20:01:39 <bremner> #startmeeting
20:01:39 <MeetBot> Meeting started Thu Jan  8 20:01:39 2015 UTC.  The chair is bremner. Information about MeetBot at http://wiki.debian.org/MeetBot.
20:01:39 <MeetBot> Useful Commands: #action #agreed #help #info #idea #link #topic.
20:01:49 <bremner> #topic rollcall
20:02:07 <cate> ciao
20:02:14 <Tincho> bremner, cate: I think that could be the realm of the boursaries, maybe with a consultation with the wider team, but still in the scope of the boursaries
20:02:21 <nattie> I'm here, mostly in an observing role - bursaries fall under PA, so I need to know about stuff, but plan to mostly take a hands-off approach.
20:02:26 <Tincho> sorry, now I am out of topic :)
20:02:35 <ana> hi
20:03:25 <cate> Tincho: in past there was special debian fund, so special rules. Than it could be decided by the same team, but let try to use extra non-debconf funds for such things, as in (some) past debconf
20:03:52 <bremner> ok, I guess we'll move on to actual agenda, and late latecomers interrupt randomly as per tradition.
20:03:57 <RichiH> here, thought not part of bursary
20:04:06 <bremner> #topic scope of meeting
20:04:14 <cate> RichiH: there is still no bursary team
20:04:45 <bremner> So, sorry Tinch, but I want to keep the topic to the ranking process. We have had a hard time with that in the past.
20:05:27 <bremner> In particular, I think/hope we will have some other pools with different rules, but these rules are for "regular" applicants.
20:06:00 <bremner> are people OK with that? and OK with forging ahead before we really have a bursaries team?
20:06:09 <Tincho> bremner: sure
20:06:42 <cate> yes
20:08:06 <Tincho> bremner: regarding the last question, in the design of the new teams it was intended that some rules would be defined independently of the actual bursaries team
20:08:36 <bremner> Tincho: right. That's why I think it's actually good that anybody who's interested helps make these rules.
20:09:27 <bremner> #info this meeting is just about ranking applicants who are "debian contributors", broadly defined.
20:10:18 <bremner> #topic categories that contribute to ranking
20:10:56 <bremner> comments?
20:11:21 <Tincho> bremner: I'd say yes to all the points in the wiki
20:11:28 <ana> Tincho +1
20:11:32 <Tincho> s/points/categories/
20:11:37 <cate> I don't like the amount requested
20:11:46 <cate> I think it should be independent
20:12:03 <ana> I interpret amount requested as reasonable amount
20:12:04 <cate> or we sponsor only the most near people
20:12:07 <bremner> ok, let's discuss that. Anybody like to defend "amount requested"?
20:12:15 <ana> depending on where you're travelling
20:12:34 <Tincho> you also have the ratio requested/real cost
20:12:44 <cate> ana: in past there are some discussion if more sponsored people is better (small ammounts)
20:13:12 <ana> e.g sompebody asking 400 EUR to go Germany from Spain is probably overstimating
20:13:36 <bremner> ana: do you think it's better to have that in the ranking, or as a seperate step?
20:13:39 <ana> on the other side, we can just offer less sponsorship if the person doesn't have a good justification and do not keep this into account
20:13:54 <ana> bremner: separate step
20:14:19 <ana> s/keep/take/
20:14:54 <Tincho> you could also cap the sponsoring... there are so many ways of doing this...
20:14:56 <bremner> I can see either way. From a logistics point of view, it feels better to sponsor more people.
20:15:28 <ana> in previous years, I have seen people from the same country asking very different amounts
20:15:43 <Tincho> need to leave brb
20:16:28 <ana> we can't compare finantial need, or past/potential contributions, but we definitively can compare prices of people travelling from country X to country Y
20:17:15 <bremner> ana: sure. But it seems easy to say sorry, we're only offering EUR100 to get from germany to spain.
20:17:33 <noshadow> ana: assuming the country is far enough away that the size of the contry is small compared to the distance.
20:17:45 <bremner> I think the question is do we want to tilt towards  people from closer places.
20:17:54 <bremner> or at least that's my question.
20:17:59 <bremner> hard on people from asia.
