I’d like to restart the LLVM Bay Area meetup. Is anyone interested in helping out or leading this effort? I think finding a venue that has outdoor seating would be good given COVID concerns. I have a few ideas:
Community Centers: We can order food and utilize community spaces for our meetup. This would give the group more privacy and the ability to mingle with others easier. I have looked at centers in Los Altos and Palo Alto, so there are some options.
San Pedro Square Market: They have a variety of spaces we could reserve for this meetup. Attendees can order their own food from a variety of restaurants.
If anyone has any other suggestions, please let me know!
Big +1 for a space where folks can order and pay for their own food. I think that’s much more sustainable long-term and gives more flexibility, even though past events were nice in that they were often covered.
One thing to check is that it’d be good to allow folks to bring their own food (or attend w/o eating) if the options are expensive or may not include food folks can eat.
The other historical factor had been access to transit options which are very limited in the SF bay area sadly. Downtown Mountain View was specifically suggested years ago because of access to both light rail and caltrain. But I’m not sure about spaces that are as well set up as the two markets mentioned.
I know some senior folks @ Google that might be willing to help fund the event; I’d be happy to drive setting that all up and helping organize these again. I found them to be tremendously helpful in the past.
The last time I attended a Bay Area social, it was massive, and I ended up sitting with some people who barely knew what LLVM was; they just knew there was free food and beer. So a mild -1 to a fully free event.
Sorry for the delays. I just got approval for a small budget; for now we’ll be able to run ONE instance of the meetup at the prices I estimated. I can’t promise anything, but I suspect once we get this going and exercise our internal expense reporting, organizing a second instance should be more straightforward.
Next, I will contact the venue about scheduling.
@pogo59 I agree; there’s probably more cost effective means of raising awareness of LLVM. I was thinking I’d send out a Google form for folks who were interested in attending to RSVP (since this venue will need a headcount) that asked for their email and SHA from a commit of theirs in LLVM? WDYT? Could be a SHA within the past 6 months? Then I’d send a calendar invite with the details once I’ve verified the SHA.
Depends on the goal of the social. I no longer live in the bay area so it’s a pretty abstract exercise for me; I just thought it was worth observing that attendance got out of hand in the previous model. Limiting to recent contributors is one tactic, although it’s a chunk of work on your part to do the verification.
I would like to discourage limiting any meetups to recent contributors only.
I am happy to book meeting space at local community centers for the LLVM bay area meetup as I think that would help alleviate some space constraints from restaurant venues. However, this would be different than what they were in the past as it would not have any open bar (which I don’t think should be a prerequisite but I realize some folks enjoyed that aspect). I also think putting this with a small cost to attend is reasonable (ie 10 dollars) as it would make ordering food much easier for a group.
To be clear, I’m not trying to take over organizing this. I was providing help if you wanted it. I read you could host one meetup on your current budget and that you were worried about size/RSVP. The large banquet area you mentioned is far larger than the meetup usually is (AFAIK) and even the small area seems sufficient. So space isn’t an issue, it just sounds like you may be paying more out of pocket if people RSVP but don’t show up? Maybe I’m reading that wrong.
The LLVM Foundation is hoping to help local meetup organizer with some expenses going forward. The would include rental fees for spaces like community event spaces and then charge a small fee to cover food for the event and also help with the RSVP no-show situation.
What would this google form include other than name? A small fee could be setup in Meetup to try to discourage no-shows. I assume you are charged per person?
Oh, I see. Sorry; I think I had just misunderstood your points.
The venue I’m thinking of I’m pretty sure doesn’t charge for plates that are RSVP’d but no showed; I should confirm that with them though as I’m not 100% certain that’s their policy. I think it’s more so that they need some rough-ish number to ensure they have staff on hand at that time, and whether to seat folks in the smaller or larger of the two distinct rooms they have. If we RSVP that there will be 40 people, and only 30 show, I think they will only charge us for the 30 that do show, but I should confirm with the venue. If that’s indeed the case, the no-show aspect becomes a non-issue.
Oh, I didn’t know about the LLVM Foundation’s budget. I suspect that if I have a hard time getting an approval from my employer for a second instance, maybe that’s something I’d look into making use of.
In terms of splitting the cost (between my employer’s budget, LLVM Foundation’s budget, and any fee charged or collected), I’m curious how paying for and then expensing might be complicated (particularly if there’s a fee or donation), but perhaps it doesn’t have to be complicated. Like paying would be use up the cash fee, then have budgets to cover the rest. Collecting the fee in person is another complication; I wonder if we could do that ahead of time online, and that becomes the RSVP? Know any sites that can do that? I wonder if meetup.com you can charge for events like that? Perhaps that complicates the expensing further… If no-shows aren’t an issue, charging a fee is perhaps better than asking for someone’s recent contributions to LLVM…though folks might not be able to cover a fee, but not charging a fee is simplest.
A form might include name and email address; I live and die by Google calendar, so I’m happy to send calendar invites as reminders. Those help alleviate no-shows, too.
I assume if there is a fee, collecting it per person would be simpler (than say by employer).
@tonic when you refer to community center, I’m curious about food. I was imagining a restaurant again for the food (not the beer). If we host at a community center, then I guess we’d look at having the event catered then at that point?
Stein’s in Mountain View also has a nice outdoor location and before the pandemic we were at that location as well. I agree that being close to transit did make a difference for a lot of folks.
I would not object to charging a fee for those working full-time but I would prefer that it would be free for students, interns etc
The previous meetups could be very well attended and while I really enjoyed this since I was able to meet a pretty diverse group of folks and had so many amazing conversations I think I would feel safer with a limited attendance. While being outdoors does reduce the risk a lot, it does not eliminate it. Unless we plan on requiring a negative covid test. If that was the case I would feel comfortable with unlimited attendance.
From discussion here on this topic I can’t tell if the July 7th Meetup event at Steins is actually happening or not. It looks like it could be a recurring event from when they were definitely still occurring.
If not, my input is to make organizing or attending the social event uncomplicated and unburdensome. I’m happy to pay for my own food and beer and wouldn’t expect otherwise.
PM
and talk about compilers for a bit 
! Either way, I’ll be there this Thursday
of you better show up 