What about piggybacking larger trade shows? Does the ETS foundation show up at any tradeshows? Maybe share a booth with the manufacturers of some of Mr. Ritter's products. Have a seperate room for a keynote speaker. A "nominal" charge for the speaker, but the individual pays full cost of the convention entrance (if any). Conferences on Hurricane Prepardness, and C.E.R.T. come to mind.

This would greatly reduce the planning needed, but could be more expensive. It would still need the 50 - 100 guaranteed participants to pay off (probably, I don't have exact numbers..)

Maybe we could get Les Stroud.. he seems popular here...

ETS does not show at trade shows. Aeromedix, retailer of the RSK knives, etc., has a booth as EAA AirVenture (Oshkosh), the only show it does, but that's not a viable proposition for holding any non-aviation related event and in any case would be even more difficult and expensive due to the enormity of that event. I do attend various conferences (non-public invited) and shows (SHOT, OR, Blade), but none that would lend themselves to public attendance or, again, they are so large that they would drive the price up, or they monopolize my time. Piggybacking on some other event is certainly a possibility, but nothing currently on the schedule lends itself to that.

How about a "virtual" conference? Must be some way we could use a chat room or similar to do a bit of a get together. I don't know much about such things. Just a suggestion.

Good Idea. I do this near daily in my job and I also present to customers now and then in a similar fashion - though it typically involves the phone, most web conference software uses chat as well.

for first pass at the concept, we could use keyboard chat. Each person pre-types a small introduction and sends it to the group in rotation. Would need a moderator to keep thing under control. We hams do this frequently on the various radio teletype modes. Takes a bit of getting used to, but would allow anyone, anywhere to join in.

Not sure what, if anything, it would accomplish though. We get the same effect here on the board without the limiting "be there at the same time" issue. Probably not woth the effort......

If I had my server up and running, we could do it as an IRC chat, but now that I'm off broadband I don't keep the server running.

Any of the rest of us got a box that could host IRC that is on all the time? A ETS channel might not be bad. I just don't know how much traffic it would generate. Might not be enough, might be too much.

Comandeer a campground somewhere?

Somewhere without bears. <img src="/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />

Bring your own shelter, food, gear.

Sue

Maybe you're onto something Susan, but, perhaps not just one campground...

As others have indicated, it might be tough to get everyone together in one place, but, maybe we can have something like they do on National Trails Day in the US, where there are activities at various locations around the country. I've worked on trail restoration projects along the Appalachian Trail here in the northeast on that day in past years. At the same time, people were involved in activities from Mount Katahdin in Maine, to places like the Backbone Trail along the Santa Monica Mountains in California. (Which is a cool hike, about 70 miles.) There are places where interested folks get together all over the country.

Anyway, we could, with some planning, designate an ETS Day. Perhaps a few volunteers who were interested... (motivated folks with too much time on their hands) could find a location/park/whatever suitable for camping in their area, and invite those in easy driving range to join in for a weekend away. It could be as simple as a "drive up to the tent site at a state park" kind of camping, or something involving a little backpacking, or canoeing, etc.

Ok, needs more thought... <img src="/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />

I had emailed Les Stroud, his assistant got back to me and said he'd love to do something like this. I didn't ask about cost or anything, only his interest level. He said he'd love to!

He will be doing a new series of survivorman and would be unavailable for anything between September 2006 and probably March 2007.

My job involves creating online extensions of real-world confererences. Suffice it to say that a real=-world conference, at a small venue, in an out of the way place, costs about $200,000 to produce and has a sketchy payback rate for most small organizers.