Amanda Perino: It's RailsWorld 2024 CFP season! How to become a speaker?

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hello old friends and new friends. So today we have a special guest. It is Amanda Perino. She is the CEO of the Rails Foundation and we are going to be talking to her about Rails World and what the Rails Foundation is and what its plans are for this year and maybe for next year and actually a funny thing before we start. So around a year ago, me and Adrian started having our first talks about maybe making a podcast. But really a strong catalyst to doing it was when you and me, amanda, had this chat that we uploaded to the Suprails YouTube and after doing the chat with you, it felt so great and I really called Adrian right away and let's do the podcast.

Speaker 2: 0:51

Oh cool. I'm glad I was a part of the catalyst for that idea. That was already taken shape. That was cool. That was a good chat.

Speaker 3: 0:58

Yeah, yeah, thank you for that. I mean, I spoke with Yaro before and I told him like, hey, let's do a podcast together, and he was like I don't know, maybe it's not for me, but afterwards, after you going on the show with him, he really wanted to do it. So yeah, thank you for that. I think I'd like to start today to talk a little bit about the most famous dog in the Rails community. How's Milo? How is he doing? I know he has like a respectable age. How is he doing?

Speaker 2: 1:30

Yeah, he's 17 now. He's doing really good. He's literally at my ankles curled up. It's getting harder and harder to leave him because he's getting so old. So actually I'm going to fuzz him in Brussels at the end of this week and I don't have anybody to watch him, so I have to take him with me in a backpack so some people can meet him in person if they're at fuzz him.

Speaker 3: 1:53

Nice, nice, beautiful. So, yeah, get in touch with Milo at fuzz them. Okay, let's talk about, I think, what everybody's curious about these days. Tell us about Rails World 2024. Maybe you can start from like when and where, talk about the venues, the stays, activities, and then touch upon the CFP and other things that you have prepared for us.

Speaker 2: 2:18

Yeah, so Rails World 2024 is going to take place in Toronto September 26 and 27. That's a Thursday and a Friday, so we're asking people to come in on the Wednesday for pre-registration and really it's going to follow a similar setup to Rails World in Amsterdam, which means it's going to be two tracks over two days and focusing in a cool venue. I have to say that it is a really really cool venue. This time it does have challenges, but it's nice. It's a nice place to hang out and we're really going to focus on talks that push the boundaries of Rails. So it's really technical talks that we're going to be looking for.

Speaker 3: 2:59

Okay. Okay, that's cool. That's very good that you said that, because now I feel that it's kind of like CFP season Everybody's you know putting out their CFPs and I had a conversation with Andy as well and like this is this was my question Like what are you looking for for CFPs? What should people, you know, focus on? And you know, because the CFP is like, you get some questions like what would you like to talk about? But we need a little bit more guidance, so it's more technical talks, right.

Speaker 2: 3:29

Yeah, it is more technical talks and it's funny because I was looking at the document. I'm pulling it up for myself here. I don't know how other events do it, but I can tell you a little bit about how we do it.

Speaker 3: 3:41

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 3:43

Before we kick off, we kind of sit down and decide on what we want the overall messaging to be, and then from there, a couple of topics like how can we align rails with plot topics in tech right now, and then that's what we put into the CFP and that's what we ask for and that's what we look for. So, for instance, this time last year I think we hit on something quite good and we're going to stick with that. That's why it's like very future focused. And oh look, I also have striped nails as well.

Speaker 3: 4:15

Just, this episode is not sponsored by Stripe. But if you do want to sponsor, it's all good, because we're all wearing striped shirts, we are all prepared.

Speaker 2: 4:24

So so I think the last time it was any talk from the one person framework up to Rails at scale and like the journey within and also how is Rails competitive, what's coming to Rails and who's going to deep dive into that. So that's kind of what we're looking for this time as well. But also the core team has been very public about Rails 8 milestones. This time you can see exactly where Rails is going. And I would say to people wanting to talk if you can look into those milestones and see if you have any experience and talks on things that align with that, you'd be in a really good position for the CFP this year.

Speaker 3: 5:09

Okay, sounds like another very strong Rails, and how does it fit in this new environment and how you know it helps to deliver, to ship apps faster and to ship value as fast as possible.

