[Inpycon] suggestions for PyCon India

[David Goodger]

[I found this in my email drafts folder; thought I'd sent it long ago.
Hopefully it isn't stale ;-) ]

Hi all,

I had a great time in Bangalore, and I was impressed by the size & scope of
PyCon India in only its second year. I have some suggestions based on my
experience organizing the US PyCon over the years. Some have already been
mentioned here (I know I heard some discussed).

* You should add time between talks, 5 or 10 minutes. Attendees need time
for moving between rooms, and the next speakers need time to set up their
laptops.

* At PyCon US, we have "time remaining" signs: 10 minutes, 5 minutes, STOP.
These are very useful for the session chair (MC), who can be sitting in or
near the front row and watching a clock.

* Speakers should be encouraged (required) to repeat any questions they are
asked. Often the people on the other side of the room cannot hear the
questions. The recordings rarely pick up the questions.

* Speakers and MC's should feel free to defer questions to the end of a
talk, especially if the questioner is insistent.

* Speakers should not run off immediately after a talk, but move swiftly to
the hallway and answer any after-talk questions.

* As you grow, you may choose to add parallel features (e.g. open space) and
secondary events (e.g. development sprints, tutorials). You already had the
FOSSEE sessions for beginners, a great idea! But take it slowly, and don't
add anything before you're ready.

* I noticed some audio feedback when people were speaking. This can be
reduced by placing the microphone closer to the speaker's mouth. The further
away, the higher the gain must be, and the more likely feedback becomes.
Something to tell your speakers.

* These kinds of instructions for speakers can be printed up ahead of time,
and given to speakers and MCs. If you're interested, I can get the
instruction sheet from US PyCon.

* A "green room" is very useful: a room for speakers with a spare projector
(to test laptop connections), wired network connections, a printer, water,
etc. This can double as a conference office.

* WiFi at conferences is always an issue.  802.11 was not designed for such
high user densities. In a nutshell, at PyCon US we deploy lots of real APs
(not laptops!), at low power (important!) on alternating channels, to reduce
interference. We are lucky to have Sean Reifschneider, a sysadmin and
networking guru who has effectively deployed wireless for many years. Sean
has written reports about PyCon's wireless here:
http://www.tummy.com/Community/Articles/pycon2010-network/ (with links to
earlier years).

* Pre-printed badges with icons for speakers (and anything else you want to
track) are a good way to see at a glance who is missing.

* It's best to avoid staggered starting times. Sometimes it's unavoidable,
but try hard!

* One way to handle the lunch/break rush is to stagger the *ends* of talks
just before lunch/breaks. For example, some talks can end 15 minutes later
than others.

* Lightning talks are particularly popular at US PyCon, to the point where
it was unfair to schedule other talks against them, so we made them plenary.

* For North American conferences, as you grow in attendance, costs go up
per-person (you have to move from free space to hotels or conference
centers). If this is true in India as well, you may consider holding
multiple regional conferences instead of one national conference. It's not
ideal, but it's one way to keep costs down.

* I noticed a large drop-off in attendance between Saturday and Sunday. It
seems to have happened last year as well. Why is that?

Most importantly: notwithstanding any of the above, please don't imitate any
other conference too closely. It would be a shame to lose the unique
character of PyCon India.

-- 
David Goodger <http://python.net/~goodger>
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