[ivfdf-news] IVFDF 2017 - Cambridge Update

[Sally Vernon]

Dear IVFDFers,

Inspired by the Great Joy and Epic Dancing that was Exeter 2015, we 
retreated back to the Fens of Cambridge to Plot and Scheme...

The short version is, we have many of the things we need to run an IVFDF, 
including a keen group of mostly-organised people. However, we are 
currently lacking the slightly-essential thing, a place to host the 
festival.

We had a meeting (minutes at the bottom of this email) and we think the 
right answer is that Cambridge should provisionally offer to host IVFDF 
2017, but if we can't find any promising looking venue by the end of this 
summer, then we'd have to withdraw the offer. Trust me, we have a Huge 
Spreadsheet with 39 possibilities on it (ending with 'Put a Giant Marquee 
on the Common'), if it's do-able we'll find a way to do it :-)

(Exeter should definitely not cancel their booking until we have something 
looking more like a plan!)

Hope this sounds like a good idea to Central IVFDF! If someone else out 
there is plotting and scheming over 2017 let us know - it would be a shame 
to duplicate effort.

[Oh, if you're reading this thinking 'I am a Cambridge person, I want to be 
on their committee, why didn't they invite me?' it was a very haphazard 
process mostly involving who was on the minibus together on the way home 
from IVFDF and who we spoke to in pubs. We've only had one meeting so far, 
if you're keen and want to be involved let me know!]

Cheers,
Sally

IVFDF 2017
'Should we do it?' meeting

18th March 2015

Present:

Hannah, Hugh, Colm, Ed, Sally, Stephanie, Paul, Peter, Annette, Ruth, 
Brian, (Jonathan and Susanna)

Notes

IVFDF 2017 - it's a great idea!

We have a good group of interested people (problem is more likely to be 
large committee rather than not enough people!) And could sort bands and 
workshops.

The real problem would be venues. We have lots and lots of ideas of 
possible venues, but no clear obvious 'we can do this and it will work' 
venue.

In IVFDF 2006, we said 'yes' to IVFDF and then spent until about Easter 
trying to find a workable venue.

So we think we should do the same again: - We can't guarantee we will host 
IVFDF until we have a suitable venue - But we can say to central IVFDF that 
we are keen, and have enough people to organise - We should try and be 
clear by the end of the academic year whether there is a venue we can do it 
in or not - Exeter should not cancel their booking until they hear we've 
got a venue. - If there is another university interested in hosting, we'd 
like to know, to avoid duplicated effort. We might be able to just 
negotiate a 2017/2018 arrangement.

We discussed possible venues.  

There is a google docs spreadsheet of all the venues discussed. [If you 
want to see the list, let me know, but anyone with the link can edit it, so 
I thought sending it round the full IVFDF mailing list was a bit Brave]:

We assigned people venues to go off and investigate. Not every venue has 
someone to investigate it yet, but if all of these turn out to be duds, 
then we can send people off to find more. Also if anyone is keen to get in 
touch with one of the venues that isn't already being contacted, feel free 
to sign up against it on the spreadsheet.

Ed's email is a good guide to the kind of questions to ask, although we 
think phonecalls are often more helpful.

What are we trying to find out by 'investigating'? Generally: - Do they 
sound helpful? Friendly? Keen? Like they could be armtwisted into it, but 
don't really want it? - Roughly what do they have? Numbers / size of halls? 
Anywhere for workshops? Anywhere to sleep? - Roughly what sort of money 
would they want? - Are they available on the usual weekends? On any 
weekends at all? - What would you imagine an IVFDF here would look like? 
Would we just book this place? Would we need to book some other places in 
conjunction with it? What other nearby places might work?

We discussed that we needed better information - budgets from previous 
IVFDFs, numbers of tickets, numbers of floor campers. We think IVFDF gets 
about 650-850 people.

We discussed that the precise date does not matter, but that it should be 
in Lent term, and that the last weekend of February / first weekend of 
March was traditional.

We discussed that it would be easier to organise with something like a wiki 
and maintained documents like last time. We could get log in to Andrew's. 
Maybe get Matthew to set one up. Maybe make the google group do documents.

We want another meeting Mid to late April to discuss what we've found out. 
Are any of the venue options Obviously the Right One? What has central 
IVFDF said? Do we need to start speaking to the second round of venues like 
the University Sports Centre or the village colleges?

We decided it would be good if we had some people to organise the next 
meeting. We agreed Stephanie for secretary, and Sally as interim chair 
(Paul and Peter also interested, might be clearer by next meeting how this 
would work best long term)