<html><head><style>pre,code,address {
margin: 0px;
}
h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 {
margin-top: 0.2em;
margin-bottom: 0.2em;
}
ol,ul {
margin-top: 0em;
margin-bottom: 0em;
}
blockquote {
margin-top: 0em;
margin-bottom: 0em;
}
</style></head><body style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><div>Thanks Timothée,</div><div><br></div><div>I'm back on the topic and I'm trying to build a complete understanding of the organizational requirements. </div><div><br></div><div>For once, I need that to write to and talk to potential venues, but also, to understand which kinds of financial transaction will be required, so I can set up and handle them appropriately.</div><div><br></div><div>Further, in two weeks, June 26th to 29th, the openSUSE Conference (oSC) is in Nuremberg. I'm planning to give a presentation about the undertaking of bringing LGM to Nuremberg in 2025 in order to reach out locally in search for a team, partners and supporters.</div><div><br></div><div>In both cases I don't want to tell wrong things to the people and in general I want to represent the community appropriately.</div><div><br></div><div>The <a href="https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/public-documentation/">https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/</a> website is very helpful. On one hand the archive of older editions really helps to get an idea of the extend an LGM can have and it has a lot of inspiration in there. On the other hand <a href="https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm">https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm</a> especially under "LGM set up" but also under /lgm/ideas/lgm-board/ and /ideas/libre-graphics-association/ a lot of the spirit is transported.</div><div><br></div><div>However, it feels a lot like archaeology, as it seems to me like not much of the aspired organizational structure is left.</div><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex"><div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Cantarell; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.4); -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;">As far as I know, all the organization is done by the local team.</div><div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Cantarell; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.4); -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;">[...]</div><div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Cantarell; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.4); -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;">Only for the talks selection we use to have a selection committee.</div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>This is interesting, especially when looking at <a href="https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/public-documentation/">https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/public-documentation/</a> and other discussions it seems to me like there's extensive interest of the online community to shape the event. I've been at many LGMs so I believe I have a good understanding of the culture and expectations, I'm also thankful for the existing docs. However, as it seems, there has not been a board or similar (ever?), just talk about it.</div><div>I also see sometimes mentioned a "Global Organization" team, e.g. <a href="https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/about/organization-team/">https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/about/organization-team/</a> ,but I don't see what their tasks were.</div><div>Your answer is a lot like a blank cheque for the local organization. But one of the risks I see, that decisions may not be OK for some/all of the community. E.g. there's a discussion about rules for sponsoring: <a href="https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/public-documentation/rules-for-sponsoring/">https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/public-documentation/rules-for-sponsoring/</a></div><div>I also see that that discussion is not finished, but you get the idea. In general, as it seems to me, there's a lot of burden and responsibility on the local organization also taking the risks of any decisions.</div><div>How can I or potential partners be sure that I actually represent the "LGM"? Is there a scenario where the endorsement of my efforts can be removed?</div><div><br></div><div>I'm sure we'll find more tasks that can be handled from anywhere, and as we do and require it, I'll ask here for help.</div><div><br></div><div>Another one about decision making: I see the GNOME Foundation is mentioned in <a href="https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/ideas/lgm-board/">https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/ideas/lgm-board/</a></div><div><br></div><div>This quote is about collecting sponsoring funds:</div><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex"><div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Cantarell; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.4); -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none;"> The money doesn’t need to be in the bank, it needs to be secured by the simple mean of a written agreement, an exchange of emails, and an invoice sent from the GNOME Foundation to the sponsor.</div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>and this one is about instructing the payment of the travel reimbursements:</div><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex"><div>The data is easily exportable to a spreadsheet we share with the GNOME administrative staff.