Add first advisory board meeting notes
Abner Coimbre
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start_dark_color: "black"
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bg_color: "#060610"
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content_class: "mt-4"
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content: "[Abner](https://abner.page) is founder of Handmade Cities and the sole organizer for our conferences.<br><br>At a young age he was mentored by Kennedy Space Center on how they make software. After winning NASA’s Intern of the Year, Abner penned an essay on their programming philosophy: featured in the [news](https://observer.com/2017/07/a-look-into-nasa-coding-philosophy-kennedy-space-center-programming/). He was subsequently promoted to launch control engineer.<br><br>Abner started the [Handmade Network](https://handmade.network/), an online community learning to make quality software. He went on to work under Jonathan Blow for several years and finally Cyan Worlds to ship the [Myst remake](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1255560/Myst/).<br><br>Now in his early thirties, Abner's mounting concern of declining software standards—both ethical and technical—pushed him to run conferences and grow local meetups full-time. (He still loves [programming](https://terminal.click) though.)"
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content: "[Abner](https://abner.page) is founder of Handmade Cities and the sole organizer for our conferences.<br><br>At a young age he was mentored by Kennedy Space Center on how they make software. After winning NASA’s Intern of the Year, Abner penned an essay on their programming philosophy: featured in the [news](https://observer.com/2017/07/a-look-into-nasa-coding-philosophy-kennedy-space-center-programming/). He was subsequently promoted to launch control engineer.<br><br>Abner started the [Handmade Network](https://handmade.network/), an online community learning to make quality software. He went on to work under Jonathan Blow for several years and finally Cyan Worlds to ship the [Myst remake](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1255560/Myst/).<br><br>Now in his early thirties, Abner's mounting concern of declining software standards—both ethical and technical—pushed him to run conferences and grow meetups full-time. (He still loves [programming](https://terminal.click) though.)"
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- title: "Our Advisory Board"
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title_class: "mb-20 text-center text-white"
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---
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title: "Advisory Board"
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meta_title: "Advisory Board"
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layout: "single"
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description: "The Handmade Cities Advisory Board"
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draft: false
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---
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The Handmade Cities Advisory Board is the board appointed to advise the [founder](/about). They supervise the founder's general affairs as he:
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1. Organizes our two annual conferences: [Boston](/boston) in the summer, [Seattle](/seattle) in the fall
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2. Supports and grows our local meetups around the world
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3. Decides which talks, demos, interviews or similar content are given at Handmade Cities
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The board has voting power over talk and demo submissions from the community. The founder may override the board, but such a decision must be made public through the meeting notes below.
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The board meets once a month. Meet the members in the [About](/about) page.
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**MEETING NOTES (TIMES IN US/PACIFIC)**
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- [18 March 2025 16:00](/board/meeting/20250318)
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---
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title: "Advisory Board Meeting"
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meta_title: "Board's Meeting Notes"
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layout: "single"
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description: "Advisory Board Meeting Notes - 18 Mar 2025"
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draft: false
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---
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#### Meeting Notes - 18 Mar 2025
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**AGENDA**:
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No agenda set, first meeting
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---
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**DISCUSSION ITEMS**
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1. **Handmade Boston (HMB): Aug 1-2 (Fri-Sat)**
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- Sister conference to Seattle
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- Return to original technical lectures format
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- No more online track: No more online tickets or Twitch stream for Boston
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- We still plan to record in-person lectures for archival
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- Boston should have job booth rentals just like Seattle
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**2025 Target:** Two-hundred in-person attendees. We're still in the growth and experimentation stage
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2. **Handmade Seattle (HMS): Dec 5-7 (Fri-Sun)**
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- Flagship Conference
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- Fully-Hybrid: Physical track and online track like always
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- The formula is already perfected, just need to focus on selling out current venue again
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**2025 Target:** Four-hundred in-person attendees. The closest we got to selling all in-person tickets was Fall 2023, with 97% of all tickets sold (right before mass layoffs hit hard.)
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**Founder's note:** A general phenomenon is that once you finally pack a venue (typically a 400-seat theater), you'll see exponential growth the following year, exploding to say one thousand ticket holders and then an order of magnitude after that. See PyCon, VidCon, etc.
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3. **Ticket Sales**
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- Early bird sale begins sometime in the Spring (with 20% discount)
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- Once we start ticket sales we will use the [newsletter](/news) to request community submissions
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**Q: Are board members allowed to submit their own talks or demos?**
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*A: We've decided no, but we'll revisit the question (and its ethics) next year.*
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4. **Weekend Conferences**
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Board agreed hosting conferences over the weekend gives attendance a massive boost (even though venue rental is more expensive. Risk is worth it.)
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5. **Revolt Chat**
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- Board agreed [Revolt](https://revolt.chat) is a substantial improvement over Element/Matrix for the conference live chat
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- Board wondered whether we should support Discord as another private chat server, in a bid to expand audience
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- Founder noted a third of our ticket holders are anti-Discord and privacy-conscious
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Finally, the board recommended a survey to previous ticket holders.
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6. **Voting on Talk/Demo Submissions**
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- Matt Nite simply used a Google Form for Software You Can Love
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- It's best if the founder says "please read these submissions by the next meeting, and add your own notes"
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- Source speaker candidates from meetup hosts too
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We've agreed to create a dedicated email address for receiving submissions
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7. **Hard Deadlines to Commit to Present at HMB/HMS**
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- Gradually add penalties if deadlines are not met
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- Ensure all speakers sign agreement. No exceptions
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8. **Conference Agendas**
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- Get the agendas up as early as possible
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- It's okay to massage the schedule around throughout the year
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- It's okay to let speakers massage their talk title and description even if it's already on the website
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---
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**ACTION ITEMS**
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- Create HMC email address for community submissions
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- Create dedicated webpage explaining how to enter submissions. WITH DEADLINES
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- Discord integration for submissions: allows live thread discussions among board members
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- Make sure Jim (1st speaker for HMB) is on our website by the next meeting
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- Make sure Taylor (1st speaker for HMS) is on our website by the next meeting
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- Determine how many open slots we have for each conference
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**Founder's note:** The last item depends on the venue and the available hours the rental affords us, which is being negotiated. I will, however, present figures from previous years so we can estimate.
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---
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**NEXT MEETING**
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Date: 16 April 2025 1600-0500 (US/Pacific)
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