FSOSS, Toronto, Canada, Friday Oct 28
A quick post to let those in and around Toronto know that if you’ve got some free time on Friday, Eben will be giving a talk about Raspberry Pi at the Free Software and Open Source Symposium (FSOSS) at Seneca College, York University. He’ll be giving his presentation at 2pm. If you want to attend, be sure to buy your ticket online rather than at the door – it’ll cost you much less than buying one when you arrive. I’m afraid we weren’t confirmed in time for you to get an early-bird ticket, but if you’re a student you can get in for CAD $40. General admissions are CAD $85.
This means that Eben’s going to have to leave the ARM Techcon in Silicon Valley pretty sharpish on Thursday afternoon after his presentation there, so if you’re one of the California attendees who has told us you want to meet him, nobble him immediately after his talk!
16 comments
Rollins
Lol so meeting the men in pi is more expensive than the pi itself. Not that it’s not worth it but, it’s a good sign this has become a BIG DEAL. Congrats can’t wait to get my own pi, and hope a Calgary Canada trip happens at sometime.
liz
Yeah – one of the things that’s really surprised me since I’ve been working on this is how much some conferences cost to attend, even if you’re just going for one session. It’s always a surprise when the open source conferences turn out to be the really pricey ones, too.
I understand that the ARM talk will definitely be recorded (I’m not going to either of these so can’t record them myself), and the FSOSS one may well be, so hopefully those who can’t make them will be able to watch the talks anyway. If you’ve watched any of Eben’s earlier presentations, I’d guess he’ll cover some ground you’re familiar with already, but he always makes sure that the Q&A sessions take up a substantial portion of any slot, and they’re always very interesting.
Jason Tigg
Will you be able to post the videos or a link to them on here when they are available? Thanks
ukmaker
As fascinating as Eben’s work is, not sure its appropriate to ‘nobble’ someone at a conference …
Abishur
Wait so the big seminar on how great open source is… costs a ton of money?
ramon1928
Open source conferences have trouble being sponsored.
In contrast corporations. who want you to buy your product after you saw it, will spend more on conferences/fund their own.
Chris Tyler
FSOSS is not an expensive event: Most attendees pay $40 and get two days of talks, two lunches, a reception, and a T-shirt — plus a swag bag and optional workshops. Most students get in for $20 (or for free by volunteering), and financial assistance is available should anyone need it. Even at the “we wish you hadn’t waited this long to register because we’ve already ordered T-shirts and lunches and printed badges” rate ($85 general/$40 students), it’s still a deal :-)
As a past chair,I assure you that the registration fees fall far short of covering the conference cost, and it’s only through the generous support of the sponsors that FSOSS breaks even.
(FSOSS talks are recorded and released under a CC license).
Nutmeat
I always feel disappointed when event organizers have to defend the fees they need to collect to cover event costs. The ignorance of the consumer is distracting you from the news: Eben is in Toronto, Canada, and will speaking in that country’s largest city this Friday. Exciting. I’d relish the opportunity to meet him, and to hear more about the dev work the students at Seneca have been doing to bring Fedora to the ARM.
Chris, I’m sorry you had to defend the good people of this conference, just because it’s not free as in beer.
Eben, thanks for spreading the news in Canada. The schools of this nation will benefit from your vision when they open their eyes to see it, too.
Lawrence Mandel
Actually, I received a free drink ticket with my registration so in a sense it is free as in 1 beer.
Thomas Bouchet
Is there any chance that, as a UK Foundation, there will be some conference in Europe ?
Fun stuff is always in California (US or Canada, ok).
liz
Well, you can see the board (but not us) in London on Saturday at the RiscOS show. The talks we’ve done/are doing in Oxford, New York, California and Canada are actually pretty geographically distant from each other, you know! We should be in continental Europe in the next few months too, and we are aware we need to go to other continents too – keep an eye on the website for announcements.
Thomas Bouchet
Arf !
This will be too short to come see it in London for me. But, I hope to see the team in Paris (France, not Texas ;) ) soon !
KyRol
Will be possible to capture some video and put it here or it will be prohibited?
liz
The organisers say they’ll be videoing it and releasing it with a CC licence, so we’ll be displaying it here. If you want to make your own video, Eben certainly has no objections, but you should check with the organisers too.
Lawrence Mandel
Great talk today at FSOSS. Seeing the Raspberry Pi demo was definitely the highlight of my day. I was glad to hear that the XBMC team has these in hand. As Eben said, I see lots of promise both inside and outside of the classroom.
karamoko keita
i want to buy one raspberry