I've been told, though obviously I don't know, that the costs are proportional. I assume it's not literally a "if we get one additional person, it costs an additional $500". But I assume SM wasn't proposing to get just one or a few more "open source developer" attendees. If we're talking about just a few people it's not worth arguing about... or doing anything about. It would only be useful if we got a lot of such attendees. -hadriel On Aug 18, 2013, at 10:01 AM, John C Klensin <john-ietf@xxxxxxx> wrote: > > > --On Sunday, 18 August, 2013 08:33 -0400 Hadriel Kaplan > <hadriel.kaplan@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > >> ... >> And it does cost the IETF lots of money to host the physical >> meetings, and that cost is directly proportional to the number >> of physical attendees. More attendees = more cost. > > I had promised myself I was finished with this thread, but I > can't let this one pass. > > (1) If IETF pays separately for the number of meeting rooms, the > cost is proportionate to the number of parallel sessions, not > the number of attendees. > > (2) If IETF gets the meeting rooms (small and/or large) for > "free", the costs are borne by the room rates of those who stay > in the hotel and are not proportionate to much of anything > (other than favoring meetings that will draw the negotiated > minimum number of attendees who stay in that hotel). > > (3) Equipment costs are also proportional to the number of > meetings we run in parallel. Since IASA owns some of the > relevant equipment and has to ship it to meetings, there are > some amortization issues with those costs and shipping costs are > dependent on distance and handling charges from wherever things > are stored between meetings (I assume somewhere around Fremont, > California, USA). If that location was correct and we wanted to > minimize those charges, we would hold all meetings in the San > Francisco area or at least in the western part of the USA. In > any event the costs are in no way proportionate to the number of > attendees. > > (4) The costs of the Secretariat and RFC Editor contracts and > other associated contracts and staff are relatively fixed. A > smaller organization, with fewer working groups and less output, > might permit reducing the size of those contracts somewhat, but > that has only the most indirect and low-sensitively relationship > to the number of attendees, nothing near "proportional". > > (5) If we have to pay people in addition to Secretariat staff > to, e.g., sit at registration desks, that bears some monotonic > relationship to the number of attendees. But the step > increments in that participate function are quite large, nothing > like "directly proportional". > > (6) The cost of cookies and other refreshments may indeed be > proportional to the number of attendees but, in most facilities, > that proportionality will come in large step functions. In > addition, in some places, costs will rise with the number of > "unusual" dietary requirements. The number of those > requirements might increase with the number of attendees, but > nowhere near proportionately. "Unusual" is entirely in the > perception of the supplier/facility but, from a purely economic > and cost of meetings standpoint, the IETF might be better off if > people with those needs stayed home or kept their requirements > to themselves. > > So, meeting "cost directly proportional to the number of > physical attendees"? Nope. > > best, > john > > p.s. You should be a little cautious about a "charge the big > companies more" policy. I've seen people who make the financial > decisions as to who comes say things like "we pay more by virtue > of sending more people, if they expect us to spend more per > person, we will make a point by cutting back on those we send > (or requiring much stronger justifications for each one who > wants to go)". I've also seen reactions that amount to "We are > already making a big voluntary donation that is much higher than > the aggregate of the registration fees we are paying, one that > small organizations don't make. If they want to charge us more > because we are big, we will reduce or eliminate the size of that > donation." Specific company examples on request (but not > on-list), but be careful what you wish for. > > > > >