Ambassadors/Meetings/2006-05-04

Fedora Ambassadors Meeting Minutes 2006-05-04

Participants

• lxmaier: AlexMaier
• MrTom: ThomasCanniot
• ChitleshGoorah: ChitleshGoorah
• FrancescoUgolini: FrancescoUgolini
• ke4qqq: DavidNalley
• FrancescoUgolini: FrancescoUgolini
• CyberSpy: LeeJoseph
• McGiwer: PawelSadowski
• drpixel: ?
• mspevack: MaxSpevack
• gomix: ?
• rMenezes: RodrigoMenezes
• SynTed: TheodorosSynodinos

Regrets

• ThomasChung
• GeroldKassube
• FlorianBrand
• KarlieRobinson

Transcript

• File:Ambassadors Meetings 2006(2d)05(2d)04_fedora-ambassadors-2006-05-04.txt

Summary

• Ambassadors Schedule: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Ambassadors/Schedule
• Fedora Events: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FedoraEvents

Famsco Update

• lxmaier reports
• a meeting took place on monday
• you can see the transcript here: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Ambassadors/SteeringCommittee/Meetings/2006-05-01
• you can see next meeting's agenda here: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Ambassadors/SteeringCommittee/Meetings
• a few highlights from the meeting:
• mspevack reports
• so we've been shipping DVDs all over the world the last month or two and it's *incredibly* expensive and not a very good method of spending our money
• we are looking into different alternative methods to help our ambassadors out with goods and money
• mspevack will write up a proposal for how to handle the distribution
• tchung reports
• Since last report, we have 6 more new members
• See http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Projects/WeeklyReports/2006-04-24
• As of 2006-04-30, we have 65 approved members (approved=signed CLA and have a Fedora account)
• lxmaier: do you want to expand on the spending calamity?
• mspevack:
• sure -- bottom line is that we've been slowly getting ourselves sucked into the business of global distribution
• mailing DVDs, shirts, etc from Raleigh all over the world
• it's just an inefficient use of money
• better use of money is to sponsor shows, and build up an infrastructure
• that allows people worldwide to make use of local production capability to produce DVDs, etc
• we've got a store set up here in the US that is about to go live, which allows people to order fedora stuff, and the shipping (within the US) is reasonably priced.
• A project for the next couple of months (we're gonna have Jack Aboutboul work on it) is figuring out how to replicate that kind of a setup internationally
• if we can get that in place, then the local ambassadors/folks putting on a small to mid-size show don't have to figure out how to get 100 DVDs made
• they can just order them from somewhere that's reasonably close by and not get killed on shipping
• so that's the grand vision -- and we need to try to make it happen
• lxmaier: mspevack: could you please update the budget table in the wiki with the spending, so all of the ambassadors can see what you're talking about
• MrTom: but ambassadors would have to *pay* for ordering stuffs wouldn't they ?
• mspevack: there's a few different scenarios:
• 1: just like it is now
• people request money for an event, some amount of money is given
• they spend that money as they see fit, and file a report with expenses, how it was spent, the gain, etc.
• and they are reimbursed
• 2: people want to do *even more* than the money that FAMSCO can provide directly
• so, people take the money that famsco is offering, but they also get even more stuff on their own, and then re-sell it at the event (for a small cost, think of it as a Fedora