</div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>What has happened to that relationship with the GNOME foundation? Is there any documentation about the agreement or required/possible interaction with the foundation? It could be a good blueprint for whatever I have to establish.</div><div><br></div><div>I also ask, because I can talk to the Geeko Foundation (<a href="https://geekos.org/">https://geekos.org/</a>) about providing similar services to us. They have a board meeting at the oSC and in general a fitting mission statement.</div><div><br></div><div>I also consulted the lawyer of my company (BTW: <a href="https://strong-type.systems/">https://strong-type.systems/</a>), whether it would be possible to handle this kind of transactions via my company or if it would be (more) feasible to create a non-profit for the task. Waiting for the reply so far.</div><div><br></div><div>More specifically, the sponsoring-reimbursement-complex creates the biggest questions for me. <a href="https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/ideas/lgm-board/">https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/ideas/lgm-board/</a> mentions it a lot and highlights the difficulties. I believe, without help, I won't be able to secure sponsoring for the event that also covers travel expenses. But there seem to be knowledgeable people around:</div><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex"><div><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Cantarell; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.4); -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; float: none; display: inline !important; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">[...] some of us who have been involved into the process of getting the money in</span></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>Is there anyone who can tell me more about:</div><div><br></div><div>- More concrete numbers about the expected costs.</div><div>- Is it important for sponsors to get a "tax deductible relief" from a non profit?</div><div>- Is it important where that non-profit is located: e.g. USA, UK, Germany?</div><div>- I need to understand how the reimbursements are handled from the bookkeeping and tax paying perspective. AFAIK, there will be no proper invoices for this.</div><div>- Is there documentation on the numbers of the past?</div><div><br></div><div>The next important tasks are, somehow interrelated:</div><div><br></div><div>- Get a venue and a date.</div><div>- Get a structure to handle money flow.</div><div>- Start search for a sponsoring a budget.</div><div>- Team.</div><div><br></div><div>I'll soon kick off the active part of the quest for a venue and I'm working to understand the financial requirements.</div><div><br></div><div>For the future, I'd like to develop an understanding on how to support local organizers better, in order to make it lower-threshold to organize an LGM. There's a lot valuable information and discussion on the website, but, as I said before, it seems there's not much structure behind it anymore.</div><div><br></div><div>Lasse</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>On Thu, 2024-05-23 at 12:38 +0200, Timothée Giet wrote:</div><blockquote type="cite" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex"><div>Hello Lasse,<br></div><div><br></div><div>Great to see you back on next year's organization topic!<br></div><div>I'll try to answer some of your questions below.<br></div><div><br></div><div>Le 23/05/2024 à 09:56, Lasse Fister a écrit :<br></div><blockquote type="cite" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex"><div>Hello everyone,<br></div><div><br></div><div>it was great to be back an LGM in Rennes two weeks ago and to meet for<br></div><div>real again! Many thanks to the organizers for the reboot!<br></div><div><br></div><div>When I went to the organization meeting for next year, I thought I'd<br></div><div>get information about what needs to happen from my side for a proper<br></div><div>proposal from me for Nuremberg for 2026 or later. However, due to the<br></div><div>lack of proposals for 2025, I agreed to try to get an edition for 2025<br></div><div>going in Nuremberg. Because it is a complete cold start for me, I set<br></div><div>the condition that I'd need to assemble a local organizer team etc. and<br></div><div>see how it evolves.<br></div><div>I had a busy time directly after the meeting, but now I want to renew<br></div><div>my pledge to try to make this happen. This also marks the kickoff of my<br></div><div>efforts, I'll start to contact local people and organizations in order<br></div><div>to assemble a team, find a location and sponsoring.<br></div><div><br></div><div>I went to LGM since Leipzig in 2014, with the exception of Rio de<br></div><div>Janeiro, but I never took part in organizing. It would be very helpful<br></div><div>if we could establish communication channels and create some knowledge<br></div><div>transfer. I'm not sure if the mailing list is ideal for it though.<br></div><div><br></div><div>I have some immediate questions as well:<br></div><div><br></div><div>How is the division of labor between the local organization and the LGM<br></div><div>network/board? Is there any general board/organization left at all, is<br></div><div>it this list, or is there rather just ad-hoc/decentralized/spontaneous<br></div><div>collaboration? (BTW, the website is down again, but archive.org<br></div><div>works, <a href="https://web.se.org/web/20230604114444/https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/about/organization-team/">https://web.se.org/web/20230604114444/https://libregraphicsmeeting.org/lgm/about/organization-team/</a><br></div><div>is the best I could find.)