[djangocon-organizers] Offering $250 tickets to women?
Audrey Roy
1) that you're all volunteers, and
2) that DjangoCon does not have enough money for a women's grant yet.
Would it be possible to offer a $250 ticket for first-time female
attendees? It can be done as a discount code to avoid any
controversy. The $395 ticket + $350-700 hotel cost + $250-600 flight
cost is scaring off a few women who really should be attending (if not
speaking).
I'm talking about intelligent, experienced female Django devs who work
for elite design agencies, who scale some of the biggest Django sites
in the world, etc. DjangoCon would give them the confidence to
open-source more of their code, as it did for me.
Audrey
Jeremy Dunck
with costs and whether the conference is likely to sell out.
But I'm not sure why a discount code would avoid controversy? Is the
concern that men might feel the discount unfair? How does a discount
code avoid that?
Aside from the conference reg cost, the lodging is the most easily affected.
As far as cutting lodging costs -- what about women collaborating to
share hotel rooms, or pairing to use AirBnB safely?
Audrey Roy
done to help immediately. If any organizer reading this has the power
to do something, could you set up a women's ticket or discount code
today?
There's a lovely lady with 4 extreme talk ideas who's on the fence
about submitting, due to financial issues. And another one who's the
dev/sysadmin for one of the top news sites in the world, who's not
sure why she should attend.
Audrey
David Cramer
--
David Cramer
On Thursday, June 30, 2011 at 8:42 PM, Audrey Roy wrote:
I mention the controversy aspect because I'm hoping something can be
done to help immediately. If any organizer reading this has the power
to do something, could you set up a women's ticket or discount code
today?
There's a lovely lady with 4 extreme talk ideas who's on the fence
about submitting, due to financial issues. And another one who's the
dev/sysadmin for one of the top news sites in the world, who's not
sure why she should attend.
Audrey
On Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 11:25 AM, Jeremy Dunck <jdu...@gmail.com> wrote:
I think as far as economics go, the organizers would need to speak up
with costs and whether the conference is likely to sell out.
But I'm not sure why a discount code would avoid controversy? Is the
concern that men might feel the discount unfair? How does a discount
code avoid that?
Aside from the conference reg cost, the lodging is the most easily affected.
As far as cutting lodging costs -- what about women collaborating to
share hotel rooms, or pairing to use AirBnB safely?
David Zhou
was a discount code set up, would every woman be eligible? Why only
first-time? Will the discount code be publicized and marketed to all
women? And if this did start, why now on the eve of early bird ending,
rather than say, at the very beginning of DjangoCon 2012?
In any case, if this code is primarily for the few women mentioned in
the original email, can I propose setting up a separate fundraising
drive if these women need financial help? I'd certainly donate some
some money towards a paypal account provided the background and talk
proposals of the women in question were revealed.
-- dz
> On Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 1:18 PM, Audrey Roy <aud...@cartwheelweb.com>
Jeremy Dunck
> I think there's some wider implications we should consider. If there
> was a discount code set up, would every woman be eligible? Why only
> first-time? Will the discount code be publicized and marketed to all
> women? And if this did start, why now on the eve of early bird ending,
> rather than say, at the very beginning of DjangoCon 2012?
Audrey has been pushing for assistance for some time, but is getting
noisier as the deadline approaches. I'll take advocacy when it comes,
but I hope to channel it into something both effective and fair.
> In any case, if this code is primarily for the few women mentioned in
> the original email, can I propose setting up a separate fundraising
> drive if these women need financial help? I'd certainly donate some
> some money towards a paypal account provided the background and talk
> proposals of the women in question were revealed.
Some people in need are not happy to admit it. It's reasonable that
they'd want some privacy. Would you also be happy to donate if OB or
DSF vouched that the money would go to people in need? Or is the
resumé so that you can judge on a case-by-case basis for yourself?
David Zhou
>> In any case, if this code is primarily for the few women mentioned in
>> the original email, can I propose setting up a separate fundraising
>> drive if these women need financial help? I'd certainly donate some
>> some money towards a paypal account provided the background and talk
>> proposals of the women in question were revealed.
