A short blog, because we’re in the slow time.
Over the last twenty years, Dan built up a bunch of BSDCan technology infrastructure. Andrew is busily scooping that out of his hands and migrating it to servers under his control. Once the web site is under the current team’s control, we’ll launch the 2024 edition and announce the 2024 dates. We won’t be using all of Dan’s infrastructure. Paper submission and conference registration systems are solved problems, and re-solving them is neither educational nor interesting.
Colin and Allan are still setting up the Canadian business to handle the money. Paperwork, government, all that translates to “hurry up and wait.” They’re pretty much settled on non-profit. A Canadian non-profit needs three directors, so Peter Hansteen got volunteered. We specifically wanted a director who was not part of FreeBSD. Peter’s main role will be to say, “Uh, guys, what about NetBSD?” (Allan and Colin will certainly do their best to be inclusive, but they’re unabashed FreeBSD folks.)
We’re also discussing financial transparency. Ideally, we’ll provide a subject-to-much-revision rough cut during the closing session, and a more complete report after the conference closes. We will not detail individual receipts for surge suppressors and whiteboard markers because someone will nitpick that we didn’t need them and even if we did we could have gotten them cheaper at https://FellOffATruck.crime — but on the other pitchfork tine, if we’re asking for money we must document that we’re not squandering it. Like any venture, our goal is to build up sufficient cushion to carry BSDCan through lean years.
We plan to get the the CFP out at the beginning of December and close it 15 January. That’ll let us announce accepted papers in February and let folks start booking travel.
Migrating two decades of accumulated tech is ugly, thankless work. If you see Andrew, buy him a drink.