Autonomous Geek writes "The POI (POSIX Organizing Initiative) in Portland, OR is putting out this draft conference call to gather interested parties and supporters together to plan the Portland Oregon Social Information Xchange for June, 2003.



What we would like you to do is read the preliminary ideas we have put

together, and let us know if you are interested in helping us organize

this conference, speaking at it, providing training or anything else.



We have set up an organizing mailing list, and are having our first

face-to-face meeting of local organizers to discuss local logistics in

the coming weeks. Please let us know if you are interested in organizing

locally or just interested in helping to shape the conference.

Please email organize@posix2003.org if you wish to be added to the

mailing list or have suggestions, ideas, or comments.



We are committed to organizing the local logistics of such a conference

but we need YOU! to make the content of such an event. Please respond to

this soon so we can start to organize with as many people involved as

possible.



WHAT: The Portland Oregon Social Information Xchange or POSIX.



WHEN: June 27-29th, 2003



WHERE: Portland, Oregon



WHO: All self proclaimed geeks and people who are interested in using

technology to build community, strengthen social struggles, and

exchange skills, knowledge, experiences, and dreams.



WHY: Because as both activistics who are geeks and geeks who are activists

are chances to interact face to face are few and far between. A chance to

meet allows us to strengthen and grow the geek activists community.



POTENTIAL STRUCTURE: We see that there are eleven general areas of interest

we would like to develop workshops, discussions, training and skill

sharing around:




        * Wireless Networking


        * Security Culture


        * P2P


        * Free Software


        * Gnu/Linux, Free BSD


        * Programming Languages


        * Cool Activism Projects


        * Living in an information/networked society


        * Robotics


        * Legal Issues around computing


        * Computering for Kids


        * Community Networking



This is *not* an exhaustive list of topics, but simply a place to start

the discussions of the conference from. Please help us by letting us

know what workshop/skillshare you would be interested in doing and what

resources you need to be able to do it.



SOME LOGISTICAL ISSUES: It is unlikely we will be able to do much

fundraising to put this conference together but we will try. If you

know of any potential funding sources, please put us in touch.

Generally we will try to do this on the cheap, asking for a

registration fee to cover costs on location - and are trying to find

a space where we could stay overnight.



For further information, discussion, to be added to the mailing list or

anything else, please contact: organize@posix2003.org



Thanks! We want to get the ball rolling on this ASAP so please reply

soon."