Re: On cooperative work [Was: Re: newbus' ivar's limitation..]

On 2 Aug 2012, at 17:46, Doug Barton wrote:

> Well that's a start. :) And where was this availability announced? If I
> missed it, that's on me. But providing remote access that you don't tell
> people about isn't really any better than not providing it at all.

It's not widely advertised, because we're likely to be able to support a limited number of remote participants (10 seems like the upper limit for the technology that we're looking at, and I wouldn't be surprised if it degrades before then).  As with all other things in the project, we welcome people who are willing to make an effort to engage.  We provide it when people ask, not spontaneously, because organising cameras and decent microphones requires effort on the bart of the organisers.  We only have one microphone available that will give good pickup over a whole room, for example, so we can't offer remote participation in parallel streams and we need to prioritise people who are willing to go to the massive effort of sending a one-line email saying 'I would like to make a contribution in this working group but am unable to attend'.  

The FreeBSD Foundation has also offered to fund new contributors who want to attend but are unable to afford to do so on their own.  In spite of the fact that I spent some effort encouraging people to apply for this, only one person actually did.  

We make a considerable effort to ensure that DevSummits are easy to attend for anyone who wants to contribute to the projects.  They are not intended as spectator events, but for anyone who wishes to engage with the community there are procedures in place for attending or participating remotely.  I have very little sympathy with people who complain that the community isn't engaging with them, without making the effort to engage with the community.  

David