Speaker 1: 5:21

Type of conference yeah, exactly the previous Rails world. I really liked that there was some not so technical talks like shape up or making money on open source. It really helps you find down, like relax a bit from like hard technical topics to more like soft skills.

Speaker 2: 5:45

Yeah, and that's an actually good thing to talk about, because we had, I think, 26 talks last year and this year because the number one request from people was more time between talks to chat.

Speaker 2: 5:58

Okay, the thing that suffers there is we need to take one or two talks out of the agenda. So there's less talks this time. We are going to keep those I don't know what to call them like kind of more soft talks, like the shape up talk, and that we're going to keep those to a minimum. Let's call them like business management talks. Those will always be a tiny tiny bit, if we keep them at all, in lieu of technical talks. I know everybody kind of likes those to decompress a little bit and it's less technical and less heavy on your mind. But we're putting 30 minute breaks in between most of the talks and that's kind of where you can decompress. That's kind of how we're looking at it.

Speaker 3: 6:37

Wow, I think that's major. 30 minute break. That's. That's amazing. I definitely know a few people that last year they didn't go on under, they didn't go to any talks like Greg was out there on the hallway track talking to people. He didn't see any any talk. He said, yeah, I'm gonna see them at home.

Speaker 2: 6:54

It's all good, it's gonna be okay, yeah and the way I see it, some conferences have a lot of community oriented talks on on the track like how to mentor, how to, how to I don't know what off the top of my head how to hire juniors, and really the way I look at it is that that can happen at on the hallway track, like face-to-face with people, one-on-one, rather than on on the stage. So it's a little bit different than other other events. Look at this, but that's how we're approaching it a little bit about the CFP process yeah, that's a good question.

Speaker 2: 7:27

Um, we do have a space right now.

Speaker 2: 7:30

There's a couple things up in the air. We do have a space that could be workshop oriented, but I had a lot of challenges last time in that a lot of people wanted them and the space was limited. And then there was this really manual process, that that people signed up for all the talks so that they can get into one of the talk and I really had to go through one by one and say not you there, you can maybe go over there. In the end I think everybody got what they were looking for, but then people didn't show up and really just the the messiness of the registration process which fell on me didn't do justice for the workshop presenters. So this time I think we're not going to do workshops.

Speaker 2: 8:11

Um, and that space, we're hoping that that space, which is a smaller track, so a third track could be like a lightning trap talks track for the community, so people who are attending and they have a five or ten minute talk you can give it at Rails world nice, I guess that's one of the, the surprises that I wasn't necessarily supposed to say yet, but okay, tell us a little bit about the CFP process, because I know you wanted to do this last year and it didn't really happen.

Speaker 3: 8:43

You wanted to do the CFP, to publish it, to pick the the speakers and then release the ticket sales. Are you going to be able to do that this year?

Speaker 2: 8:51

I think so. Yeah, so we're going to open on February 5th the CFP and then we're going to keep it open until March 21st and immediately I think that's a Thursday or Friday and then the Monday after we'll release ticket sales and we want to let all speakers know by then if they're if they're in or not, so that at least there's 24 people who don't have to rush for tickets. I'm hoping that'll it'll work out like that. So it's so far. It depends on how many people apply to the CFP. You know yourself that it takes time to really go through each one and then kind of evaluate them next to each other and make sure you can fit it into the agenda, to make sure it makes sense, and then the the agenda flows well. So that's kind of even the big focus for the next couple weeks.

Speaker 3: 9:39

That makes sense. I think that's a great process to let everybody know about the speakers and that they'll speak and they don't have to think about should I get a ticket or not. What should I do with the ticket afterwards? Yeah, tell us a little bit about the sponsors, because I know you opened up the sponsorship prospectus. What are you looking for there? What was missing maybe last year, or whatever you would like to share about that?

Speaker 2: 10:09

Last year. I think it went really really well. As far as what was missing, not much. All the sponsors were fantastic. I think they had a lot of engagement on site. We got good feedback back, maybe some tips here and there, but in general it's the same that the attendees sent more time between talks, what we're looking for this time and I think AppSignal was our Platinum sponsor last year and they did this really well One of many that did this well but they brought the fun aspect to it, the engagement aspect to it. They had lots going on around their booth and they brought the games. And then they brought what was it? I'm walking around their booth in my head. They brought the Shula game.

