[boston-pig] Boston PyCon 2008 Bid
Napoleone, Doug
Doug.Napoleone at nuance.com
Thu Feb 1 23:29:20 MST 2007
First I would like to thank everyone who responded to the call for
volunteers. With this much support, having PyCon in Boston will not
be a problem.
For full information on PyCon and the 08 Bid process see:
http://us.pycon.org/TX2007/HomePage
http://pyfound.blogspot.com/2006/04/so-you-want-to-host-pycon-2008.html
http://wiki.python.org/moin/PyCon2008
http://wiki.python.org/moin/PyConPlanning/BidRequirements
I would like to start the real work behind the bid process.
To do this I will need the help of 3-5 people over the next three weeks
running up to the PSF PyCon 2008 Meetings to be held Feb, 24th and 25th
in Texas. You don't need to be present at the meeting to help out.
My Contact Information:
e-mail is doug dot napoleone at nuance dot com
google talk/jabberid: doug dot napoleone at google dot com/Home
AIM: Derivin
phone: 1-774-644-0049
I will need help gathering information from local hotels (listed below),
taking pictures of one or two of them, and help to choose the best one.
I will also need help setting up a Boston Bid Wiki page.
I also request that people who are interested in helping out add
their names to that wiki page (once it is created) to show what a
strong community we have in boston.
If one of our bids (plural explained below) is accepted we will need local
volunteers to put in an hour here or there over the year, up until the
actual convention date when the real help will be needed. Mostly help
with promotion, setup and teardown.
This is a VERY long e-mail so if you are not interested, please feel
free to stop reading now (if you have not already).
If you are interested in helping out, please read all the
information below, and contact me. I will set up a google chat, and
get the wiki going to coordinate things. I would like to start
calling hotel event coordinators Monday.
I will be at the Feb. 8th meetup, and we might discuss things then,
but I would perfer to keep that open for PyCon presenters who want
practice.
Included in this e-mail is an overview of how we will proceed with
building the bid, a crib sheet of the information on the conference
for use when talking to the hotels, and a list of hotels with links to
contact & space information.
===================================
Welcome to the PyCon08 Bid Process!
===================================
Initial bids are gathered from hotels and the best are put forward
to the PSF and convention organizers, afterward the final contract
with the chosen location is drawn up and signed.
Bids for a city usually give two (or more) options.
The plan is to put forth a Harvard+hotel and a central hotel option.
Samuel Klein and Ivan Krstic are putting together a Bid to have
the conference held at Harvard and have people stay at a nearby hotel.
They are both alumni and both work on the One Laptop Per Child project.
This might be a cheaper option than having the conference in a hotel.
I would like to put together an alternative option for having the
conference in a hotel which has good T access, easy to get to from
the airport, plenty of room, and activities for the family. Basicly
a dream location. I chose the hotels listed below for their location,
their meeting room space, and some personal experience in that order.
If anyone knows of other options, please speak up; (keep in mind
the information listed in the crib sheet below).
Normally you would go to the local chamber of commerce or the Mass
Technology Leadership Council and send out a single request for bids
from all local hotels and conference centers. You then get back 15-30
(or more) bids to follow up on. Most are standard form bids.
Then you pick promising ones and start up a dialouge.
San Fan. CA and Chicago are both putting together bids, and this is
the process they used. They are still getting bids from hotels and will
soon get negotiations underway.
We will NOT be doing this.
PyCon is unlike most conferences and defies conventions (ok bad pun).
Our needs are very unique and are included in the crib sheet below and
on the requirements page. Contacting the Hotel event co-ordinators
directly, by phone and in person, is the best option and will get the
best results.
===========================
Bid Information Crib Sheet:
===========================
0. Overview
-We are a 100% volunteer organized conference with 400-600 attendees.
