New subject: [Foss4ga.discuss] Questions to FOSS4G-Asia 2018/2019 bidding teams

5 Aug 2017


      Dear Rangajeewa-san, Iwasaki-san and Sanghee-san,
Thanks for submitting your bids for FOSS4G-Asia 2018/2019
I send you the list of questions that the selection committee
requests to be answered. The teams to which the questions
are addressed is shown at the end of each question.
Please go through the questions and answer in
as much detail as possible. There are 16 questions in
total.
Please send me (venka.osgeo@gmail.com) a PDF containing questions and 
answers before 11 August, 2017 midnight (UTC).
https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?year=2017&month=8&...
I request you to kindly adhere to the above deadline for submitting
your answers.
1. About how much is the expected cost for the venue (rental cost,
    eventually additional expenses like insurance, security, etc.)?
    *(-> Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka)*
2. Very often the number of local attendants is a lot higher than
    international visitors.
    How many attendants from your country do you expect (worst case and
    optimistic estimation)?
    *(-> Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka)*
3. How much would be the maximum number of attendants you could manage?
    Is there a minimum number of attendants, when the event would cause
    financial problems?
    *(-> Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka)*
4. Do you have a rough proposal for conference admission (ie. ticket
    types and costs, handling of free tickets, cost for gala dinner,
    etc.)?
    If costs are unknown yet (which is probably the case), what costs do
    you aim for.
   *(-> Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka)*
5. Do you see difficulties with receiving Visa documents for foreign
    visitors?
    *(-> Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka)*
6. Does your venue and workshop facilities provide good access to
    internet, especially for foreigners, that cannot use mobile internet?
    *(-> Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka)*
7. Your proposal has 2 "core" days for presentations. FOSS4G Europe for
    example usually has 3 presentation days.
    For an international conference, where international visitors usually
    spend significant time traveling, a longer event with a larger
    presentation program may be more attractive. It will also allow to
    accept more talk submissions and thus more participation.
    Have you considered an additional day for presentations? Would it be
    possible?
    *(-> Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka)*
8. How many delegates from your local community
     participated in the last FOSS4G-Asia 2017 event
     *(-> Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka)*
9. Have you already contacted some local chapters
     in Asia to garner their support for the event
     *(-> Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka)*
10. Are you planning a special price for students and
      participants for low-income countries?
      *(-> Japan, Korea, Sri Lanka)*
11. In your proposal the main conference days are only weekdays.
    Do you think this will affect participation of local community
    members, that cannot get their employer's permission to attend
    the conference.
    *(-> Korea, Japan)*
12. Your conference dates are just two days on a weekend (Sat./Sun.).
    Are the university facilities only available on the weekend?
    Do you plan to organize another day with workshops?
    Weekend events can have an influence on participants sent by their
    employer. Do you see an issue with local business visitors to
    attend a weekend event?
    *(-> Sri Lanka)*
13. The main conference is proposed to be held on a weekend
     (Sat = 8th Dec/Sun = 9th Dec) with the social event on a Monday.
     What is the rational for having the conference over the weekend?
     Availability of conference room?
     *(-> Sri Lanka)*
14. Obviously one big concern with your bid (compared to the Korean or
     Japanese bid) is the quality of the available facilities for this
      event. You will have to convince us that the quality of your
      facilities is sufficient to host this event successfully. What is
      the current availability and speed of WiFi at the proposed
      location? Are there sufficient power outlets for attendees to use
      their laptops (-> improptu hackfest). How frequent are electric
      black-outs. What is the quality of the conference rooms. Could you
      include a few pictures of the rooms we would likely be in? How
      about the air conditioning in the rooms. It is my understanding
      that temperature around 30 degrees or sometimes even higher can be
      expected.
      *(-> Sri Lanka)*
15. Why is your document named: "(Seoul)FOSS4G_Asia_2019_Proposal.pdf"?
     Putting brackets into a file name is bad practice and makes me
     wonder whether that means we can also expect other poor choices
     during the conference (tiny names on badges, errors in the printed
     conference program, lack of power outlets, complicated WiFi
     registration process).
     *(-> Korea)*
16. Why is your document named: "FOSS4G_ASIA2017_LoI_Tsukuba.pdf"?
    Why 2017? You propose to host a conference in 2018. This miss-naming
    of the "Letter of Intent" makes me wonder whether that means we can
    also expect other poor choices during the conference (tiny names on
    badges, errors in the printed conference program, lack of power
    outlets, complicated WiFi registration process).
    *(-> Japan)*
Best
Venka