It's a dry heat, unless there's a monsoon. I'd show.
On 2020-01-14 12:40, Henry Vanderbilt wrote:
On 1/13/2020 8:56 PM, willsrw wrote:
Hi
Does anyone have insight as to whether or not there will be a Space Access
Symposium this year? Last year's Symposium was a great start.
Thanks,
Rick Will
I might have some insight here. Ahem. (And yeah, it's getting past time I
shared what's going on with the conference.)
The short version: Not this April, alas. A Space Access right after Labor
Day is not impossible, but our current planning baseline is April '21.
Some background for the long version...
Agreed, last spring's Bay Area Space Access conference was programmatically
very useful. Putting a Space Access together has a way of clarifying what
the current priorities are, this one after a couple years hiatus even more
so. (More on what came out of that soon.)
Logistically speaking, doing the conference out-of-area ended up a wash - the
mix of issues straining our resources to the max changed, the net strain alas
did not. The good news: It didn't kill me - apparently I'm getting somewhat
healthier again finally.
Fiscally speaking, the Bay Area was, well, expensive. We hoped for a big
attendance bump there, we got a modest one, we just about broke even. Far
better than losing a big chunk - many thanks to everybody who worked their
hearts out helping keep things close - but not sustainable.
Net of the above: There will be more Space Access conferences. It's still
useful - it covers ground not really systematically addressed anywhere else
we're aware of. And it should be doable sustainably, though that's going to
take some more work.
We will do the next one in Phoenix. The logistics are easier and the prices
are lower.
We will not, alas, do the next Space Access this April. We were looking into
that, ran into logistical difficulties, had to punt.
We probably won't do it on an annual basis going forward either. Every
year-and-a-half to two years looks like a better interval, both to ease the
logistics, and to allow enough interesting new thinking to accumulate so each
conference has a higher cool-new-ideas to same-old-stuff ratio.
April of next year is our current baseline. Later this year, Labor Day or
shortly after, is still possible, but at this point low-probability.
RE both "later this year" and some long-term thoughts on possibly going to a
spring-fall schedule at 18 month intervals, an informal survey question: How
many would (or absolutely would not) consider coming to Phoenix somewhat past
the peak of the alien-desert-planet _hot_ part of the summer here for this
thing - possibly Labor Day weekend, possibly a week or two after, historical
average ~100F midafternoon highs, ~80F overnight lows - but to a really nice
resort hotel in a really nice many-restaurants-walkable touristy neighborhood
at a very tolerable price?
I ask because end of summer is slack season for space conferences in general
- once you hit October the calendar is jammed - and late summer is also
low-cost season for conference sites here. If you've got some heat tolerance
and are willing to be seen in public in shorts, hawaiian shirt, and a
wide-brimmed hat (or in a suit by the pool) outdoors is still livable. And
even if not, this town is set up so you can spend three days here and never
be outside of air-conditioned spaces for more than thirty seconds at a time.
Henry
