[okfn-discuss] Open Knowledge Festival 2015 - Location Thoughts

[Abbas Mahmood]

Hi Rufus,

I think that OKFest shouldn't be held in Europe simply because that's
where most of your staff are based. If OKF sees itself as a global
organisation, then OKFest could be used as an opportunity to raise
awareness about the OKF mission in lesser known regions, such as
Africa and the Middle East. I believe that the publicity that can come
out of OKFest would raise awareness and potentially lead to the
increased formation of Local Groups/Ambassadors in these regions.

Regards
Abbas
(Former Ambassador)

On 10/8/14, Rufus Pollock <rufus.pollock at okfn.org> wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> Open Knowledge Festival 2014 in Berlin this year was fantastic and we plan
> to run an Open Knowledge Festival 2015 next year.
>
> I’m writing as part of what will be an ongoing process to solicit input re
> Open Knowledge Festival 2015. Today's email focuses, at this point, on a
> key first step, namely the location - I emphasize that this is just the
> first of many things to discuss re the Festival but this is the first
> priority as we need to sort out the location (and relatedly the date) asap.
> I will also take a moment to provide a bit of essential background for a
> decision about location.
>
> Background
>
> First, some background: As we said last year (2013),  we have made some
> changes about how we do OKFestivals and OKCons:
>
> A. Primary organizing responsibility for Open Knowledge Festival will fall
> on Open Knowledge “International” (rather than being a local chapter) .
> Open Knowledge International will, of course, always work with all local
> groups and the broader community to include them in the event, especially
> in programming.
>
> B. Open Knowledge Festival will likely not move around that much, at least
> for the foreseeable future (it will likely stay located in one (or at most
> 2) places)
>
> C. OKCons (Open Knowledge Conferences) can be organized locally and
> regionally by any local groups who want to do so. Open Knowledge encourages
> local community-organized OKCons and Open Knowledge International can
> provide some event guidance and cross-promotion.
>
> Why make these changes?
>
>
>    -
>
>    By creating these distinct options local groups are encouraged  free to
>    go run events without depending on Open Knowledge “International” (and
> Open
>    Knowledge International will happily support and promote all such event
>    activities). Meanwhile Open Knowledge International has primary
>    responsibility for coordinating a great Open Knowledge Festival.
>    -
>
>    Its a huge amount of work to put on an Open Knowledge Festival and
>    involves significant financial commitment as well as dedicated staff and
>    resources. Both 2012 and 2013 events were amazing but took a huge amount
>    from the partner local group and also involved significant risk for all
>    parties (in terms of up-front financial commitments etc).
>    -
>
>    These events whilst awesome have so far almost never broken even on a
>    full-cost basis - they generally make a small-ish loss (and there’s
>    always the risk of a big loss since you have to make up-front
> commitments
>    for venue, organizing etc and revenues in terms of tickets etc come
> later).
>    As a smallish non-profit, this is a big deal for Open Knowledge
>    International but it is potentially an even bigger deal for a local
> group
>    (especially when they commit a lot of time and energy). At the same time
> we
>    plan to continue the approach whereby Open Knowledge Festival was a
>    great convenor of many communities. Many friends and partners hosted
>    side-events or united their community at the event. We will make every
>    attempt diversify these events with friends and partners in a similar
> way
>    in the future.
>    -
>
>    Running the event in the same place can significantly reduce
>    organizational and other expenses (since you can reuse learning and
>    experience from previous years). It also may make it easier to
> fund-raise
>    since you have pre-existing contacts.
>
>
> The Specific Issue
>
> This brings me to today’s specific issue: thinking about the location of
> Open Knowledge Festival 2015?
>
> At present, the two likely options are London or Berlin based on:
>
> A. the location of the coordinating and organizing team (who are primarily
> Europe based at the moment)
>
> B. the strong desire to run the event somewhere we’ve run major events
> before (as above: this helps us build on previous learning and experience,
> saves on logistical planning and reduces risk in a big way). This is
> similar to other large open events such as OSCon or MozFest.
>
> However,  it would be fantastic to hear people’s thoughts both on this idea
> and on the criteria by which we should determine location (these could be
> especially relevant if at some point in the future we want to consider
> relocating or moving the Festival around). I also emphasize that this is
> just the first of many things to discuss regarding Open Knowledge Festival,
> and as always, we hope all of the community will get heavily involved
> especially in programme curation. Also by confirming the venue and doing it
> somewhere that is cost-effective we can spend more time and energy on
> bringing as many of the community to the event as possible.
>
> The kinds of criteria I can imagine at the moment are (in no specific
> order):
>
>
>    -
>
>    Cost /ease of travel to the location from around the world (e.g. are you
>    at or near a large international hub airport)
>    -
>
>    Complexity and cost for organizers / coordinators (e.g. organizing an
>    event in a new location is more complex than doing in previous location.
>    Organizing with 4 lead organizers is more complex than with two or one)
>    -
>
>    Venue options and costs (this is all-in costs - often a venue may be
>    cheap or even “free” but has large number of hidden extra costs - or
>    requires the organizers to take care of setup and takedown etc)
>    -
>
>    Living costs at the location (e.g. hotels, food etc)
>    -
>
>    Complexity of travel arrangements for participants (e.g. how hard is it
>    to get visas- this is extra important for organizing team as they will
>    often have to support this process)
>    -
>
>    Local partnership opportunities
>    -
>
>    Local fund-raising opportunities
>    -
>
>    Financial complexity of operation (e.g. do you need a local fiscal
>    partner/sponsor and how complex are the local tax and legislation)
>
>
> Would be great to get folks’ thoughts both on additional items not included
> and any thoughts on this list as well as generally.
>
> Regards,
>
> Rufus
>