There has been lot of discussions on what really constitutes a valid
submission for foss.in, I think there is a lot of confusion, and we will
try and clear this up:

The aim of the conference is to increase Indian contribution to FOSS, and
the team is unanimously behind this aim.

This essentially means the event should be aligned to aid people to start
contributing, the key word has always been contribution and not
development. Talks which address how to make new documentation or art have
always been welcome.

What we are trying to avoid are talks which *just* build users. And by
users i dont mean just end users, but people who use this technology to
suit their needs without caring about the project itself. As Atul says -
"One way traffic".

What is the problem with that you might ask?
The problem is in a global foss community this usage does not translate to
contribution. It ends up as a solution to scratch an itch that then ends
up in some unused site. We are not even considering cases where all it
gets is used to suit someone's needs.

Hence what we need is to get people interested in not just how to use the
technology but also how to make it better. This is a whole new paradigm,
no conference has ever forced this approach. We know that we are pushing
the envelop here.

We are trying to get people interested in projects for the coolness of the
projects and the usefulness in participating in then, v/s just the
coolness of the project as a tool.

This is a mindset change which we are trying to bring about.

Secondly, Lots of people said users become contributers, Hence we
shouldn't just target contributers.

Yes i agree with you all that some users become contributers over a long
term. But do realize that we have never said talking about how to use your
project or demoing stuff is not allowed. All we are saying is, the talk
should also address how to contribute to the project. Position your talk
around contribution, not getting more users.

For the Main Conference, we require speakers to be actual contributors to
the project, not just users. And they should talk about the project, about
what it does and so on, and of course demo it, but then they should spend
a majority of their talk slot telling people how to get involved and
contribute. Ideally, that would be bug fixes, feature requirements,
documentation, artwork and so on.

This means driving interest of the people towards the internals, the
milestones and the requirements. Thats the missing part in most of the
current submissions, an effort to involve people into the project. And
this what needs to be fixed to get your proposal accepted and to make
foss.in achieve its targets.

Cheers,
Shreyas

--
CelAbrate your flaws