20:18:47 <bremner> #info amount requested penalizes people from far away
20:18:57 <noshadow> bremner: northern or southern Germany can almost double or half the distance needed to get to Spain.
20:19:05 <ana> bremner: ah ok. I didn't understand it that way.
20:19:06 <bremner> feel free to #info, otherwise the minutes will be empty.
20:19:34 <bremner> ana: so you are thinking reasonableness of request?
20:19:59 <ana> bremner: yes, exactly
20:20:34 <cate> BTW do we know how much budget do you have?  It could effect the discussion
20:20:35 <bremner> do others also agree that this could be a seperate sanity check / amount limiting step?
20:20:46 <ana> noshadow: which part of Spain? ;) Seriously, I remember insane requests when dc9
20:21:02 <bremner> cate: we are making general rules for future years, or at least trying to.
20:21:25 <cate> bremner: ok
20:21:35 <madduck> cate: it's my personal aim to have the budget finished by the time bursaries start working
20:22:00 <madduck> (although I really don't think we should overcommit)
20:22:22 <ana> bremner: I would settle this as asking people to explain when they seem to be more expensive than others "nearby" and do not penalize for this
20:22:23 <bremner> madduck: nattie I have ideas about that for the next dc-team meeting.
20:22:41 <bremner> ana: that was the informal practice last year.
20:23:16 <ana> about prioritizing people living closer to the confernce over those overseas, I wouldn't do it, or debconf would become a local-ish event every year. We already have minidebconfs for that
20:23:29 <bremner> ok.
20:23:37 <ana> bremner: glad to read that, it didn't fully happen in the years in was in the committee!
20:23:40 <noshadow> ana: Barcelona for example. Only arguing that "same country" might not be a good approximation for "nearby".
20:23:43 <ana> in -> I
20:24:43 <bremner> #agreed Amount requested to be considered as a seperate step / consultation / sanity check
20:25:59 <bremner> hrm. Is MeetBot dead?
20:26:24 <bremner> MeetBot: #agreed Amount requested to be considered as a seperate step / consultation / sanity check
20:26:24 <MeetBot> bremner: Error: "#agreed" is not a valid command.
20:26:33 <madduck> no, it never acks those things; stupid, I know.
20:26:40 <bremner> ok.
20:26:48 <madduck> MeetBot: you suck in this regard.
20:26:48 <MeetBot> madduck: Error: "you" is not a valid command.
20:27:24 <bremner> so that leaves us with three categories. Any further objections / discussion?
20:27:41 <bremner> or other categories?
20:27:58 <cate> no, I agree the other cat
20:28:05 <bremner> mraw ;).
20:29:35 <bremner> #agreed the other 3 categories as listed in the agenda are OK, and sufficient
20:29:59 <cate> "Past outcomes from Debconf partipation / Plan for this year" is most about DebCamp and travel?  Or also attendee should give the plan?
20:30:17 <bremner> excellent segue to next topic
20:30:20 <cate> but this probably is a detail we can skip[
20:30:28 <bremner> #topic what information should we collect
20:31:43 <Tincho> bremner: your previous agreed did not work
20:32:04 <bremner> Tincho: which one? any of them?
20:32:15 <Tincho> [20:28:54] <bremner> [21:26:35] MeetBot: #agreed Amount requested to be considered as a seperate step / consultation / sanity check
20:32:16 <Tincho> [20:28:54] <MeetBot> [21:26:35] bremner: Error: "#agreed" is not a valid command
20:32:32 <cate> also the last one
20:32:35 <bremner> Tincho: that was my second try, with the nick prefix
20:32:40 <cate> but we didn't get the error yet
20:32:46 <cate> agree != agreed
20:32:54 <bremner> argh. software sucks.
20:32:57 <cate> darst: MeetBot is very slow
20:33:33 <Tincho> bremner: it does
20:33:57 <bremner> well, I have logs in the worst case.
20:34:08 <bremner> let's carry on and pretend the bot is working.
20:34:11 <darst> not all commands produce output, in particular #agreed shouldn't make any output
20:34:34 <bremner> later we can discuss making darst repeat HCI 101 ;)
20:34:39 <nattie> my word, it's darst!
20:35:16 <bremner> ok, so is it reasonable to ask people asking for food and accomodation to fill in the same 3 boxes?