Speaker 3: 10:56

They brought the.

Speaker 2: 10:57

T-shirts.

Speaker 3: 10:59

The baby clothes.

Speaker 2: 11:00

Yeah, they get the ducks. I think sponsors who want to do these fun, interactive things are always going to end up adding a lot of value to an event If companies have ideas on what they can do and what they can bring to the event not just a booth setup but what are you going to do with the booth? Those are conversations I'd love to have soon.

Speaker 1: 11:23

When I heard that RailsVeld is going to take place in Toronto, my first thought was, oh, it might be in the Shopify headquarters location. Can you tell us a bit more about the actual location?

Speaker 2: 11:36

Yeah, it's at a really cool location. Actually, one of the things that made me feel really comfortable with this location is called Evergreen Brickworks. It's an old brick factory set in the middle of a park. It's surrounded by a gratery. It's got the cool vibe of an old brick building that we can transform ourselves. There's graffiti on the walls, the old brick kilns are still there and you can walk through them. What made it really comfortable to choose this venue specifically is that Shopify had we found out when we were researching Shopify Unite there in 2022, I think They've been on the location. They've done events there. They've worked with the same vendors. Those vendors will understand what we're going for because it's the same vibe, the raw industrial vibe, the cool aspect. They've been there before. I reached out to somebody at Shopify on the events team to say did you like this venue or are there problems working with this venue? Everything was rave reviews. That's how we knew it would be a safe space to go.

Speaker 1: 12:45

Okay, so we know, what's expected in 2024 and are you already thinking, like about the next year, about where Rails World will take place in 2025?

Speaker 2: 13:00

I'm already thinking of 2026. So yeah, 2025 is definitely on my mind. Every once in a while on the, I've set up a suggestion form on the foundation page of rubionrailsorg and every once in a while I get a suggestion. All it is is like a country. We've got Colombia, slovakia, so they're slowly trickling in, and I also asked that in the Rails World post event survey. So I'm going to go through these places and see like which city has a good vibe for this. Possibly it's going to be back in Europe in 2025. I mean, that could change if we think North America is really fantastic and we want to stay there. But the idea is to kind of remain flexible between the two continents and eventually possibly reach out further to other continents.

Speaker 1: 13:50

let's say, I mean, if we do live voting, so like anybody can vote, I'm sure that Tuzla is going to win.

Speaker 2: 13:58

I don't know if you asked Mahavint Tuzla, a story subject since he moved to San Diego.

Speaker 1: 14:08

Yeah, I think it's a good decision.

Speaker 3: 14:10

Yeah, definitely looking forward for Euroka as well. Yeah, one other crazy idea was like allow only the Rails contributors to vote. Then it's a win-win. You'll get people contributing so they can vote for Rails World.

Speaker 2: 14:25

We already have a lot of good ideas. I mean off the top of my head and there's like no, I'm not saying this with any sort of commitment or conviction because I haven't started the search, but I think Berlin would be awesome for an event like this. I think Barcelona or Madrid would have the right kind of venue that we're looking for. And then at the same time I'm looking at any sort of metrics that I have, like we have really light tracking via plausible, and it kind of tells you where people are looking at rubionrailsorg from countries around the world, so also looking to see where the activity is, where the most amount of people are. That's also why we chose Amsterdam. We know that the community is really big there, but now that I think of it like this community will go anywhere in the world, it doesn't matter.

Speaker 3: 15:16

You're right.

Speaker 2: 15:16

North.

Speaker 3: 15:17

Korea. I voted for. I suggested Barcelona on the Twitter thread, so that would be amazing. I would love to come down.

Speaker 2: 15:24

That would be great.

Speaker 3: 15:26

We have a big community there as well.

Speaker 1: 15:29

I was choosing a country, I would maybe choose Morocco, so it is on the very west of the like Eurasia. No, it's not Eurasia, it's Africa. So it's not like America, it's not Europe, it's Africa. So another continent. Then it's close to the US and close to Europe. Then it is warm, it is cheap and it has low visa requirements.

