Updates about the GNOME.Asia2009 bits

[Sankarshan (সঙ্কর্ষণ) <sankarshan randomink org>]

It has been a while since there have been updates about it, here's
what has been happening:

Sayamindu has been helping me talk to the potential hosts (IIT-Madras
and IIT-Mumbai) about the event. We re-used parts of the content in
the brochure from last year to pitch at the places. However, at this
point, we are facing two different issues:

* examinations - being universities, both have their examination
schedules are clashing with the proposed dates. The downside of that
is that we would end up looking at a loss of volunteers and
stakeholders at the venues

* scoping - of the event. In all our talks, the institutions have been
pretty much diligent in asking what the speaker size is, what would be
the expected attendance etc. The underlying reason for that is to
estimate how much the departments at the universities have to outlay
in terms of accommodation (this generally gets back-charged) etc.
Perception prevails that this isn't a good economic year and, it is
natural for the departments to be wary.

Bottom-line, I am not too upbeat about the way things are going. I am
planning to approach a few other venues especially institutions to
check out how things stand. I am giving myself another week for that,
after that, I plan to informally sound out what it takes to get an
event management group handle it.

~s

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