On Thu, 25 Aug 2011, Stephen Farrell wrote:
I didn't say that. I said that IETF meeting hotel prices have
risen more than 20% above inflation. I have no idea if average
hotel prices for setups like ours have done that, or if the
IETF attendees are really getting a bad deal. I think the
latter though to be honest. Have you evidence that I'm right
or wrong?
I'll let the people who crunch the numbers answer that one.
and that isn't limited to the venues under consideration by the
IETF. NANOG and APRICOT hotel rates have gone up as have other
meeting hotel rates,
Do you/the iaoc have solid information on that or just anecdotes? Do
the iaoc communicate with other conference organisers to get such
information? Have those other rates gone up more or less than IETF
HQ rates?
Well, *I* attend all of those events and *I* have experienced
significant increases in hotel rates over the last decade. You can
call that an anecdote I suppose. Based on my experience, the increases
are across the board.
Fine. But not very relevant. Hotel prices in, for example,
Ireland, have fallen thanks to our local financial incompetence.
I don't know the trends in hotel prices where we meet, but would
hope that the iaoc does. Do you?
Again, I don't have comprehensive data, but will note (again) that we
are severely limited by venue availability for an event our size,
based on the "one-roof" desire, and (often) inclusion of meeting
rooms.
I think the only way to get HQ hotel rates down
Have the iaoc actually tried to achieve this specific goal?
Personally, I don't believe you've been doing that, but I
could be wrong.
It's been said already that there is a tradeoff between "big city"
venues (that have meeting space) and remote resorts like CityWest: in
both cases the HQ hotel is often expensive, but the community clearly
wants us to go places where they have alternatives. Hotel rates are
certainly high on our list of factors when choosing a venue, but it
isn't the only factor.
Go for it and we'll see. Maybe it'll be crap (but to be honest
how much can it differ from Disney;-) but its worth trying so
long as the meeting facilities work for the meeting.
We can certainly look into it.
The University Campus, or maybe "University Conference Center" idea
is worth exploring, such places do exist (in Atlanta for example),
but, as others have pointed out, we need to clearly define what the
goal is here and recognize that there are some incompatible
requirements.
I think this is *very* much worth doing. (Full disclosure: I tried
to get IETF-72 in Trinity College Dublin but that fell over thanks
in part to our local fascist sysadmins who hopefully don't read this
list;-)
Bottom line - the HQ hotel is a big cost for those who stay there
and getting to the unaffordable state for various folks for various
reasons. *Please* make it a specific goal to reduce that. Or
produce some model of overall costs that you aim to reduce if you
prefer. Anything so long as its measurable and starts going down.
S.
PS: Just in case. Yes we can stay at alternative hotels. But
nonetheless, aiming to reduce the HQ hotel rate is still a
good thing.
Ole
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