PyCon Feedback and Volunteers (Re: Pycon disappointment)

[Brian Jones]

On Mar 16, 8:09 pm, a... at pythoncraft.com (Aahz) wrote:
> If you did not like the programming this year (aside from the sponsor
> talks) and you did not participate in organizing PyCon or in delivering
> presentations, it is YOUR FAULT.  PERIOD.  EXCLAMATION POINT!

I find this insulting, inexcusable, and utter nonsense. If putting the
blame for a failed experiment on the backs of the good folks who paid
good money for travel, lodging, and registration is also an
experiment, you can hereby consider it also failed.

The bottom line is that the people who are providing feedback in this
forum are doing so *voluntarily*, and for the good of future PyCon
events. They were sold a bill of goods, it was ill-comunicated, and
they have taken their time to express that this is not a good idea
moving forward. If it weren't for these people giving feedback, you
would not have a complete experiment, because you would never have
been able to prove or disprove your hypothesis. In fact, the people in
this forum are just as important to the process as those who devised
the experiment.

As an experiment, it would seem that having an event organizer, who is
presumably interested in the future success of the event, talking down
to the people who would also like to see a better event in the future
(and think they can make that happen - otherwise why bother giving
feedback?), is doomed to failure. Of course, I'm only looking at how
the experiment is being carried out. I claim ignorance as to the
hypothesis.

The rest of the points in your rant are all pretty commonly known by
now, to most. At the end of the day, the buck has to stop somewhere,
and that somewhere has to be with the organization that were charged
with motivating a volunteer force, and the organization who set the
expectations of the attendees. If you think that PyCon would've been
better had there been more volunteers, then you should feed that back
to the folks in charge of attracting and motivating said force. If you
think it was simply a mis-labeling of the different classes of talks,
feed that back to the folks who are in charge of such things. The
point is that there are endless things that can be done which are more
useful and productive than pointing fingers back at the people who
support the conference by being attendees. They help build the
conference too.

A conference answers to its attendees, and that should be an
expectation of anyone concerned with conference organization. Period.
Exclamation point.

Brian K. Jones
Editor in Chief
Python Magazine