[Ambassadors] NA Events Expectation Proposal

[David Nalley]

2009/3/21 Karsten Wade <kwade at redhat.com>:
> On Fri, Mar 20, 2009 at 05:25:32PM -0400, David Nalley wrote:
>>
>> So - if you are going to talk at a LUG meeting - consider showing up with pizza
>> If there's a BarCamp - consider having Fedora sponsor it - and make
>> sure you pitch a lot of Fedora/FLOSS/Linux talks.
>> If there is a conference we are going to have a presence at we should
>> be sponsoring it.
>
> I tend to agree, and in fact was stuck recently when asked if Fedora
> would sponsor LinuxFest Northwest.  The reason I didn't say yes was
> budget.  AFAICT, we don't have the money to fund getting people there,
> running a booth, and providing any sponsoring more than ... US$100?

So we talked this over in #f-a yesterday and looked around and found
several places we could cut money from to provide at least 500
dollars.
That said, I gotta admit, now that we are mass producing swag and
handling shipping separately I wonder what the $750 that we currently
have allocated is for. My understanding is that travel and lodging for
several people wasn't included in that budget. FAD is also supposed to
have a separate budget. I know based on our discussions that we were
waiting on Max's blessing.

>
> OTOH, I would argue that your approach is a good reason for Max to
> argue for more event budget overall.  While it is not in Red Hat's
> interest to sponsor a show they cannot get good sales leads from,
> Fedora's purpose is different.  We *do* get new participants and
> contributors at every show we attend (which are equivalent to
> 'qualified sales leads' for Fedora!), and would obviously get more
> value if we get the brand out there as a sponsor and organizer.

I'd actually argue that it's a good idea for RH to show up even at
community events, but that's a separate issue.
That said - I think the reason to contribute is similar to why we
encourage upstream development. Contributing to a conference provides
more resources to put on a better conference which in time attracts
additional attendees which gives us additional people to talk to to
garner users and contributors. Yes we need to make the argument to our
benefactor.

Max: I'd really like to hear your opinions here as the keeper of the purse.



>
> At this point, FAmNA needs to decide to funnel money in to
> sponsorship, which will probably reduce the overall number of events
> we can do this year.

I really think we have been introducing efficiencies into things that
should let us get far more accomplished with the same money. For
instance we spent 1/3 per piece of media for F10 than F9. We are
ordering swag in bulk and dealing with distribution on our own rather
than having event owners deal with getting swag and thus paying far
more for it.