[osol-mktg] OpenSolaris Developers Conf
Laura Ramsey
Laura.Ramsey at sun.com
Fri Aug 5 10:52:36 PDT 2005
Glenn, Keith, Rich, Jim and Jorg:
Great comments all. You have all touched on the same questions in my mind.
This is A LONG email--here's what is covered for readers on the go:
--Update-- on conference development--SunW is interested and looking
into it...
--Hot Seat--Answers to Keith's questions--They are Good ones (both the
questions and answers)
--Next Steps--A preview into what roles and time commitment necessary
for building the RIGHT conference!
Here we go!
LKR
x66750
--------------------------------------------------
--UPDATE--
==========
After the last week of pinging around other "stakeholders" in a
Developer Conference hosted by Sun, I've learned a few more things:
1--
Corporate marketing (Let's refer to this group as SunW --W stands for
Wallet in this case!) is actively discussing hosting a user conference
in the near term (before JavaOne 2006) . Stakeholders are of course the
Solaris Marketing Team, the Sun Developer Network team (tools, portions
of Open Source program office --Jini, JXTA, GlassFish) and the
OpenSolaris team. I am joining this effort to ensure OpenSolaris has
outstanding visibility and contribution to both the design of such a
conference and participation if it should occur. Interesting to note,
these discussions are held periodically and decision for a SunW level
conference is not always the result--Kinda like standards efforts at
OASIS...(boo, bad joke, sorry) This would be the Extravaganza approach
(User/Business) and we could host the hard core Developer track within
this setting.
2--
I think we're all orbitting around the idea of Developer, lots of
planning sessions, not too many signs...etc. vs. the Extravaganza
approach...note: that's the approach that SunW would go for. Interesting
to note that if we build the content for option 2, then we have our
stuff together and can roll regardless of SunW's plans...which is a
great way to go. See "next steps" below....
--HOT SEAT--
===========
So, earlier on the thread Keith asked excellent questions--you'll be
interested in the answers because it notes the sheer numbers and power
behind the SunW "Machine", and it begins to answer the mystery of "why
would marketing care?"...
Regarding the Bleeding edge approach--combining Solaris development and
opensolaris content--extending into User base...Keith asks..
Q: "On what have you based your estimate of 2500-5000 participants? Even
if admission were free, it seems unlikely that 40% or more of the
people who've registered would spend the travel money needed to
attend. This is especially true given that the number of people who
have actually contributed code or even posted to mailing lists is a
small fraction of that number."
A: I was surprised too. And alittle worried that we'd have big expectations. But, Funny enough, these estimates are based on the number of the attendees at the SunNetWork conference in September of 2002 --those registerants that checked off the boxes for Solaris developer/adminstration as their field of interest. Having said that, I'd probably take out 20% because SunNetwork had alot of Oracle and BEA marketing dollars invested that this go around might not be there.
Also, Sun's first Solaris developer conference in 1991 had 2,300 attendees. We had to turn away folks at the door because the Fairmont in SJ was busting at the seams. My sense is that if we could rally that many in 1991, we can probably match those numbers today. HOWEVER, Glenn's comments are not going unheard--and I agree. If we cut the crowd in half (600-1,200) we can have a more focused agenda.
(COMMS Chaos Theory 2--content focus is diluted by diversity of topics as dictated by number of attendees)
Regarding the Pure Oxygen developer conf OpenMic approach--Keith asks....
Q: "I'd be interested to know whether your organisation (ed: marketing) would have any
interest in (2a) at all, since it's fundamentally an engineering forum
and would offer little in the way of marketing opportunities (all the
attendees would be existing contributors)."
A: After attending OSCON, I have more interest in this format than ever. From a community building standpoint, it would be outstanding--and facilitating community building and the care and communication to the community is one of the OSMarketing team's main duties. So, having this targetted approach, as long as it is interesting to the OpenSolaris developer community, We want it.
One thing I like about the Pure Oxygen approach is that you guys will get some really solid inbound information from the participants--rather than the group just "talking to" attendees like we did at OSCON, we might even get some folks Giving US something! That would be awesome.
The other thing I like about this approach is--if we plan it, we can execute WITH OR WITHOUT SUNW contribution, either as a track in their extravaganza if that's the way things evolve, or if they decide they don't want to do a big conference, we can go it alone. Either way we win.
(COMMS Chaos Theory 6--He who has the most compelling content wins)
---NEXT STEPS--
===============
1--Continued discussion and Lively Debate on content/venue/format
2--Continued updates (I'll keep them shorter in the future)
3--Core Team formation. It's time to get together a core team of folks who can advise and assist in this effort. Volunteers would be great. Here's the roles we'll need filled:
1--CONTENT CHAIR
-review of presentation abstract submissions and Selection
-review of proceedings materials for distribution at conference
--Liason to engineering content/efforts of Solaris, BigAdmin, SDN etc...
