mo@seismo.CSS.GOV (Mike O'Dell) (06/23/87)
Just a few thoughts as to why Usenix meetings get held where they do... Winter meetings: At the moment, there is coordination with /usr/group since an overwhelming part of the membership says meetings with them are important. This is based on a real survey of the membership (not just meeting attendees) which had an astonishing return rate. Summer meetings: One big problem is the size of the meeting. Finding meeting space for 2000 people is hard. We are too big for most places, but far too small for the large ones. Further, hotel rooms for 1200-1500 hotel rooms are non-trivial to obtain, particularly when your membership tells you quite emphatically that the three most important considerations are (1) cost, (2) cost, and (3) cost, with immediate proximity to the meetings a close second. One of the big advantages of Phoenix in the summer is that it is CHEAP!! It is also hot, but so is at least 3/4ths of the rest of the country - Phoenix is also DRY which make HOT much more tolerable. (I live in Washington, DC, and would trade you even for Phoenix weather instantly.) As for the reception at Rawhide, it was clearly not the best ever held; the best was at Champagne-Urbana when the entire meeting went over to John Mullen's house for beer in the back yard and burgers&dogs cooked in his garage. And it wasn't crowded. However, those days are long, long gone. Again, the size is the issue. I will say, however, that if our luck holds, you can expect an AMAZING time in San Franscico next summer. And if Choice 1 fails, we could always rent an airplane hanger, 10 helium cylinders, and a billion balloons, catered with the canonical beer and hotdogs. (grin...) So, if people have constructive suggestions, not just flames about the intuitively obvious, I know the Board would love to hear them. They very much try do new things, and one of the liabilities of that is they all don't work out like you would have liked. -age-ID:age-I
grob@cmcl2.NYU.EDU (Lori S. Grob) (06/23/87)
In response to all the general bitching about Phoenix...
Yes, it was hot and miserable and we all suffered BUT ...
It was an extremely good conference.
The reasons for picking Phoenix were obviously financial. Usenix
has alot of people who attend on their own nickel and I am sure they
appreciated the off season rates.
The conference itself was very good and let's not lose sight of how hard
people worked to make it that way. Even ignoring the high quality
of the talks the amount of organizational work that went into it was
obviously staggering.
While everyone is entitled to complain (after all this is usenix)
about everything at all times, let's not get carried away and overlook
the hard work that goes into doing this TWICE A YEAR and usually gets only
flames as a result.
This is not to say that I didn't complain alot in Phoenix. I did.
But let's throw some bouquets at the people who ran this thing
(and who are undoubtedly reading this) along with the rocks. Okay?
Lori
Lori S. Grob (NYU Ultracomputer Project)
grob@nyu.arpa
{mcvax!seismo,floyd,harpo,ihnp4,...}!cmcl2!grob [That's c-m-c-ELL-2]
Courant Institute (NYU), 251 Mercer St., NYC 10012, 212-998-3350
"I wish I were as certain of anything as he is about everything" Macaulay
Anyone is entitled to disagree with me about anything at anytime.eric@hippo.UUCP (Eric Bergan) (06/24/87)
In article <44000@beno.seismo.CSS.GOV>, mo@seismo.CSS.GOV (Mike O'Dell) writes: > ... > particularly when your membership tells you quite emphatically > that the three most important considerations are (1) cost, > (2) cost, and (3) cost, with immediate proximity to the meetings > a close second. Is this still true? I noticed that the attendees seemed to be much more "corporate" than university or self-employeed for this Usenix. I suspect the membership is changing. Is cost still being held up as the most important consideration? Not that I want to start holding the meetings in downtown Manhattan, but they Hilton and Hyatt certainly weren't that cheap compared to other major cities. How many attendees stayed in the less expensive hotels due to price considerations? > And if Choice 1 fails, we could always rent an airplane hanger, > 10 helium cylinders, and a billion balloons, catered with the > canonical beer and hotdogs. (grin...) Sounds good to me... -- eric ...!ptsfa!hippo!eric