-The conference is week long, broken into three parts:
Tutorial day (thursday)
Main Conference (friday-sunday)
Sprint days (monday-thursday)
-We are extreemly technical with 400 computers connected to the network
-The main keynotes will be given with schoolroom style seating. (600
max)
-We serve lunch and have two snack breaks (not durring sprint days)
0.1. Links
http://us.pycon.org/TX2007/HomePage
http://pyfound.blogspot.com/2006/04/so-you-want-to-host-pycon-2008.html
http://wiki.python.org/moin/PyCon2008
http://wiki.python.org/moin/PyConPlanning/BidRequirements
0.2. Dates
-Harvard option: Spring Break (March?)
-Hotel option: Thur. Feb 21st - Thur Feb 28th. (core con 22nd-24th) 2008
1. Attendance
1.1. breakdown of expected attendance:
-Before thursday: ~10 people w/ access to space wednsday evening
-Thursday, tutorial day: ~200 people
-Friday-Sunday: 400-600 people (410 in '06, >475 in '07)
-Monday-Thursday, sprints: 150, 100, 50, 25
1.2. A multi-year contract for 2 years is acceptable if it gets us a lower
rate, but we should be careful come contract time
1.3. Space breakdown:
-Main ballroom should hold 500-600 people in a classroom layout.
-We need minimum 3 primary rooms for the 3 main tracks (usually ballroom
divided or divided ballroom + 1 room)
-Each of the 3 primary track rooms should hold 150 people (theater
seeting is fine for non-ballroom space)
-Need 5 classrooms for tutorial day 30-50 people classroom seating. (we
can be flexable here)
-Sprinting can be flexible.
-Space outside meeting rooms for moving between talks & breaks
-Quiet lounge
1.5. Room rates/breakdown
-We would like to keep it to ~$80 a night pretax for a single/double.
-We can currently garentee 700 room nights. The 07 data is not yet fully
in and we might be able to garentee up to 900.
-Old Expected 07 ~1000 breakdown: W:80 T:200 F:200 S:200 S:100 M:50 T:40
W:30 T:10 (We want to contract for < expected)
-Hotel rate would be allowed for the monday before the conference
through the following friday evening.
-A higher rate for the sprint week is acceptable.
2. A/V
2.1. Hotel gets first option usually, may contract out.
2.2. We need:
-Mic/amp/speaker for 3 main presenters (we have some mics, but not much)
(basic PA stuff)
-Special projectors might be needed by location, might need to rent or
contract out.
-We have some projectors (3?) but not enough (PSF is currently
purchasing some)
-We record presentations. Standard hook into system needed.
3. Food
3.1. Hotel usually gets first option on making a bid (we would like $36-$42
per person per day cost)
3.2. External catering is usually also an option, get recomendations from
hotel
3.2. Breakdown:
-Buffet lunch thursday-sunday (w/vegitarian option)
-Coffee/tea early morning thursday-sunday
-morning break snacks/soda friday-sunday
-afternoon break snacks/soda friday-sunday
-water in rooms/hallways thursday-sunday
3.3. breakfast will not be served, neither will dinner. Hotel rest. will be
recommended to attendees
(but we will also recommend local shops as well).
4. Network
4.1. we have 400 people on the internet via wireless at the height of the
con.
4.2. We will have our own industrial grade wireless AP's (load balanced
even)
4.3. We require T1 bandwidth (down) but minimal upstream.
4.4. Wired access is also usefull.
4.5. attendees do not get free internet in their rooms, only in con space.
4.6. We need power for all these devices. (we have the industrial power
strips, but dont want to overload outlets)
============================
Hotels w/ Conference Centers
============================
There are three hotels part of the Prudential/Coply complex.
These three hotels all connected to two malls and have fantastic T/Parking
access.
You can go from the airport to the hotel w/o going out side
(but you do have to switch commuter rail lines). All three can vastly exceed
our needs. They are also the most expensive in all of boston. The prudential
happens to be the best fit (and might be the cheapest of the three).
