[OOTB-hive] The future of Alfresco Summit

[Richard Esplin]

Below are my understanding of the answers to your questions.

Ole, Gab, and I have been asked to meet with the Summit planning team next 
week to provide our input on what the developer and open source communities 
need to have a valuable experience at the conference. I will emphasize these 
points.

Thanks,

Richard

On Wednesday, May 06, 2015 21:09:59 Jeff Potts wrote:
> I agree with you that DevCon wasn't killed--we morphed it into Alfresco
> Summit a while back and added some business tracks and those were
> successful conferences overall with cross-over between the two, as you said.
> 
> I also understand the motivation behind having a single conference every
> year rather than two.
> 
> The questions I have about Alfresco Summit that may drive my opinion about
> what happens with BeeCon are:
>  * Will this year's summit include technical tracks? If so, how many?

This year's conference will include technical tracks. I have not yet received 
word of how many. I'm told that "it will be comparable to last year".

>  * Do sessions presented by users of Community Edition have an equal chance
> of being selected when compared to sessions presented by users of
> Enterprise Edition (all other things being equal)?

Technical talk selection will be handled in a similar manner to previous 
years, except that Ole and Martin will be chairing the selection committee. I 
would not characterize that as "an equal chance", but I expect we will 
continue to have users of Community Edition presenting.

>  * What will the cost of this year's summit be? (I'm thinking of its
> attractiveness to Community Edition users as well as a recognition that
> people from outside of the US may have a higher travel cost now that this
> is their only choice).

The cost has not yet been determined. I haven't even heard a rumor, so I can't 
speculate.

> 
> Jeff
> 
> On Tue, May 5, 2015 at 10:48 PM, Richard Esplin <richard.esplin at alfresco.com
> > wrote:
> > 
> > I think a community led Alfresco conference is a wonderful thing, and I
> > will
> > address that topic in a separate post.
> > 
> > I wanted to clarify the future of the Alfresco Summit. This is going to be
> > long, but I hope it is helpful.
> > 
> > Disclaimer: I am no longer on the Summit team and am no longer involved
> > with
> > determining its future. But I can share what I know about the reasoning
> > behind
> > our plans for 2015.
> > 
> > The Alfresco Devcons in 2010, 2011, and 2012 were wonderful events. They
> > had a
> > clear focus, were not too formal, and provided a lot of value.
> > 
> > In 2013 we tried to compliment the developer event with business tracks.
> > We
> > wanted to have a single global conference that provided something of value
> > for
> > all members of the Alfresco ecosystem. There was a lot of worry that it
> > would
> > dilute the developer tracks, but in the end I think we ended up with a
> > great
> > technical conference. We saw a lot of cross over between the "business
> > tracks"
> > and the "technical tracks", and we got overwhelming positive feedback from
> > attendees. The challenge is that the business tracks weren't as successful
> > as
> > we wanted.
> > 
> > In 2014 we tried again. Though again we didn't achieve our target audience
> > mix, we got a lot of positive feedback about the value the business
> > sessions
> > provided. We feel like those sessions are useful for all attendees. Also,
> > it
> > is much easier to attract sponsors to a conference that appeals to all
> > levels
> > of our client organizations. The conference would not be possible without
> > the
> > participation of the sponsors.
> > 
> > In 2015, we decided to change how we measure the success of the Summit. We
> > understand that the regional Alfresco Day events are much better at
> > attracting
> > prospective customers and leading to sales. It took us a while as a team
> > to
> > realize that we should not be applying those measures to Summit. I believe
> > that now we will be able to focus on the global event where we can come
> > together, learn from each other, and build relationships that will sustain
> > our
> > community for the coming year. I believe that we are moving back towards
> > the
> > goals that governed our planning for Devcon.
> > 
> > I am a little disappointed to hear people say that we killed Devcon. Our
> > intention is to preserve a solid technical conference, and we would
> > appreciate
> > specific feedback on how we can do that. We obviously can't implement
> > every
> > suggestion, but the conference has always been strongly shaped by feedback
> > from the attendees.
> > 
> > The strongest feedback we have received this year is a feeling of
> > disappointment that we are having a single global event . Honestly, I
> > think
> > the concern isn't that it is a single event, but that it is in the US.
> > 
> > Since I joined the planning team, every year I proposed that we hold a
> > single
> > global event. Running two conference is a very challenging thing. It
> > significantly increases the cost, it distracts key members of our
> > technical and
> > leadership teams for almost a month, and it divides our community. My
> > argument
> > was that most attendees do not come every year, and if we rotate between
> > the
> > continents then most people will continue attending. Having everyone in
> > one
> > place makes it easier to bring more Alfresco employees without having the
> > employees dominate the conference. It also helps that participants won't
> > be
> > away from their jobs for as long. And I look forward to having our US and
> > EMEA
> > community members interact more.
> > 
> > I was not involved in the selection of the venue for this year's Summit. I
> > was
> > disappointed to hear that we were starting a single global Summit in the
> > US
> > instead of in Europe. I know we looked at venues in multiple countries,
> > and I
> > think the selection came down to finding a hotel that could meet our needs
> > within our budget. It is a challenge to find a venue for our size of
> > conference: we are too big for most venues, but we are still too small for
> > many hotels to want to give us as much space as we need for presentation
> > rooms.
> > 
> > It is unfortunate that it took us so long to make a decision and announce
> > our
> > plans. Our conferences have been so dynamic that it is a challenge to plan
> > more than one year in advance; we want to see how the current year goes
> > before
> > making plans for the coming year. This year it also took us a long time to
> > make a decision about what the goals are for the conference. If our goal
> > is to
> > close deals, then we didn't not succeed and shouldn't have a Summit. But
> > everyone in the company recognizes the value in having a conference were
> > all
> > members of our community can assemble to interact with our team, learn
> > about
> > the product, and improve in their job functions. We had to make that
> > decision
> > before we could decide about one location or two.
> > 
> > I also feel that our team made a mistake in not communicating openly about
> > our
> > plans for the conference. I hope that this explanation serves to
> > ameliorate
> > that.
> > 
> > I hope to see you at Alfresco Summit this year, and at the Order of the
> > Bee
> > conference as well.
> > 
> > Cheers,
> > 
> > Richard
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