20:36:13 <nattie> not IMO
20:36:16 <Tincho> bremner: I am not sure
20:36:30 <nattie> i mean, food and accommodation are a separate matter from travel bursaries
20:36:44 <bremner> well, we only want to do one ranking, right?
20:37:05 <Tincho> it depends on how we take board sponsorship... is it a special privilege, or it continues to something that is given to most DCs
20:37:14 <cate> bremner: and DebCamp. DebCamp is separate, and requires more plan to get sponsorship [and possibly a limit on places]
20:37:15 <Tincho> (debian contributors)
20:37:37 <gregoa> bremner: I think this depends on the criteria for food/accom and travel; i.e. when (like in the past) everyone-involved gets food+accom but only a bunch get travel sponsorship, I don't think it's reasonable to ask the same questions
20:37:53 <Tincho> nattie: the idea, i think, is to have boursaries also allocating board sponsorship
20:37:53 <gregoa> (ok, Tincho put it shorter :))
20:37:59 <bremner> yeah. I guess that's the discussion we're having.
20:38:26 <Tincho> cate: re debcamp, that is another discussion to have, too
20:38:29 <nattie> yes, true.  however, it's a lot harder to estimate cost of food as a non-organiser
20:38:48 <Tincho> nattie: you ask the local liaison for that :)
20:39:07 <bremner> one argument, for the sake of balance, is that people with a weak contribution record (e.g. newb's) might want to say something about plans. We could make it optional?
20:39:45 <nattie> we found out that quite a few people don't necessarily want to eat on-campus all the time
20:39:50 <bremner> to ask a hard question, what about financial need and board sponsorship?
20:40:35 <Tincho> what is the question?
20:40:59 <bremner> should we ask people to explain why they cannot pay for their own food and housing.
20:41:25 <Tincho> bremner: I think it depends on the answer to my previous q
20:41:30 <cate> I think we should continue as the past: we thanks the active contributors with boards
20:41:56 <bremner> I guess the default is not to make a radical change.
20:42:55 <bremner> how about this: for board, tell people to look at contributors.debian.org, and if that is representative, leave the boxes blank. Otherwise fill in as many as they want.
20:43:14 <cate> I totally agree. I like that we document more the process: more transparent, but I like how it was done on past year (OTOH I was not in the team, so I don't know if there were problems on allocating money/desicions/..
20:43:35 <Tincho> cate: how was it done?
20:43:40 <Tincho> bremner: I like that idea
20:43:51 <cate> Tincho: about what?
20:44:14 <Tincho> cate: you said you liked how it was done last year
20:44:17 <gregoa> bremner: does this mean: "policy for food/accom is: everyone gets it if they are contributors"? if yes, I'd suggest to spell it out clearly
20:44:42 <cate> Tincho: the rules, etc.
20:44:47 <bremner> gregoa: good point.
20:44:59 <bremner> any objections to formalizing our current practice?
20:45:17 <cate> no
20:45:26 <Tincho> bremner: I think it is a requirement at this point :)
20:45:37 <Tincho> (formalising)
20:45:50 <bremner> yes, I mean gregoa's point specifically ;).
20:45:57 <Tincho> ah, +1 then
20:47:38 <bremner> #agreed subject to budget constraints, food/accomodation sponsorship will be provided to all debian contributors
20:48:41 <bremner> ok, that's the big picture. How about the fine print of how we check who is a contributor, and what it says on the web form?
20:48:57 <Tincho> I think that should be spelled out too
20:49:09 <bremner> agreed
20:50:04 <cate> spelled out contributor TO DEBIAN
20:50:20 <cate> we had some upstreams asking sponsorship in past IIRC
20:50:23 <bremner> cate: debian contributor to DEBIAN ;) ?
20:51:05 <cate> bremner: you see, you can contribute indirectly to debian. Ask nattie to translate my through
20:51:19 <ana> contributing directly to Debian?
20:51:45 <ana> contributing directly to Debian regularly?
20:51:46 <bremner> cate: OK. What do you think of my idea of pointing people to contributors.debian.org and asking them to supplement that as needed?
20:52:03 * nattie stands by as cate's official translator
20:52:07 <bremner> ah, right. recent and regular are two interesting words here.
