OPEN 2020 - Postponed - Now going online

Oli SB Public Seen by 154

How should the online event work!?!? Please add your thoughts...

Graham Thu 12 Mar 2020 9:56AM

I think that we are in a fast moving situation with little clarity. What seems very likely is that the UK Govt will begin imposing tighter restrictions imminently, and we don't yet know what those restrictions will be or how far the Govt will go in terms of locking down movement and gatherings as time goes by. Consequently, alongside any health risk there are financial risks for people who may be planning travel and accommodation for the event, and no doubt there are financial risks for the organiser. In light of that I think it is reasonable to postpone the physical event.

Anthony Green Wed 18 Mar 2020 12:05PM

Singapore are much better prepared than the UK. They've learnt from the SARs outbreak and have an civil service that's more intertwined with their society with rapid response times in crises. The viral growth rate in Singapore has been much lower as a consequence.

Danyl Strype Wed 25 Mar 2020 4:24AM

After reassuring their participants that FOSSASIA would go on as normal, it ended up being a mostly online conference anyway. Singapore closed their borders the day after the conference finished. Given everything that's unfolded since you made the announcement, it's become crystal clear that you folks made the right call.

Vincenzo Giorgino Thu 12 Mar 2020 9:47AM

Hi,

it seems the best decision. It would be worth using those dates to experiment with new forms of participation without postponing to Autumn. How? I'm not the most suitable person but I will follow the most experienced. I think the organizer can assign slots of one hour to the various proposals - by the way how many are there so far? And each one is a self-managed and recorded webinar. Each proposer can then make a 10-minute summary that goes to the organizer of the overall event. All uploaded on a dedicated site.

Maybe we will move less and less in the future but we will be increasingly connected and not only to communicate but to produce resources for the commons (and not only for this socio-economic form)in this Age of Transition.

Best wishes, Vincenzo Giorgino

Steve Huckle Thu 12 Mar 2020 9:57AM

Corvid-19 or not - I'm not certain people flying to conferences from all over the world is sustainable anymore.

Simon Grant Thu 12 Mar 2020 10:28AM

This seems to me a great opportunity to be really co-creative in how we plan and host the online event. I suggest having some early and deep generative conversations around this. I know a bunch of people with Art of Hosting experience who could, I believe, contribute a lot to this conversation -- probably including some people who are already booked on.

Wardy Thu 12 Mar 2020 10:30AM

Oli, sucks that your excellent event can't be F2F. An online event can still be good. I cant go into it all now. But could talk in 12-hours if you are still up and about. If not, will drop some considered thoughts about Open Co-op rolling time zone plans. Be well.

[email protected] Thu 12 Mar 2020 10:57AM

I can appreciate this decision, especially as it is really unclear how the coming few months will develop - hard for people to make a travel commitment right now, even if it'd be for June. The statistics show that we're a week or so behind Italy (I'm talking here in Catalonia and Spain). People are starting voluntary confinement here in Catalunya and Spain, telework is highly recommended, schools are about to close in Barcelona. So we'd better practise our online relations. That said, it s***s that we can't meet F2F, which gives so much higher quality relations. How do we manage online beers? ;-P

As Simon says, it's an opportunity to be really co-creative to prepare such online event. One Free Software solution that comes to mind is Big Blue Button: https://bigbluebutton.org/ I haven't got direct personal experience with it, but I understand it is one of the better online video conference and learning environments, and it is around for years now. We should check the specs and best practices. Other options maybe NextCloud Talk. With CommonsCloud.coop we'll be testing that soon. Or solutions for Opensource MOOCS... It depends also on how massive the online gatherings are supposed to be, what team or resources there are to set up and run such stuff.

Danyl Strype Sun 5 Apr 2020 9:18AM

Anyone who wants to test Big Blue Button (with the Greenlight front-end) can try out the NZOSS instance discussed here: https://nzoss.nz/covid-19-response-help-those-working-home

Poll Created Thu 12 Mar 2020 11:18AM

Take this as an opportunity to broaden participation Closed Mon 1 Jun 2020 10:01AM

Maybe this will provide an opportunity for a greater number of proposals/projects to be presented rather than relying on votes to allocate a limited number of slots. After all, it's impossible to know exactly what we're each voting on (given the brevity of the description in each case) and I'd certainly prefer to hear/see what everyone has to say/show (within reason). If using Zoom (for example), presentations (no longer necessarily of a fixed length) could be recorded in advance and made available to view a few days before the start of the "conference". Then perhaps more time could be spent during the conference days focussing on Q&A, facilitated discussion, etc., and going much further towards identifying potential synergy.

This would (I hope) give some visibility to a far greater diversity of projects; to allow participants to prepare questions ahead of the Q&A/discussion sessions; to connect inputs to outputs; to start building (or at least mapping) a more effective, resilient and synergetic network; and to ensure that our individual efforts have a better chance of not going to waste.