Re: PGCon 2008 RFP

On Mon, Jan 5, 2009 at 4:10 PM, Chris Browne <cbbrowne(at)acm(dot)org> wrote:

> gmr(at)myyearbook(dot)com ("Gavin M. Roy") writes:
> > Personally, the only argument I see for standardization is it makes
> > the conference feel more professional. Having been to a fair
> > amount of conferences, I'm more impressed by the ones that put an
> > emphasis on the polish of the event, matching collateral materials
> > (logos, signage, > etc). Obviously content is king, but second to
> > content is how the content is conveyed, the design image of a
> > conference.
>
> I'll suggest different "prime value" to this sort of
> standardization...
>
> Standardizing formats means that you *might* more readily be able to
> produce a single, somewhat-uniform-looking, document combining all the
> material together.
>
> Conference proceedings are the more typical example of attempts to
> "standardize format;" having common format means that they can publish
> *THAT* as a "book" and not have it look like a dog's breakfast.

Agreed and I think that was the point of the OP.

> The PostgreSQL-related conferences aren't formal enough for that sort
> of imposition to seem at all reasonable. We're generally not in the
> sort of academic "publish-or-perish" peril that would force the
> presenters to go to that particular sort of effort.

I don't think anyone but the people objecting to having such collateral
material are suggesting imposing it on anyone. I think the OP was vague,
but he did not say he wanted to force it on people, just soliciting opinions
on having such standard materials.

I would suggest that, for our purposes, there is a value in NOT
> attempting standardization, namely that we haven't anything resembling
> the degree of infrastructure required to support production of a
> sufficiently "all-encompassing" standardized format.

I don't think it's as big of an effort as it's being made out to be.

We don't (yet ;-)) have in-place upgrades beteween versions; I'd
> *much* rather that "systematizing efforts" went into that.

I do too ;-)

> If we had someone around that was a graphic arts "guru" who wanted to
> put together some nice looking PowerPoint/Keynote/OOImpress templates,
> I don't imagine anyone would say "Don't do it!" But I don't think
> it's worth looking *hard* for that, or in trying to impose burdens
> surrounding this on presenters.

Agreed

> I don't believe that a lack of "collateral matching" is our largest
> problem :-).

For clarity I don't think anyone thinks it's a problem. I think the
suggestion was it has the potential to make the conference better. I know
others don't agree. I don't think we need to bike-shed this to death. It
was a suggestion that a minority of people who have participated in the
discussion agreed with. If one of us feels strongly about it, we'll step
up. There's no need for the name calling and rude behavior that was in
#postgresql with regard to this.

Gavin