Speaker 2: 15:58

Is there already a community there, or is it just the community would show up?

Speaker 1: 16:02

I think it would just show up.

Speaker 2: 16:04

And then I could go surfing. That would be great. Morocco's got great surfing.

Speaker 3: 16:09

And great food, of course, yeah also. Well, until then, tell us, what other cool initiatives does the foundation have prepared for us in 2024?

Speaker 2: 16:22

Right now, we're like full steam ahead as far as the four pillars I always call them of why the foundation was set up Documentation, education, marketing and events. We have balls in the air for all four of those pillars, so that feels really, really good. We've been in talks with somebody to create a tutorial for the Ruby on Rails website, like a brand new one. We have put a team together for updating the documentation, the writing, but also the UX, so they're going to start working on that. They've already started. Marketing is ongoing since we started and we have 2025 events work happening, so it feels really good. We're in a really good position to push the needle forward for all four of those pillars. That's really cool.

Speaker 1: 17:10

I've seen the news that Emmanuel Hayford has joined the Rails Foundation to do some publishing. Can you tell more about it?

Speaker 2: 17:21

Yeah, so one of the we put out a vacancy for technical writers the plural before and we that's where we found the technical writers who are going to work on the documentation. And Emmanuel also applied and as I was going through his application, to me it made sense because he's so active. He helps write this week in rails. He shares tips already, so I commissioned him to do a series of rails tips. So far we have 12 going. I think we've shared three or four and that's just to kind of keep that's the marketing side of it, right, like the marketing pillar, just to put the news out of what's new in rails and this is how you can use rails and these are tips and tricks and that was always the intention. I'm a little late to it. He only started like just before the end of the year, I think it just said the last week in December we posted the first tip. But this has been something we wanted to do from day one.

Speaker 2: 18:16

Yeah he was just like a natural profile.

Speaker 1: 18:18

He has got the podcast like the rails change log, and I remember he was also given a talk, I think, at the Athens rail sauce about what's new in rails 7.1. So it kind of perfectly fits him to be writing about, like, what's new in rails.

Speaker 2: 18:37

Exactly, and like he's really on top of it, because I mean every couple of weeks he's the one who writes the tips are like the this week in rails newslet. So we needed somebody like that, who's really constantly looking at the changes in the framework and can share that with everybody.

Speaker 3: 18:55

Beautiful, cool, so I think that's a good place to wrap up for today, amanda, thank you so much. Take care of Milo and hopefully we'll see each other in more rails events throughout the year, looking forward for all the initiatives that you have prepared for us.

Speaker 2: 19:18

Yeah, cool On that subject. Thank you for having me, but what is the? Which events are you going to? Because I'll be at Tropical Ruby in April.

Speaker 3: 19:26

Oh, I'll be there. I'll be there as well.

Speaker 2: 19:28

See you there.

Speaker 3: 19:29

Yeah, definitely I'm going to. So I'm doing, I'm doing since city Ruby, since city, yeah, since city Ruby, and then Tropical RB, and then probably you Ruko friendly and rails. Well, this is my short list for this year.

Speaker 1: 19:44

Oh, you're also doing short list.

Speaker 3: 19:48

Yes, also doing friendly. Yes, I have to, I have to.

Speaker 1: 19:52

Amanda, are you coming to any other conferences?

Speaker 2: 19:55

You know I wish I was just looking at Ruby conferencesorg and we're at 21. 21 events this year. Yeah, I think it's exciting that you could travel the world and like really just Ruby all over. But I have the old dark and already I have to go to Toronto for two or three site visits, going to Fosdom and then going to Tropical RB. It's just too much time away from away from my dog in his old age. If something happens. Like God willing, I don't want anything to happen to him. But if something happens I'd be a lot more available to go and attend some other conferences. But that just means there's one more spot for everyone for a developer, because I'm not a developer, right? Thank you so much for having me and I will see you all around the world. I'm sure let's see where we end up in the same place at the same time next time.

Speaker 3: 20:47

Definitely. Thank you so much, Amanda, for coming here and sharing the news. Have a good one.

Speaker 2: 20:52

Bye.