20:52:42 <cate> bremner: ok
20:52:58 <nattie> useful in preventing people from either trying to pull historical rank or hastily contributing something just for exposure?
20:54:06 <bremner> brb. feel free to solve all problems.
20:54:48 <cate> nattie: there is no ranking problem. contributor or not: board or not.
20:54:49 <highvoltage> yay problem solving!
20:55:26 <bremner> hi, voltage!
20:55:41 <nattie> danger, danger!
20:55:44 <highvoltage> :D
20:55:49 <nattie> (you knew i'd say that)
20:56:05 <Tincho> need to get food, sorry. solve all the worlds problems for me :)
20:56:06 <bremner> so, how strict should we be about this wording?
20:56:23 <bremner> ok. so, everyone boards with Tincho. and RMS.
20:56:59 <bremner> Let me interrupt, the current quiet discussion with
20:57:14 <bremner> #topic digression: when should we stop?
20:57:28 <bremner> I can handle another 30 minutes.
20:57:34 <cate> bremner: when you will be the last one to write
20:58:04 <cate> I think we are near to the end
20:58:26 <bremner> ok, let's try to at least agree on the board stuff.
21:01:39 <bremner> So my proposal, given it might just be me and cate at this point, is that we finish up the current discussion on food/board, and then try to set another meeting.
21:02:00 <nattie> i'm still watching
21:02:30 * gregoa as well, at least with one eye
21:02:35 <bremner> hurray.
21:02:51 <bremner> #topic food/board bursaries (what information to collect)
21:03:20 * ana here too
21:04:03 <gregoa> are we still at "regular" and "recent" contributions to DEBIAN?
21:04:23 <bremner> I guess so. How strict, and how detailed do we need to be?
21:04:48 <bremner> have we ever denied someone food/accomodation sponsorship because they haven't contributed lately?
21:05:21 <cate> I think this should be decided by the team: they will handle such information, so thay should know how much they need
21:06:34 <bremner> cate: I guess I meant, how detailed to we need to be in describing "what is a debian contributor". Is that what you meant?
21:07:00 <cate> bremner: no, on DC12 only few people who forgot to notify us the non-arrival
21:07:39 <cate> bremner: ah. I would leave much generic
21:08:28 <gregoa> I'd also leave it to the team to decide on rare corner cases
21:08:53 <nattie> one hopes that people would assess their own contributions honestly
21:11:12 <bremner> #agreed information collected for board/food: contributors.debian.org, plus optional free form text from applicant in one or more of the standard 3 boxes
21:12:41 <bremner> #topic what can/should we ask people about financial need
21:13:42 <bremner> probably we need more time/energy/people to discuss this, but is there something we can agree on now?
21:13:54 <gregoa> bremner: for board sponsoring: nothing, as per above policy; for travel sponsorship: depends on the policy there :)
21:14:19 <bremner> #info this topic is defacto just about travel sponsorship
21:14:22 <cate> I would write more in detail about that, but anyway we cannot verify, and it is most personal the "need"
21:15:09 <ana> I'm missing to know how travel sponsorship has been done in the last 2-3 years, it would be helpful as initial point for the discussion
21:17:32 <bremner> we asked about this a bit indirectly, I think.
21:18:18 <bremner> I can dig a bit.
21:18:32 <cate> and the question was not clear. I think we found later that people interpreted differently the "need"
21:19:58 <bremner> yeah, I think that's part of the motivation for what we are doing.
21:20:22 <bremner> ana: last year we just gave one subjective score to each applicant.
21:23:25 <gregoa> so, what's the meaning of this "need" thingie? is the "the amount I'm asking for" or "the amount below which I can't buy a ticket" or some ratio of the bank account or something else?
21:24:37 <bremner> ana: so to summarize: was asked a fuzzy question about need, and then either gave it a number seperately, or used it as part of making up some number.
21:25:45 <gregoa> or put differently: what is it that the team wants to find out (independent of the used terms)?
21:26:27 <bremner> gregoa: somehow we breezed through "Financial need" is a category, with out knowing what it was ;).
21:27:05 <bremner> I guess we as a community have some vague idea that lack of personal money should not keep "deserving" people from attending debconf?
