TECH4FRICA conference postponed for 2008
By oneafrikan | September 8th, 2008 |
I’ve been delaying this blog post in the hope that one or two avenues would change things, but unfortunately they haven’t and so it’s time to face reality ;-(
In short, unfortunately I/we weren’t able to raise enough money through sponsorship to cover enough of the costs needed to make the financial risks tenable, which effectively means no conference this year. The majority of responses were along the lines of “we’ve already allocated our budget for this year”, or “it’s not our business focus so we won’t spend money on it”.
*** Please spread the word ***
So, the obvious course of action is to try get into next years budgets; and keep plugging away at people to get at least a yes/no. Based on that, it’s either a yes for sometime in 2009 / 2010; or give up on the idea having tried, failed and learnt from it. I’m not convinced that giving up is the only option just yet though!! 
That said, a few good things have come from the efforts so far, and they are:
- a few people have stepped forward to offer sponsorship in the last week or two, unfortunately it’s not enough to cover costs, but it is a good sign.
- word seems to be spreading, I’ve been amazed at how many emails have come in every day, from all over.
- Most of the speakers have committed to staying involved, which means that we’re still able to speak to sponsors with such a great lineup
Bottom line:
- My sincerest apologies to you all.
- If you have any questions or comments, please comment.
Thanks, and will be blogging soon with more news!!
September 8th, 2008 @ 6:44 pm
Thanks for your efforts Gareth - I was really looking forward to meeting other local developers and advocates.
I am still planning on coming to Johannesburg that weekend and would like to meetup with whomever else will be in town. We can have an ad-hoc little meetup, perhaps the kernel for the future conference.
Coincidentally, the following week there is a BarCamp Johannesburg planned. I’m hoping that we can potentially bring that forward to the weekend of October 4 - since the following weekend conflicts with MobileActive.
http://barcamp.org/BarCampJohannesburg
Regardless, any meetup or discussions are still great!
September 8th, 2008 @ 7:32 pm
I was very interested in attending this event and have been from the first time you announced it. The time to canvass for sponsorship against next year is now. Keep up the good work.
September 8th, 2008 @ 7:50 pm
[...] You can read the blog post and comments here. [...]
September 8th, 2008 @ 8:23 pm
Generally, my views, never seem to make sense — but amma share them any way, hopefully this time the english language won’t fail me —-
I still think, there is a need to think big, but start small — I speak from my perspective, but this web dev/design has been a lonely place since 1996/7 — there is more people now interested, but it’s still not crowded. I don’t even know how many people in jozi/jhb are into this ’stuff’ — if locally we can grow a ‘collective’ of sessions, meetups, get togethers to discuss these things, surely the different lil groups put together maker a greater noise —
arggggggggggggg — done lost my plot again — i fear i don’t contradict myself somehow.
Hopefully somebody can hear through my noise.
September 9th, 2008 @ 3:42 pm
ok.. so now is the time to get as many of us techheads involved and let’s build critical mass.. serious momentum and steamroll these fools into understanding how they can benefit thru involvement in T4A..
perhaps u should consider non-tech brands as sponsors as well.. like Stork..(Unilever)..
September 9th, 2008 @ 3:44 pm
seconds… plse issue regional/city/provincial licenses to people who can, will and want to speak on behalf of T4A.. and start recruiting.. online.. offline.. below the line.. above the line.. thru the line..
i’m dying to start a techie meet-up in durban, but in a way that doesn’t get my own horn tooted at the end of the day.. this seems like “vrugbare grond”..
September 9th, 2008 @ 3:46 pm
thirdly.. now u have time on your hands to work a level of interactivity and cross-communication/access (so others who are not family can see my family baobab) into kindo..
September 10th, 2008 @ 2:02 am
Gareth,
This news comes as a bummer! I will say this though, you most certainly started something… you planted a seed, and over the next year, i think you need to lean on this community to make sure this seed grows. Project Diaspora will do as much as we can to promote it. Let me know if we can be of assistance in getting the word out early for next year’s event…
September 10th, 2008 @ 3:39 am
[...] sad news just in, the guys behind Tech4Africa had to cancel the event due to lack of adequate sponsorship. Even with a flurry of last minute donors, the funds [...]
September 10th, 2008 @ 8:24 pm
Sorry to hear about the cancellation =[
Would have been great I'm sure. Nevermind; on-ward and up-ward we go! Unfortunately the web dev / design industry here is a little slower than the rest of the world; but persevere and good things will happen mate!
On that note; if you're ever in need of speakers for PHP Dev or CSS / Accessibiliy / Usabilty and SEO; drop me a line! I'm sure we can sort something out! ;]
Thanks
James
September 24th, 2008 @ 1:08 pm
Move the Conference to Dar-es-Salaam,Tanzania and I would look for sponsors for the event.
Please get in touch. Lets do this thing.
October 2nd, 2008 @ 7:04 am
Thanks for effort Gareth - getting sponsors for anything is always tricky.
Regards
Ferdie
October 3rd, 2008 @ 6:54 pm
I emailed the organizers asking to sponsor and never got a response… Hopefully it will happen some other time. Thanks for your efforts - I think there must have been confusion
October 4th, 2008 @ 2:15 pm
Following your efforts with interest. My BEST wishes for the future…
Will keep in touch. I am http://twitter.com/meerkatje as well.
Please follow me if you would like to see what we are up to…
October 14th, 2008 @ 11:49 pm
Занимаюсь дизайном и хочу попросить автора technologyforafrica.org отправить шаьлончик на мой мыил) Готов заплатить…