On Wed, Feb 4, 2015 at 5:58 AM, Rich Bowen <rbo...@rcbowen.com> wrote: > On 02/04/2015 03:42 AM, Pierre Smits wrote: >> >> We are discussing again, as it seems to me, what the purpose of the >> Apachecon is based on talks submitted. And why is that? >> >> It appears, at least to me as I have seen the discussions before, that the >> ASF misses a clear strategy regarding the event, why we do it and what the >> intended audience is. This should be fixed prior to opening the process >> for >> the next event (Apachecon EU 2015), because then it will be easier to >> communicate, easier to invite speakers (and yes, we should do that), and >> get everybody on board regarding helping out. >> >> Is the event to be considered as the bi-annual party for ourselves, where >> we can all (all the presenters) claim how good we (as the individual) are >> with the products of the various projects? Is it an promotion and >> networking event? Or is it something that sits somewhere in the middle? >> And >> how does it fit with the strategy and other activities of the ASF Offices >> and Projects? > > > The conference exists to build Apache community, intra- and inter-project. > Other goals have historically orbited that, as Nick describes - fundraising > (in the early years), marketing of the ASF, user education (still an > important goal). But primarily, in my mind, it exists as a way to build > community.
That's how I've always looked at it. In a way, you can look at it as yet another service we provide to our communities. Just like we provide SVN, git or JIRA. IOW, this is a chance for even the smallest communities to have something like a summit for its members. Given how many projects we host, there's also a non-trivial residual benefit for inter-project collaboration to be sparked. I think this is an area where we can do better. For example, I would love to have some kind of an event at the ApacheCON that would encourage as many folks as possible to learn about various ASF projects. I have some ideas around running a kind of lighting talks/reading group where each participant is randomly given an ASF project and is required to present on it in 5 minutes or something. Thanks, Roman.
