[Showme-devel] Three things to note please

Mon Sep 14 16:56:25 UTC 2015

Hi Kris

My sentiments are perfectly aligned with yours. I am trying to get the
greater team on board with this early, as they get anxious if they perceive
things jumped on them or done behind their back.

I see the components of this competition as 'pre-competitive': the
ShowMeBox is a Debian thing and other sponsors can join in, but I also
absolutely agree that with the effort involved, we can realistically only
do one competition/outreach initiative.

So, DebConf team, (also please see thread below):
1. How long would we need to decide yes, we are on board, or no?
2. What more information do we need to make this decision?
3. Can I give a deadline of mid-October to bikeshed about this?
4. In my mind it is a huge plus, aside from the benefits that Jonas and
Kris already mentioned, that we have two long-time Debian people
driving this, not to mention the rest of the team. I think this initiative
is really special. At the same time, I don't want the wider team to feel
rushed or... Well, I don't want to piss anyone off, basically.

Best regards
Bernelle

On Monday, September 14, 2015, Kristoffer Rose <krisrose at debian.org> wrote:

> Dear Bernelle,
>
> In terms of feedback, I can say that what has gotten my colleagues inside
> Two Sigma excited about sponsoring this is that we can demonstrate that it
> is possible in local communities in Africa to do data analysis of locally
> available data, and in this way promote global awareness that data analysis
> is an important field of study that everyone can pursue. (And the best can
> even win a prize!)
>
> For Two Sigma it is an added incentive that we can promote that we
> contributed to this being possible by releasing Beaker into open source, so
> I would like the project to use Beaker if possible, however, note that Two
> Sigma does this by making sure Beaker is *in* debian and thus widely
> available, not through a custom install or product giveaway or something.
> (So the "Beaker is a product of Kris' company" remark is not really fair.)
>
> Two Sigma is not per se excited about the hardware: that is the means to
> make the competition as wide as possible even for people who do not have
> equipment (because the cost per participant team can be kept at $50-$80). I
> hope that we can persuade Two Sigma to sponsor several hundreds of these
> (and that the Cape Town organization will help set up distribution channels
> for them). This makes this project rather unique: I do not see any of your
> other "hardware sponsorships" being that broad.
>
> Finally, I think you'll need to think a bit harder on how many
> competitions involving students you want: I fear that the interest in
> sponsoring and providing infrastructure for a competition as broad as we
> are proposing will dwindle if you try to position it as "one in several
> competitions"...especially because, excuse my directness, the likely
> outcome of the others will be a handful of tablets that won't really make a
> competition and probably will not really promote debian.
>
> I know it is early and that brainstorming and generalization is fun but do
> recognize a special opportunity when you get it: Full funding of ShowMeBox
> would involve travel ("give a multi-day data analysis class in January in
> Cape Town to the people who will distribute the hardware and teach the
> students how to do data analysis with it") as well as the final equipment
> ("build 300 computers fully installed with debian data analysis pure blend
> and some network access mechanism") and distribution ("send out people with
> knowledge to spend a half day explaining the equipment at each school"). So
> this *needs* local partners, and is quite unlike anything you can solicit
> from other sponsors, in my estimation...
>
> Finally, full disclaimer: at this point Two Sigma is funding contributing
> Beaker into Debian, but Two Sigma has not yet decided to fund the actual
> full competition: that is a proposal I will bring them in October. Please
> make it easy for me to say "the DebConf organization is on board" in a way
> that does not feel like a vacuous statement (like "we support all our
> sponsors!")!
>
> Best regards,
>   Kris
>
>
>
> On Mon, Sep 14, 2015 at 4:46 AM, Bernelle Verster <bernelle at indiebio.co.za
> <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','bernelle at indiebio.co.za');>> wrote:
>
>> Hi all
>>
>> A note from the debconf-team... can you give input on this, and if
>> there are concerns (I don't understand enough to know if this is a
>> concern or not), we should brainstorm it while this is at an early
>> stage.
>>
>> regards
>> B
>>
>>
>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>>
>> Am 10.09.2015 um 14:59 schrieb Bernelle Verster:
>>
>> 2. ShowMeBox - outreach project
>> The ShowMeBox is an idea hatched by two long time Debian people: Kris
>> Rose and Jonas Smedegaard [2]. This is not an orga-related thing, it
>> is organised independently, but I want to know if there are any
>> concerns or things to take into account. I told Kris we'll have a
>> meeting and start planning in earnest in October. [..] [2]
>> https://wiki.debian.org/ShowMeBox
>>
>> Beaker(notebook) is a product by two sigma, Kris' company.
>>
>> I'd not narrow it down to this product or type of visualization software.
>> A more general "call for challenges" (to sponsors) of what cool stuff
>> to do with a cubieboard (or other sponsored hardware) looks more open
>> and less of a two sigma thing to me.
>>
>> Other companies could then also post their challenges (FLOSS or even
>> Debian based only) and supply (their preferred) hardware in return.
>> This way you'd get more diverse exhibits for your Information Art
>> Exhibition and can provide the sponsoring opportunity to other
>> companies as well.
>> E.g. Intel could sponsor NUCs or Edisons and people could do great
>> stuff with them based on Debian and other FLOSS to fulfill the
>> challenge (e.g. to be allowed to keep the hardware and have the chance
>> to win a prize). Or HP could sponsor Slates and ask people to make
>> them innovative maths class tools.
>> As this is a sponsoring opportunity, I'd consult with Brian and the
>> sponsors team how that could fit into the overall perks available and
>> whether it means (e.g.) a minimum amount of hardware sponsored or
>> travel sponsored for the three top submissions or a financial
>> contribution to the overall budget is in order to participate in this.
>>
>>
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>
>
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