Suggested Retail Price) and use those funds to recoup costs

• you could therefore have an event that is entirely self-sufficient
• but you don't have to do it that way if you don't want to
• it just increases the number of options for ambassadors and event organizers in the way they handle things
• MrTom: about the store you are talking about... will it be a public store? if yes, what would happen if the store run out of DVDs and that an important event will not be able to receive any dvds?
• mspevack:
• gregdek knows more, but yes, it will be a public store.
• They're going to be stocking thousands of DVDs, and if we see the numbers getting low, then we will make sure they make more
• but you don't want to make too many, or else FC6 comes out and all of a sudden you have a bunch of old discs that no one wants :_)
• McGiwer: i'm not sure if paying for the stuff is a good idea. i think it would be much better if the stuff at an event was given for free
• mspevack:
• Like I said, first of all, anyone who runs an event is always able to give stuff away for free
• BUT if someone *wants* to charge a small price for some things in order to recoup some costs, then that option will be made available
• and FAMSCO needs to set some guidelines around that to your other point
• FAMSCO is *not* saying that it will no longer contribute budget towards events
• what we are saying is that we're developing a system that hopefully will make it easier for events to happen,
• and allow them to happen at a lower cost, and with less direct intervention from famsco
• because that's a much more globally scalable solution
• ChitleshGoorah: It wouldb nice to have priority list for ambassadors who participates in order to prevent excesss of old cds on our stock
• McGiwer: i only want to comment the FAMSCO's decision: yeah, it indeed can be better than shipping the schwag all around the world, it will need just more personal commitment from the Ambassadors

Projects Reports

• FreeMedia
• lxmaier:
• tchung is not here to report, but my understanding is that we have a largish backlog
• however, we had a guy named Ryan join the Sponsored Media effort:
• Ryan's site has been added to Fedora Sponsored Media Vendors list
• http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Distribution/SponsoredMedia
• he has a little bit of a different approach, in his case, you can simply pay for him to ship the DVD to the next person on the free media list
• you do not need to buy a CD for yourself
• VideoContest
• lxmaier:
• Video contest is almost ready to launch
• we have the judges panel, and we have the artwork done, waiting for approval from Red Hat brand
• once this is finished, we will rock-and-roll!
• Kadischi
• ChitleshGoorah:
• the Kadischi project as I said before on
• http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Projects/WeeklyReports/2006-04-17
• Jeremy has rewrote kadischi to fix bugs
• and soon we might expect an official livecd from Fedora as from Fedora 6T1
• nman64:
• Darko has expressed interest in returning to work on Kadischi this summer, possibly with another SoC project.

FedoraEvents

• May 3-6, 2006 LinuxTag Wiesbaden, Germany
• lxmaier: GeroldKa and BruderTux are both at the event at the moment
• ChitleshGoorah:
• I'll join the others on saturday
• I have proposed gerold to give me the fedora banners in the end for my event in Strasbourg next month just to save expenses
• May 12-14, 2006 ENSOL João Pessoa, Brazil
• rMenezes:
• Hugo Cisneiros is in Joao Pessoa right now
• he has a presentation and a booth
• I have some e-mails from him that I can sent to the list tomorrow
• lxmaier: cool, please build a wiki page with a report if you can, rMenezes
• May 20, 2006 Multimedia Day Cambrai, France
• MrTom:
• i will receive my brand new laptop in few days, it will help me a lot presenting the distro!
• About schwags, gregdek_gone told me he would send me some, I sent him an e-mail but I had no answer
• lxmaier: mspevack: do you know anything about schwag for MrTom?
• June 9-10, 2006 CarolinaCon Raleigh, NC USA
• CyberSpy:
• Everything is good to go, just need schwag or a link to whear I can purchas schwag
• I'll be speaking about Fedora and OSS at 2pm on Sat Jun 10... (lost connection)
• lxmaier: let's proceed and CyberSpy will report on the list and on the wiki
• ke4qqq: CarolinaCon (just for a general review) is mainly security related, tho heavily leaning towards OSS and *nix in general.
• June 23-25, 2006 Journée du Libre 4 Strasbourg, France
• ChitleshGoorah:
• I'm looking forward for Fedora banners that is been used in LinuxTag
• and this event lacks sponsors
• June 23-30, 2006 Fedora, Friends and Fun Virginia Beach, VA USA
• BobJensen not present
• July 22-23, 2006 LUGRadio Live! 2006 Wolverhampton, UK
• JonFautley not present

Next Meeting

• See Ambassadors Meetings for the next meeting date and time.

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