FOSS Backstage - CfP open

FOSS Backstage - CfP open #

It’s almost ten years ago that I attended my first ApacheCon EU in Amsterdam. I wasn’t entirely new to the topic of open source or free software. I attended several talks on Apache Lucene, Apache Solr, Hadoop, Tomcat, httpd (I still remember that the most impressive stories didn’t necessarily come from the project members, but from downstream users. They were the ones authorized to talk publicly about what could be done with the project - and often became committers themselves down the road.

With “community over code” being one of the main values at Apache, ApacheCon also hosted several non-technical tracks: Open source and business, Open Development (nowadays better known as Inner Source), Open Source project management, project governance, an Apache Way talk. Over the past decade one learning survived any wave of tech buzzword: At the end of the day, success in Open Source (much like in any project) is defined by how well the project is run (read: managed). Reflecting on that the idea was born to create a space to discuss just these topics: What does it take to be “Leading the wave of open source”?

As announced on Berlin Buzzwords we (that is Isabel Drost-Fromm, Stefan Rudnitzki as well as the eventing team over at newthinking communications GmbH) are working on a new conference in summer in Berlin. The name of this new conference will be “FOSS Backstage”. Backstage comprises all things FOSS governance, open collaboration and how to build and manage communities within the open source space.

Submission URL: Call for Presentations

The event will comprise presentations on all things FOSS governance, decentralised decision making, open collaboration. We invite you to submit talks on the topics: FOSS project governance, collaboration, community management. Asynchronous/ decentralised decision making. Vendor neutrality in FOSS, sustainable FOSS, cross team collaboration. Dealing with poisonous people. Project growth and hand-over. Trademarks. Strategic licensing. While it’s primarily targeted at contributions from FOSS people, we would love to also learn more on how typical FOSS collaboration models work well within enterprises. Closely related topics not explicitly listed above are welcome.

Important Dates (all dates in GMT +2)

Submission deadline: February 18th, 2018.

Conference: June, 13th/14th, 2018

High quality talks are called for, ranging from principles to practice. We are looking for real world case studies, background on the social architecture of specific projects and a deep dive into cross community collaboration. Acceptance notifications will be sent out soon after the submission deadline. Please include your name, bio and email, the title of the talk, a brief abstract in English language.

We have drafted the submission form to allow for regular talks, each 45 min in length. However you are free to submit your own ideas on how to support the event: If you would like to take our attendees out to show them your favourite bar in Berlin, please submit this offer through the CfP form. If you are interested in sponsoring the event (e.g. we would be happy to provide videos after the event, free drinks for attendees as well as an after-show party), please contact us.

Schedule and further updates on the event will be published soon on the event web page.

Please re-distribute this CfP to people who might be interested.

Looking forward to meeting you all in person in summer :)