On Wed, Feb 4, 2015, at 09:07 AM, Niclas Hedhman wrote: > Regarding "commercial" or "advertising" presentations; Why should we > reject > these outright? Why not allocate a track for corporations to present > whatever they like, in 20, 30 or 60 min blocks? And auction out those > slots. Either there is a market, or there is not... And/or combine them > with on-site sponsorship programs, of booths, give-aways and so on. > Stallman wouldn't do this, but we are said to be business-friendly, are > we not?
Not sure that allowing businesses to buy slots to run "advertising" presentations is a good practice for ApacheCon, the attendees, or the businesses that might purchase the slots. We don't want to program "commercials" not because we're anti-business, but because most attendees show little to no interest in attending a commercial. So if we sell a track of product pitches, we risk annoying the ApacheCon attendees *and* disappointing the vendors who will inevitably be surprised when their presentations are not well received. It is possible to do a useful, well-received talk that also promotes your company/project - it just requires some additional thought and preparation to make sure you are presenting what the audience is interested in rather than just what your marketing department thinks they should think/say about the company/product/project. Best, jzb -- Joe Brockmeier j...@zonker.net Twitter: @jzb http://www.dissociatedpress.net/