<br></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>As far as I know, all the organization is done by the local team. Only <br></div><div>for the talks selection we use to have a selection committee. You can <br></div><div>make a call for interested people to join that committee on this list <br></div><div>when launching the call for proposal, so people will have some time to <br></div><div>react and join.<br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex"><div><br></div><div>What kind of work can I expect from the general LGM, e.g. review and<br></div><div>selection of talk proposals, collecting sponsoring for travel<br></div><div>reimbursement and handing it out. Is there a bank account somewhere?<br></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>There is no general LGM organization/association/legal entity. Usually <br></div><div>all is handled by the local team.<br></div><div><br></div><div>So to answer your related question below: yes it's probably a good idea <br></div><div>to create a local organization to handle the finances part, unless you <br></div><div>have good contact with an existing local organization which you can <br></div><div>trust and would agree to handle that.<br></div><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex"><div><br></div><div>What are the minimal tasks of the local team, what would be nice to<br></div><div>have? At least, we need a location. I also have the impression that the<br></div><div>design and website is usually made locally. Video recording is<br></div><div>mentioned at .<br></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>The tasks of the local team are:<br></div><div><br></div><div>- to find a venue, and propose some dates. Most of the time the venues <br></div><div>have been provided free of cost by interested entities... The most <br></div><div>common is to get in contact with the local university, see if they would <br></div><div>be ok to host the event. Or a local artistic or developer organization <br></div><div>with an appropriate venue which could be interested...<br></div><div><br></div><div>- to find some financial sponsoring. It is mostly needed to provide <br></div><div>travel support for speakers, maybe rent some hardware if needed <br></div><div>depending on what's available at the venue, then if there's more it can <br></div><div>be used to organize a community event (like the dinner evening we did <br></div><div>for example), print some t-shirts, or other related expenses. So, having <br></div><div>financial sponsoring is not a hard requirement but highly recommended to <br></div><div>ease all of these points.<br></div><div><br></div><div>Video recording is a nice thing to have, though not directly mandatory. <br></div><div>For sponsoring, you might discuss with Dave Crossland who has been able <br></div><div>to get some from Google for several years, with one of the requirements <br></div><div>being to have the talks recorded and uploaded on youtube...<br></div><div><br></div><div>- to make the website and design, yes. You can reuse some content of <br></div><div>previous years for the generic pages, and probably get some help from <br></div><div>some people on this list if needed. The website can be simple, and the <br></div><div>logo design can be the generic one (there's no requirement to make a <br></div><div>yearly adaptation of it, though it's a nice thing to have). About the <br></div><div>technical details to publish the website, that should be discussed <br></div><div>further in a dedicated topic (currently, Ale manages the publishing <br></div><div>rights, and AFAIK the domain is handled by Louis, but the host seems not <br></div><div>very reliable, so we might consider migrating it...)<br></div><div><br></div><div>- launch the call for proposals, organize the selection committee, <br></div><div>communicate with the speakers to organize things. For speakers travel <br></div><div>support, usually it only covers the travel part, not the hosting or food <br></div><div>(though with a very big budget it could include that, but it's usually <br></div><div>not expected).<br></div><div><br></div><div>- and of course, run the event when the date comes...<br></div><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex"><div><br></div><div>Handling of the finances. E.g. How would a sponsor for the location get<br></div><div>funding to the "LGM" and how would "LGM" transfer that to the location.<br></div><div>Maybe the location is a bad example, and usually done differently, but<br></div><div>there must be some way to receive and spend a local budget. Do I need<br></div><div>to find or create a local organization that can handle this kind of<br></div><div>finances?<br></div><div><br></div><div>I believe it's most important to find a location quickly, but a local<br></div><div>team and budget are interdependent with that.<br></div><div><br></div><div>I'd be thankful for further urgent topics that need consideration.<br></div><div><br></div><div>Cheers, Lasse<br></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>I hope this answers your questions, I'll let the others complement if <br></div><div>they see any important missing point. And don't hesitate if you have <br></div><div>some more questions.<br></div><div><br></div><div>Cheers,<br></div><div><br></div><div>Timothée<br></div><div><br></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div><span></span></div></body></html>