TL;DR: the deadline for submitting talks proposals for DebConf21 with guaranteed consideration for the final schedule is next Sunday, June
20th.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The DebConf Content team would like to call for proposals for the DebConf21 conference, which will take place online from August 22nd to 29th, 2021.

You can find this Call for Proposals, in its latest form, online:

https://debconf21.debconf.org/cfp/

## Submitting an Event

You can now submit an [event proposal]. Events are not limited to
traditional presentations or informal sessions (BoFs): we welcome
submissions of tutorials, performances, art installations, debates, or any other format of event that you think would be of interest to the Debian community.

Regular sessions may either be 20 or 45 minutes long (including time for questions), other kinds of sessions (workshops, demos, lightning talks,
...) could have different durations. Please choose the most suitable
duration for your event and explain any special requests.

In order to submit a talk, you will need to create an account on the site.
We suggest that Debian Salsa account holders (including DDs and DMs) use
their [Salsa] login when creating an account. However, this isn't required,
as you can sign up with an e-mail address and password.

[event proposal]: https://debconf21.debconf.org/talks/new/
[Salsa]: https://salsa.debian.org/

## Timeline

* Submission deadline: Sunday, June 20th
* Acceptance notification: Sunday, July 4th
* Soft deadline for pre-recordings: Sunday, August 8th
* Hard deadline for pre-recordings: Wednesday, August 18th.

Late submissions are possible and will be considered on a case by case basis.

Recordings sent by the soft the deadline are guaranteed to be reviewed with enough time
to be fixed if necessary. Videos sent later than that will get less attention the
closer we get to the conference. Recordings will not be accepted after the hard deadline of August 18th; you will have to present live (and face the consequences of
doing that).


## Topics and Tracks

Though we invite proposals on any Debian or FLOSS related subject, we have
some broad topics on which we encourage people to submit proposals,
including but not limited to:

- Introduction to Free Software & Debian
- Packaging, policy, and Debian infrastructure
- Systems administration, automation and orchestration
- Cloud and containers
- Security
- Community, diversity, local outreach and social context
- Internationalization, Localization and Accessibility
- Embedded & Kernel
- Debian in Arts & Science
- Debian Blends and Debian derived distributions

## Language-specific miniconfs

Following the success from DebConf20, this year we will again accept language-specific miniconfs as tracks inside DebConf21. If you would like to organize one, get in touch with the content team by email to <content@debconf.org> or on the #debconf-content channel on IRC. Note that for that to work, you will have to provide volunteers who speak the language to the content team (to review and approve talks) and to the video team (to operate the streaming tools live during the talks and review recorded talks afterwards),
because those jobs will need people with knowledge of the language
spoken in the talks. Also please inform us on the best times of the day (in UTC)
for your track to be scheduled, and approximately how many talks you expect.

## Time zones

As a global online conference, scheduling needs to fit around participants' time zones. Please indicate the time zone from which you'll be attending, as well as your availability. If you will be working together with people from other time zones (e.g. in a BoF session), please indicate a preferred time window for scheduling (using UTC times).

## Online Talks

For regular presentation-style talks, like last year, there are 2 possibilities:
you can either pre-record your talk and be available for a live Q&A session, or give it live over videoconferencing. Pre-recording with live Q&A is preferred, as it
gives us less uncertainty with regards to connectivity and ensures a higher overal
quality. If you choose to deliver your talk live, then we need to be prepared for it to
fail if something goes wrong during the talk.

Of course, pre-recording makes little sense for BoFs and other types of interactive session.

## Talk proposal help on IRC

If you want to submit a talk proposal but would like to discuss it first, feel free to
pop by the #debconf-content IRC channel on OFTC, where the DebConf content team will be
available to help potential speakers prepare their talk proposals for DebConf.

Just make sure you stick around the channel if you don't get an immediate response,
because it could be coming from the other side of the world.

## Code of Conduct

Our event is covered by a [Code of Conduct] designed to ensure everyone’s safety and comfort. The code applies to all attendees, including speakers
and the content of their presentations. Do not hesitate to contact us at <content@debconf.org> if you have any questions or are unsure about certain content you’d like to present.

[Code of Conduct]: https://debconf.org/codeofconduct.shtml

## Video Coverage

As an online conference, talks will be streamed live over the Internet. And unless speakers opt-out, all scheduled talks will be recorded and published later under the [DebConf license] (MIT/Expat), as well as presentation slides and papers whenever available.

Please note that, although we will make your wishes known to the participants, we cannot control whether attendees record and publish your talk from the live stream.

[conference goals]: https://debconf.org/goals.shtml
[DebConf license]: https://meetings-archive.debian.net/pub/debian-meetings/LICENSE

## Closing note

DebConf21 is accepting sponsors; if you are interested, or think you know
of others who would be willing to help, please get in touch with <sponsors@debconf.org>.

In case of any questions, or if you wanted to bounce some ideas off us
first, please do not hesitate to reach out to the content team at <content@debconf.org>.

We hope to see you online soon!

The DebConf team

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----

iQIzBAABCAAdFiEEst7mYDbECCn80PEM/A2xu81GC94FAmDLtjkACgkQ/A2xu81G C941Mg//bCjHl4aZ6t97OBzELr73gJVfDfRaFf8yLmLrNDupi/g6KYPF0CSaIGz5 eaKvJ1VoWBzBf3EexNElFr3xzgHbptALJfptYFehYUL0xpRg10dfOJcXgeF/aWYV yaof/dU4S5CEC/l5StJQZbgGI/Hyfxx7y7g1rMlTYKP3TkJGVxcdKiaXrMcTdOHk MMn/u3b1kx4OTLTbqMJPQiCXCfGK6/shoNybJ5V74j85Q0jDMxFzIdHXDMwaZ7lv jWLgp+HMEYZymJ2XhCsJNlDTi9T5Cutv1EmSunGYbbQJ3kEo0VT/0COHsflXV8Bk sIB/0qUWh+1fFb1zjarD3+D9jlrNcBCyrkaEuQmAd9p4AZIjYXL8dY+IoHNCnAz0 Xixt3FqeQauKLQCa7v7AL4yC4m6/OpehSm7+r/3WHSRenmeDmFxXM+j0MvYeq8++ XhBRSoS/yWC8vFGH/j8gUJK7uVB6ThVkflyaeAJOsm7nG9Mzd8qUfNybrLBqM5uU YlTliCNPMArbCcCsPHHviwWE66R+ZZKSNufNCz+m2nyEpVpknZuLLZafRcyuvkVd srTzt7XIybGFtTjUAMQzk/mhNRWzWU78tKzFv0ZXuDQS2OvbFHwhz1SCFbCXaKzI X2F/TSEgTKt+oyajDjhjQWhvh/gDFdbn9vDR2TnQb6trST/S3Hg=
=bGJ6
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)