LCA kerfuffle: how companies react

Sam Varghese
Saturday, 05 February 2011 16:23

Business IT - Open Source

When untoward events happen at conferences that concern themselves with free and open source software, how do the companies that sponsored them feel?

With the number of such conferences growing, there is much demand for sponsorship money. That's the only way conference organisers can get the necessary funds to stage the events.

At the recent Australian national Linux conference in Brisbane, one of the keynote speakers, Mark Pesce, was censured by the organisers over the use of sexual images. Pesce's contravention of the conference anti-harassment code is one of a series of untoward incidents that have taken place at FOSS conferences over the years.

This tended to overshadow what was an event that was well organised against overwhelming odds.

HP, one of the event's emperor penguin sponsors, the top category of sponsor, was pragmatic about the happenings. Asked whether occurrences such as this caused the company any concern about damage to its brand, a spokesperson said: "HP supports events that align with our brand values and products.

"Whilst HP strives to ensure the credibility of its sponsorships, certain elements of the events are beyond the control of the organisers and we are realistic about that."

IBM, the other emperor penguin sponsor, did not respond to a request for comment. Intel, one of two king penguin sponsors, did no respond either.

The biggest open source company, Red Hat, which also sponsored the conference, though to a much smaller extent, had this to say in response to the same query: ""Red Hat is the world's leading and most trusted provider of open source solutions, and has built its brand on its ability to deliver value to thousands of government and private sector organisations around the globe.

"It is the impact Red Hat's technology has on these enterprises and organisations, that continues to strengthen the Red Hat brand and enable the company's continued growth."