2--PROMOTION/COMMUNICATION CHAIR--(Claire Giordano)
-Classic marketing activities to promote the show (ads, etc)
-Shot glasses with blue sparks, Beer, Pizza
-Signage, look and feel and production of proceedings
-Liason to SunW promotion/communication efforts w/ Solaris, Open source Programs, corporate
3--LOGISTICS CHAIR--(Likely a SunW representative here--LKR looking into it)
4--WEBSITE CHAIR--(TBD)
-the enduring collection of the proceedings on the web--
-Packaging the content for Int'l Roadshow throughout the fall--
In the beginning, the time commitment will be about 1 hour a week--to read updates (sorry this one is so damned long) and to comment and start collecting ideas for content.
Time commitment will really begin to become heavy once we have submissions to review, and promotions to start up. Time commitment will be not quite as heavy as the launch, but pretty heavy (20 hours a week for some, 60 hours for others!)
Any thoughts?
LKR
Glynn Foster wrote:
>Heya,
>
>
>
>>Our challenge will be to keep the format in line with You guy's (bad
>>grammar!) line of thought, or that fantastic Linux agenda Glynn
>>forwarded around...and resisting the overwhelming urge to reincarnate
>>the SunNetWork extravaganza.
>>
>>
>
>So having read some of the replies, Keith basically highlights the
>potential conflict of interest in any approach taken -
>
> o Developer - lots of planning sessions, few if any talks
> and keynotes. Useful for developers getting their job
> done and contributing to OpenSolaris.org
>
> Could potentially expand to anyone involved in opensolaris.org
> - discussions about how to marketing opensolaris.org, various
> communities [smf, tools, desktop, xorg, ...] each having
> mini-sections.
>
> vs
>
> o User/Business - This is probably your extravaganza marketing
> conference. A really good opportunity to have some highly
> technical *user* focused talks, highlighting the technology
> involved
>
>You generally have to get this right, and separate the two, so the
>developers can't get distracted and actually get some useful stuff
>discussed, rather than the usual 'Why can't the default shell be bash?'
>type of arguments ;)
>
>
>
>>Couple of interesting ways to go--what's your reaction?
>>
>>1--Solaris/OpenSolaris Developer Conference--BLEEDING EDGE Solaris
>>based technologies from developers, venue aimed at the higher end
>>advanced developer, focus on Solaris / OpenSolaris development issues.
>>2-3-days--keynotes at a minimum...Tutorials, hands on sessions, and BoFs
>>would be the sweetspot of the agenda. (Like Glynn's example from
>>australia...so cool!) With this scope, we could expect to draw at least
>>2,500 attendees, and if we opened the event up to sponsorships and
>>coordinated promotions, we could get as many as 5,000. Registration
>>fees would be minimal (Cost of event/production)
>>
>>
>
>This is probably my preference. But cut down your numbers by more than
>half and we're probably in the right direction. Depends on the above
>decision - developer or user/business? or both? If both, then you want a
>very, very clear separation of the conference - with the developers
>being able to do their thing for the first day or two alone :)
>
>
>
>>1a--Hosting the above format as a feature track at JavaOne, or ETech, or
>>OSCON (Note--that means waiting a long time to hold this event!)
>>
>>
>
>Bleh - it makes no sense to hold this at JavaOne. Completely unrelated.
>I don't know about ETech, but OSCON seems big enough already.
>
>
>
>>2--"Open Mic" Developer Conference--venue aimed at Open Source
>>developers only. Showcase all Sun's open source projects, featuring
>>OpenSolaris and Solaris development issues. 2-days--keynotes at a
>>minimum...tutorials, hands on sessions and BoFs would be sweetspot of
>>the agenda. (Like Glynn's example from australia...) With this scope, we
>>could probably expect to draw 1,500 attendees, and if we opened the
>>event up to sponsorships and coordinated promotions, we could get as
>>many as 2,000. NOTE--THIS COULD BE A FREE EVENT TO BE REALLY COMPELLING!
>>
>>
>
>Then it probably wouldn't be a developers conference anymore. By
>developer, I mean the people actually contributing kernel code. It would
>be a more user/developer conference if that makes any sense at all :/
>
>
>
>>2a--hosting the above format as a Solaris kernel "pure oxygen" approach
>>like Jim has suggested (No Signs, lots of code!)
>>
>>
>
>That's probably something that's more useful to talk about right now, or
>at least coming up with a conference plan that includes a very much sand
>boxed kernel dev pre-conference session.
>
>
>
>>Timing: Early March 2006 (so we don't collide with JavaOne juggernaut...)
>>
>>
>
>Sounds rocking to me ;)
>
>
>Glynn
>
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>
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