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maybe i'm just being naive, but i have the feeling if we: a) strongly stated that we support and encourage diversity and would like to see that reflected in our presentation lineup b) allowed people to include some information about themselves in the proposal that increases voter awareness ( like "newcomer" or "diverse perspective" or something... god, really hard not to put a joke in here. ). The designation would be the presenter's choice. c) simply reiterated the goals and code of conduct right before voting time so everyone remembers the we had this discussion. I kinda think if we did that, we'd meet our goals and would avoid having to make a bunch of voting rule changes or form a committee. On Wed, Nov 28, 2012 at 6:58 PM, Kyle Banerjee <[log in to unmask]>wrote: > On Tue, Nov 27, 2012 at 6:30 PM, Cynthia Ng <[log in to unmask]> > wrote: > > > I'm really glad to see this discussion continuing. It seems like > > there's a good amount of support for at least giving a certain amount > > of sessions over for the program committee to decide. > > > > Frankly, I'd favor letting them decide *all* of the sessions, the logic > being that the only reason for a program committee to exist in first place > is to put together a program. > > Don't get me wrong. I like approval voting. I like the idea of putting on > what people want. But that's not the same as putting on what people ask > for. > > When you ask a decent sized population what they want, they'll ask for > things they know they want to learn and people they want to hear from. > What's wrong with that? For starters, it encourages intellectual > inbreeding. Problems, technologies, etc, that affect more people are > favored while things with a more select appeal get deemphasized. But IMO, > the reason to go to c4l is not to learn about X or Y, but to expose > yourself to people and things that were totally off your radar. > > Secondly, the program should be a coherent whole, not a collection of > parts. People choose sessions individually without any knowledge of what > else will be on the program. Balance can only be achieved by accident or if > someone is making it happen (i.e. the program committee). People shouldn't > just be submitting things -- the committee should identify talented > individuals who aren't already known and actively recruit them. They should > directly suggest topics to people who know something but have trouble > recognizing how much their ideas would benefit the community. By taking a > much more active role in recruiting presentations, the program committee > can mitigate the self selection issue as well as tackle the diversity issue > head on. It's not like the process wouldn't still be community driven since > anyone can be on the program committee. > > As far as the 15% target goes, I think that's a decent goal but would hope > it would be much higher in practice. This conference is all about > participation and sharing. At the first c4l, 100% of the sessions were by > first time attendees. I seem to remember that the vast majority of the > people attending were on the stage at some time. Besides, a lot of people > do their best work early in their careers. > > And to all the people reading this who feel shy/intimidated about jumping > in, you're too respectful of the status quo. There are a lot of dedicated > people who really know what they're doing. But you should never be afraid > to call things as you see them. If everyone in a group you like thinks one > thing, and you think another, that doesn't make you wrong -- to believe > otherwise is a substitute for thinking. Creative spark rather than > technical skill is what moves us forward and many of the people who appear > very established were regarded as yahoos not that long ago. > > To summarize, I favor having the program committee decide the whole program > and think their process should be informed by voting and goals of the > community. > > kyle >