle something of that width and breadth.
Of course we could do a lot of small meetings. We have one conference OR we try to shove as many of us into FOSS4GNA as we can. The Holding small meetings idea appeals to me because people are in a room talking.
Well – that was Therapeutic. These days it helps that I sound these things out somewhere.
