Hi Ludovic, Apparently (http://www.meetup.com/about/) there are 9,000 meetups a day. Supposing each group meets once a week (and many meet less often, so this is clearly an underestimate) that would mean there are 63,000 meetup groups. So while I like your thinking, I suspect that we could not claim that Python groups are sufficiently popular to have much "clout" (credibility of threat in a negotiating position) with Meetup.com. Free events that I have organized through Eventbrite have usually been largely trouble-free, but usually they have been limited to low numbers (<50). One thing I like is the ability to have people pay a significant amount (say $100) which is refunded on attendance. This is a useful way to avoid too many no-shows (and at least make sure that you get some funding from the wasted places). I've organized conferences of up to 500 people with Eventbrite, but many of them had sufficient revenues to justify the cost of handling the administration of drop-out refunds, place substitutions and the like. Maybe we should talk to Eventbrite about some deal on reduced commissions, and particularly on the provision of a more "lightweight" user interface on the admin side. In my experience they are happy to listen to suggestions, at least, though clearly they are guided largely by commercial priorities. They might also be able to offer better ways of organizing meetings such as meetups. They acquired Lanyrd a while ago, and Lanyrd is a good Python company too, but I don't know whether that would win any credibility with the management. regards Steve On Wed, Nov 18, 2015 at 9:59 PM, Ludovic Gasc <gmludo@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi Marc,
I'm agree with your approach to try to optimise PSF ressources.
However, at least in Belgium, I must recognise that we have now more people since we've migrated on meetup.com.
At least to me, I prefer to increase the potential audience of a meetup than reduce cost.
Nevertheless, keep meetup.com and reduce costs shouldn't be incompatible: With the number of Python groups on their platform, we should have a big argument to negotiate a better group price.
It isn't a good signal for them if Python groups leave their platform: the network effect should play in our favour to negotiate.
What do you think?
Ludovic Gasc (GMLudo) http://www.gmludo.eu/ On 18 Nov 2015 22:39, "M.-A. Lemburg" <mal@python.org> wrote:
Hello PSF Community,
as many of you know, meeptup.com is pretty much the standard when it comes to organizing user group meetings - at least in the US, the UK and probably also some other countries.
Now, meetup.com is also a rather expensive service to use and with the PSF funding the fees, I'd like to investigate, whether encouraging use of alternative services wouldn't result in a better use of the PSFs grant funds.
These are some services I've found:
* http://www.eventbrite.com/ (free for free events) * https://www.farornear.com/ (free) * http://attending.io/ (free) * https://www.xing.com/de/events (free for free events, much like eventbrite, used often in Germany)
For BarCamps:
* https://www.barcamptools.eu/ (again, mostly in Germany)
Some questions:
* Do you know other such services ? * What's your experience with these ? * If you're running a group on meetup.com, would you be willing to move to a different platform ?
I think it would be good to collect this information on a python.org wiki page to better guide new user groups to meetup.com alternatives.
Thanks, -- Marc-Andre Lemburg Director Python Software Foundation http://www.python.org/psf/ http://www.malemburg.com/ _______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
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