The top 3 hotel options [from what I can find] are:
1. Sheraton Boston Hotel & towers (prudential center) [best of everything]
2. Boston Marriott Hotel Long Wharf [ballroom might be too
small]
3. The Boston Park Plaza Hotel & Towers [not good T access]
Top Three:
==========
#1 Sheraton Boston Hotel & Towers (prudential center)
-----------------------------------------------------
http://www.swift-tourism.com/sheraton/boston.htm
http://www.starwoodhotels.com/sheraton/property/meetings/floor_map_chart.htm
l?propertyID=430&buildingKey=251450&floorKey=2
We should take most of the 2nd floor for the conference.
Grand Prefunc for the main hallway & lunch
Republic A - storage
Republic B - Quiet Lounge
Grand - well the main crand room (too bad it can't be split)
Constitution A&B for the other two tracks
BackBay A-D for open space, tutorial rooms, sprinting?
Or just the 3 Independent and 3 Liberty areas?
Grand/Prefunc/Const should make up the core of the conference.
#2 Boston Marriott Hotel Long Wharf
-----------------------------------
http://www.swift-tourism.com/marriott/long-wharf.htm
http://marriott.com/property/meetingsandevents/floorplans/boslw
Only holds 420 schoolroom in ballroom (swift tourism has bad data).
A mix of theater and schoolroom might work...
This hotel has the perfect location, right off the blue line, across from
faneuil hall
This would show off one of the most beautiful parts of boston.
Right on the water! Next to the Aquarium!
The main ballroom is the ONLY issue, talking to the hotel might clear this
up!
#3 The Boston Park Plaza Hotel & Towers
---------------------------------------
http://www.swift-tourism.com/park-plaza.htm
http://www.bostonparkplaza.com/
I love, Love, LOVE! This hotel.
But the T access is poor, the room layout is less than optimal for the types
of presentations we have, and the electrical/network is an issue.
Fantastic location IN the theater district! VERY well priced as well.
It's the Theater district! Imagine getting a group rate to Blue Man Group
for Sat. Night!
I also happen to know that they decided not to go with the local SciFi
convention
in january/febuary and instead have a Doctors convention. The Doctors
convention
was canceled, and now they have nothing currently scheduled in Feb. at all.
Also Contact:
=============
Westin Hotel, Copley Place
--------------------------
http://www.swift-tourism.com/westin/copley.htm
http://www.starwoodhotels.com/westin/property/meetings/floor_map_chart.html?
propertyID=1035&buildingKey=365117&floorKey=3
We would need to take the 3rd and forth floors most likely.
Use the 4th floor main ballroom for all the scheduled presentations (splits
into 3rds) and the prefunc for lunch.
The Open Space/etc would be on the 3rd. We might be able to squeeze into the
3rd if we
Went for a mix of classroom and theater in the 3rd floor ballroom.
There is an escelator between the floors and it's a very open atmosphere, so
two floors will not be an issue.
Just more costly, so we should try to avoid it.
Boston Marriott Copley Place
----------------------------
http://www.swift-tourism.com/marriott/copley.htm
http://marriott.com/property/meetingsandevents/floorplans.mi?page=all
We could do it all in the 4th floor grand ballroom and still not fill the
space.
Ballroom F&G for main ballroom schoolroom setup.
Ballroom E as the other main event room.
Ballroom A, B, C & D for open space rooms
Ballroom K for storage
Ballroom H, I, J for um.. Who cares?
Cambridge Center Marriott
-------------------------
http://www.swift-tourism.com/marriott/cambridge.htm
http://marriott.com/property/meetingsandevents/floorplans/boscb
Again, bad seating info on swift-tourism. Only holds 550 classroom and there
is
Barely enough space for tutorials/open space.
Just out of the question:
=========================
Seaport/Word Trade Center Boston
--------------------------------
http://boston-meeting-planning.seaportboston.com/SeaBos/Meetings/SubPage.asp
?PID=721622803&SHID=40838170086279.84
Space is either too small or too big for us.
Dedicated to conferences and extreemly large functions.
WAY too expensive!
Hynes convention center
-----------------------
http://www.mccahome.com/events.html
They are already fully booked.
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