On 28/09/15 12:54, martin f krafft wrote: > also sprach Martín Ferrari <tin...@debian.org> [2015-09-28 10:49 +0200]: >> It has been used, in situations where we felt that important parts >> of DebConf were at risk: budgetary decisions, sponsors >> relationships, volunteers motivation, and even some basic tenets >> of the conference were at stake. Every time this happened, it was >> because somebody from the local team acted on their own, >> overstepping other people's responsibilities, and without prior >> consultation. > > I contest this. At no time was anything about DebConf15 at risk. The > important stuff was all arranged before the current chairs even got > appointed or teams were formed.
Long-term relationships with sponsors were at risk when you authorised unilaterally an in-kind donation for a service that nobody had even mentioned before the conference started. Debconf goals were at risk when you wanted to allocate less money for sponsored food and accommodation in exchange for more fancy perks. Volunters participation and motivation was at risk when you overrode the already ongoing efforts to coordinate childcare, without even sending them an email to the people involved. A big part of the spirit of DebConf was at stake, with the possibility of alienating the Debian community, when you set up a for-pay workshop during DebCamp in the same venue, created a webpage for it, and only then decided it was a good idea to tell the team. Not that you sought agreement on this being good for DebConf, you just asked if it was OK to link the page from the main debconf website. Actually, we did not need to override decisions for these items. For some it was too late already (sponsorship already accepted, confusion and demotivation in childcare already added), for the others it was enough to speak up and spell out the problems with the approach you were taking. In any case, it is interesting how you say that because the main things for dc15 were arranged, there was no risk. The chairs care for much more than one DC cycle, we care about the next 1, 2, 5 debconfs, and for the volunteers making it happen. -- Martín Ferrari (Tincho) _______________________________________________ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