21:27:06 <gregoa> bremner: seems like my gut feeling is not completely off :)
21:28:06 <gregoa> I think the vague idea is a good starting point
21:30:06 <gregoa> so, is the point to find out how much many is missing in order to be able to attend debconf?
21:30:33 <bremner> as a thought experiment, if the same person applied in two different years, same activities, but was unemployed one year, should we rank them higher the year they are unemployed?
21:30:42 <gregoa> s/many/money/ # don't read german while typing english
21:31:25 <bremner> gregoa: I'm not sure. Even that question is pretty hard, because people don't agree on what "missing" is.
21:31:39 <bremner> e.g. that money is already committed to holidays with my family
21:31:54 <gregoa> oh yes, I agree that's hard
21:33:21 <gregoa> re your thought experiment: is it about ranking or about acknowledging different amounts of money and accepting/denying the request?
21:33:51 <bremner> gregoa: about ranking. Because we seemed to think financial need should be part of ranking.
21:35:11 <gregoa> bremner: hm ... "financial need" as in the fact of lack of money? or as in the amount requested? - the latter would sound a bit weird for ranking
21:35:57 <gregoa> and the former seems like a non-criterion (why would someone apply otherwise?) or not quantifiable? [in $currencyunit]
21:36:21 <gregoa> (sorry if this confuses more, I'm just thinking out loud)
21:37:53 <bremner> It's a confusing topic. Some people apply because they feel their contributions to debian entitle them to travel sponsorship more or less independantly of financial need.
21:38:56 <gregoa> right. so this is a question of policy as well, I guess? "travel sponsorship is for enabling contributors to participate who couldn't afford it without"?
21:40:14 <bremner> I think we are trying to find a balance, but yes, the current topic is to favour applicants who could not participate without it.
21:41:05 <bremner> dunno. We could adopt such a policy, although it pretty much pushes the problem into "couldn't afford it".
21:41:52 <gregoa> IMO defining the methods is easier if at least the objectives are clear :)
21:42:42 <ana> what about applicants who wouldn't participate without it because it's hard to justify it to the family?
21:43:13 <bremner> sure. or just "because reasons"
21:43:18 <gregoa> but yeah, "what does 'can\'t afford' mean?" is still a problem …
21:43:54 * gregoa likes "because reasons"
21:48:04 <bremner> this is basically how we ended up with a vague question. But I don't think that it's really working.
21:50:47 <cate> and do we stop the meeting now?
21:50:54 <nattie> probably for the best
21:51:02 <nattie> it's gone on for nearly 2 hours now
21:51:04 <gregoa> bremner: because of participants' confusion or because of "what do we do with the answers?" I think the former can be improved
21:51:05 <bremner> Yes, I think so. I've been trying to formulate something for the minutes.
21:51:27 * gregoa nods, takes probably more time to think about it
21:51:53 <bremner> #info we need more time to think about this.
21:52:38 <bremner> #info issues include financial stress, justification to family
21:53:13 <bremner> Should we meet again in two or 3 weeks?
21:53:32 <bremner> for some version of we.
21:53:45 <cate> bremner: yes
21:53:52 <nattie> with more discussion beforehand?
21:54:04 <cate> when do you need to form the team? I think we have still time
21:54:17 <cate> hmm
21:54:23 <bremner> we do have time, but maybe a call for volunteers.
21:54:42 <cate> but for the question for registration system, I think we need some answer soon (in 3 week should be still ok)
21:54:49 <gregoa> maybe a meeting after FOSDEM (31st jan/1st feb)
21:55:50 <bremner> the week after fosdem is not good for me.
21:56:22 <cate> @FOSDEM?
21:56:27 <nattie> who's coming?
21:56:30 <bremner> me!
21:56:33 <nattie> cate: are you finally coming to fosdem?
21:56:56 <cate> nattie: I was thinking you will kill me if I don't arrive
21:57:03 <nattie> cate: good shadow :)
21:57:25 * gregoa also thought about an informal chat at fosdem
21:57:33 <bremner> ok, let's plan on meeting at fosdem, at least 4 of us are there.
21:57:46 <nattie> that can then feed the next irc meeting
21:58:05 <bremner> #agreed some interested people to meet in person at fosdem to discuss further
21:58:10 <bremner> #endmeeting