The PyCon US Blog

As we're ramping up preparations for an in-person PyCon US 2022 in Salt Lake City, the PyCon US organization wants to take a moment to talk about the decisions we made, the precautions we are taking, and what we are expecting from attendees to have a safe event. The main decision we've taken is to hold an in-person event, with significant measures to protect health and safety. We understand that there are tradeoffs to each part of the decision we've made, and that each person's decision of whether and how to participate is an individual one. Overall, given the current circumstances, we believe that we can hold a safe, valuable, and enjoyable PyCon US that benefits the community. Preparations for PyCon US Organizing a large event like PyCon US takes many years of planning and preparation. Host city selection usually starts three years before the event, with a thorough evaluation of potential sites, combined with our best estimates for conference size and needs. Salt Lake...

On Sunday March 17th an incident occurred involving some inappropriate comments made during a crowded plenary session. Per the stated guidelines for  attendees  and  staff  the issue was reported to the PyCon 2013 staff and resolved privately. Both parties were met with, in private. The comments that were made were in poor taste, and individuals involved agreed, apologized and no further actions were taken by the staff of PyCon 2013. No individuals were removed from the conference, no sanctions were levied. PyCon values the privacy of all attendees above everything. Except in cases wherein law enforcement must or could be involved, all reports and actions taken are kept confidential by PyCon staff. If anyone has additional questions or concerns about this event or these sanctions, please contact Jesse Noller at <jnoller@python.org>.

PyCon US 2013 is just 19 days away  - scary! It feels like only yesterday we were in Santa Clara with 2300+ other Python Hackers from all over the world! Just a few announcements: PyData Registration still open We want to make sure everyone knows that PyData , which is happening during our sprints, is still open for registration. PyData is an excellent event that lets users and developers of Python tools share ideas and learn from each other how data challenges are being solved. See the PyData talk and tutorial schedule and register for the conference at pydata.org. Follow them on Twitter @pydataconf . Tutorial Registration still open That's right! Our main conference may be sold out - but the  stunning line up of tutorials  we have from seasoned instructor are far from full! You can still join us an expand your mind with this awesome lineup -  register now . Young Coders Tutorial still open Somehow, we haven't run out of tickets for " The Young Coder: L...

PyLadies Lunch @ PyCon This year, there is such an amazing line up of talks, tutorials, events, and sponsors that we're sure you don't have enough planned. PyLadies have organized to host a lunch for women attending the conference who love Python, or who want to learn more about Python or PyLadies. What's this all about? PyLadies is a mentorship group for women in the Python community. Come join us for an opportunity to chat with your fellow female Pythonistas while taking a break from the jam-packed PyCon schedule. Who : Women who love coding in Python When : Saturday, March 16th, 12:30pm - 1:30pm Where : Second floor, Rooms 209/210 We invite any woman conference-goer to lunch at an informal, friendly meet & greet to form connections, and share Python programming stories. RSVP! Be sure to reserve your spot as space is limited! If you have any questions, feel free to contact Lynn Root .

Young Coder Registration Now Available! Back in July, we announced The Young Coder: Let's Learn Python tutorial. We've received an overwhelming response of excitement and interest. Registration is now open! About the Tutorial This free tutorial will explore how to program using Python by making games. The workshop will start with learning Python's simple data types, including numbers, letters and strings, and lists. We will also explore comparisons, if-statements, and loops. Finally, we will combined our new knowledge by creating our own game using the PyGame library. Timing The one-day workshop is being hosted on Wednesday, March 13th and Thursday, March 14th. Originally, one day was planned, but added a second day to accommodate demand. Which day should you choose? Wednesday's tutorial is for 12 year olds - 15 year olds. Thursday's tutorial is for 15 year olds - 18 year olds(ish). What is the day schedule? 9:00am - 1:00pm: Introduction + P...

Oh, its getting closer - 48 days until PyCon US 2013 kicks off - you have  registered , right? One of the joys I get helping the foundation put together PyCon US is being able to tap the talents of amazing people - one of those is  Idan Gazit , who designed the non-web  artwork for PyCon 2012 , and has once again done it for PyCon 2013. Each of his designs has been unique, but I have to say, 2013's design really takes the cake:   This piece just makes me happy on so many levels - it's retro and futuristic at the same time - it incorporates the theme ("Change the Future") and hints and the surprises we have in store for the conference. It's beautiful in its simplicity. This artwork will be featured in the mobile application we will once again have, the print program and the t-shirts. Note, that t-shirts are an additional cost / checkbox when registering for PyCon 2013 - we've focused majority of the funds this year to some special projects - Financial Aid ...