>
> Some people in need are not happy to admit it. It's reasonable that
> they'd want some privacy. Would you also be happy to donate if OB or
> DSF vouched that the money would go to people in need? Or is the
> resumé so that you can judge on a case-by-case basis for yourself?
If DSF vouched that the people in question were contributing something
cool, then certainly it's enough for me. I also didn't mean names or
anything, but rather what they were planning to talk about, etc.
Eric Holscher
Shawn Milochik
I'd donate to that cause and wouldn't want to individually screen those
who are applying; I'd consider that an invasion of privacy. If the DSF
has the desire and time to collect and distribute the donations then
that would be cool.
A case-by-case basis is far better than a blanket discount to one group
to the exclusion of all others who are under-represented. I think it's
fair to say that cost (conference + travel + lodging) is the biggest
impediment to pretty much 100% of us, regardless of our DNA or physical
attributes.
I don't think the money should come out of the DSF (or Holden Web, or
whomever would lose the gross). If they can't afford to waive (or
reduce) the conference fees for the speakers, without whom there is no
conference, then it doesn't seem reasonable to discount tickets for
another group.
It is great if any group (business, local PUG or DUG, or
special-interest group) can fund one or more people so they can attend,
share what they can, and bring back what they learned. I see that Read
the Docs is doing that from Eric Holscher's recent post. I think
grass-roots efforts are much more feasible than looking for monetary
support from DjangoCon itself.
Patrick Altman
Vicky Tuite
What I would like to see for DjangoCon 2011 is something on the website to facilitate room sharing like PyCon has. I'm looking to share a room. Maybe transportation too. I'm driving up from the Bay Area and would be happy to give someone a ride.
On 06/30/2011 04:12 PM, Jeremy Dunck wrote:
In any case, if this code is primarily for the few women mentioned inSome people in need are not happy to admit it. It's reasonable that
the original email, can I propose setting up a separate fundraising
drive if these women need financial help? I'd certainly donate some
some money towards a paypal account provided the background and talk
proposals of the women in question were revealed.
they'd want some privacy. Would you also be happy to donate if OB or
DSF vouched that the money would go to people in need? Or is the
resumé so that you can judge on a case-by-case basis for yourself?
Daniel Greenfeld
We've already contributed a lot of time and money in the area of
supporting diversity in Python. But we are doing much more.
For the site we plan to launch shortly, http://whitespacejobs.com, all
the proceeds between now and DjangoCon will be spent towards getting
women to DjangoCon. That means travel, hotel, and food.
Also, we've been looking at our own finances to see what we can do. In
fact, we've already assured at least one talented but woefully unpaid
female developer that we'll cover any costs not covered by grants or
discounts.
Daniel Greenfeld
--
'Knowledge is Power'
Daniel Greenfeld
http://pydanny.blogspot.com
http://cartwheelweb.com
Eric Holscher
Chris Adams
> Let's not put the responsibility on the conference to discount these tickets. There are enough people in the community and companies that we should be able to do this ourselves.
>
> Audrey and the pyladies have said they will post some kind of official call for sponsorship, and then we can use that to direct people to if they want to help out.
>
> I just don't want money to keep anyone from proposing talks to the conference, or coming along to learn so that they can become awesome new members of the community.
On that note, I see two areas where I'd donate: it seems like there
would be a natural area for DSF to organize - but not fund - a grant
program for first-time speakers/attendees. I'm not sure whether it
falls under the DSF umbrella or not but I'd definitely donate to a
pyladies fund which is trying to help the hesitant make it to
conferences, which could naturally expand beyond djangocon.
Chris
Audrey Roy
I like Eric's idea and Chris' response. That sounds like a good way
to resolve this. Thanks for everyone's thoughts. Thanks both for
hearing me out and for having the courage to be honest about this
awkward issue.
I've put out a call for sponsorship here:
http://pyladies.com/blog/call-for-sponsorship/
All money will go toward helping as many women attend DjangoCon as
possible. Sponsors will get a personal email from me about the woman
you're sponsoring, plus a guarantee from me that PyLadies will mentor
her throughout her Python career and get her into open-source!
Audrey