Tl;DR: I think that the Mini-DebConf and Sprint process are working great and have no plans to revisit those procedures. But we can discuss whether we need to do that.
>>>>> "Didier" == Didier 'OdyX' Raboud <[email protected]> writes: >> TL;DR: Do we want BSP organizers to take on the responsibility of >> batching together travel reimbursement requests. Didier> Yes, but… I think we, as a project, need to be clear about Didier> what this means, along at least three axes. Didier> First: what types of events qualify for travel Didier> reimbursement? You have mentioned BSPs, but would a Didier> miniDebConf also qualify? Of course, it is the expectation Didier> that miniDebConf attendees attend to "enhance Debian"; but Didier> also that they might present, or attend talks, Didier> presentations, etc; during which they are not (should not Didier> be) hunting bugs. I think such micro- conferences, although Didier> not explicitly Bug Squashing Parties, should also benefit. I hope are developers are never funding bugs. We have enough without paying for more:-) Seriously, I think it is well established that (mini) DebConfs are available for travel reimbursements. I think the procedures for mini-DebConfs and sprints are reasonably well understood and working well, so I wasn't planning on revisiting them at this time. Didier> Second: from which account is the money taken? The answer Didier> might seem obvious, but let's make sure we're on the same Didier> line of thought. When organizing a BSP (or a miniDebConf), Didier> it is of good measure to try find sponsors and supporters to Didier> help lower the cost for attendees. In plenty of cases, for a Didier> multi-day event, one needs a venue, help cover food and Didier> accomodation costs, etc. But these events rarely last for Didier> more than a couple of days; so adding significant charges to Didier> support travel makes the funding a larger challenge. So the Didier> only realistic money source seems to be external; hence Didier> "Debian" money, not "event" money. (The annual DebConf is Didier> different in terms of scale and duration, which reduces Didier> travel support in proportion to the other charges of the Didier> budget.) I'd assume we'd use our normal policies for deciding what accounts to use. In terms of how much a mini-DebConf or sprint contributes, generally they propose a budget to the DPL. Some of the mini-DebConfs tend to have some sponsors and tend to produce neutral budgets, but that is not a requirement. Didier> Third: what rules-of-thumb, or guidelines do we want for Didier> travel support? In the context of relatively _short_ events Didier> (2-5 days), I think we ought to put upper limits in term of Didier> amounts, and in terms of distance. Put differently: set Didier> economical and ecological limits. In this day and age, I Didier> don't think Debian should be supporting flying long Didier> distances for short events [2]. So we could have a Didier> duration-to-distance, or similar, criteria, as well as I think factoring these concerns in is important to do. But there are a number of other factors that also matter. * If a sprint is happening, we need to sponsor the right people to attend that sprint, and sometimes that involves long-distance travel. * People in Europe and to a lesser extent North America are geographically privileged in Debian in some significant ways. We might well choose to spend money to help balance that out some. I strongly believe that Debian should be about free software. Every time we mix in some other issue, we reduce our contributor base and dilute our mission. For that reason I'm not in favor of Debian making environmental preferences like preferring more expensive train travel over cheaper flights. I don't have a problem with individual events making such choices. >From personal experience I note that trains are a lot less accessible to people who are blind (and quite possibly a number of other disabilities in some areas of the world) than planes. You can say that you'd make exceptions for disabilities. But asking people to declare their disability and judging them like that makes us second class citizens. I don't trust many of the people in Debian who might be making those decisions to treat me with compassion and so I'd be more likely to just not go to the event than to go through the exercise of proving myself and my needs to someone who has limited understanding of the cost to me of what they are understanding. Didier> Without common rules-of-thumb, you, as DPL, would be Didier> de-facto delegating the setting of travel support policies Didier> to events; with potentially large differences in how we Didier> address the requests, and I'd regret this. I think it is OK for different events to have different policies. We have that today. I am not going to spend my time trying to facilitate reconciling that. Didier> So what I'd would enjoy to see is exchanges along the lines Didier> of: Didier> - BSP Orga: hey DPL; we organize a 3-days/2-nights BSP and Didier> would like to support travel for potential attendees. We Didier> expect about 12 travel requests; what can you do for us? - I'd much rather event organizers come with a rough budget. As DPL I certainly don't have time or desire to put together a budget for someone. I don't think the treasurer team is up to guaranteeing that task for everyone.