Just a heads up - PyCon US 2013 Financial Aid emails have been sent out! Just be sure to check your spam folder; for some reason GMail chose to mark them as phishing/spam. If you're unsure; email pycon-aid@python.org!

The train, it keeps on going - the  PyCon Countdown  shows us officially under 70 days until PyCon 2013 in Santa Clara! We're pleased to announce that in addition to all the other great things going on - we've added an opening reception in the sponsor expo hall on Thursday March 14th in the evening, courtesy of our amazing list of  PyCon Sponsors . Everyone is invited to attend, free of charge of course! We will have appetizers, socializing - the expo hall will be open (it opens at 6:00pm Thursday) and it will be a great way of kicking off PyCon 2013 in style. Oh. Did I mention everyone who is attending the conference gets two free drink tickets? I guess I just did! Come, join us on the evening of the 14th, meet up with all the other attendees and sponsors before PyCon proper really gets into full motion. If you're a sponsor, and you're interested in helping sponsor this event -  get in touch with us ! We've already got one sponsor helping us host the event, and...

How time flies. It seems like only yesterday I was announcing that PyCon 2012 was getting close - well, PyCon 2013 is less than three months away  - that's right, March is coming! We've once again packed the house with an amazing selection of  talks ,  tutorials  - sponsor workshops are coming, and so much more. We've also gotten an amazing  amount of sponsors and supporters  for the conference - so much in fact that we're looking at once again filling the expo hall which we actually expanded  this year! That's why I'm announcing that this is the last week (you have until this time, next Wednesday the 9th) for new sponsors to sign up to support PyCon and still get expo hall booths - we may still have room for the jobs fair running Sunday, but after next wednesday booths for the  expo hall  (thursday evening through saturday) will be removed from the prospectus.  As always, we will negotiate packages without booths after this cutoff with all companies wanting...

For the past two years, one of our most successful and impressive experiments has been the creation of "Startup Row", where we let Python powered startups apply for free booth space, registrations and coverage. Like all things, this has only gotten better and more impressive with time. We knew that a lot of startups used Python, but we were astounded and excited to see the number and quality of new companies that were eager to participate at PyCon and show off what they were doing. At PyCon itself, we've continually got a lot of comments from attendees that Startup Row was their favorite part of the Expo Hall. From meeting and talking with the founders of so many great companies, it was obvious that they would go far. Last year alone, we heard from several Startup Row participants that they were even approached by potential investors  - that's right, we had Angel Investors and "big boy" VCs at the conference, and the conversations that they had with the pa...

You know what's better than one huge conference? One huge conference, and another on huge data! (Sorry, I couldn't resist) Today, I am proud to publicly announce a new development for PyCon / PyCon 2013 - we're partnering and working with the awesome team behind the PyData Conference to bring PyData Silicon Valley to the Santa Clara Convention Center during the sprints  - that's right, come for PyCon, stay for the sprints and PyData! PyData Silicon Valley will happen in the same building as the PyCon 2013 Sprints: PyData Tutorials: Monday, March 18, 2013 PyData Conference: Tuesday-Wednesday March 19-20, 2013 A bit more about PyData: The PyData conference and workshop is a semi-annual event for scientists, engineers, and data analysts in the Python community. The conference focuses on techniques and tools for management, analytics, and visualization of data of different types and sizes with particular emphasis on big data. Python is already the de-facto langu...

You're probably wondering where the program is for PyCon 2013 coming in March. The short version is that, well - the program committee is having meetings almost every day trying to go through 459 individual talk proposals.  Yes. Four Hundred and Fifty-Nine. That's astounding . Literally unprecedented in the history of the conference. You can ask the team - I was fretting and hand wringing and pacing all over worrying about not having enough proposals and then the tidal wave hit. 459. Amazing. To top that? 129 tutorial proposals. This is amazing . It also presents the staff, volunteers and program committee a conundrum. With the 5 tracks PyCon's main conference has room for maybe 90 talks . That's if we squeeze and push. With 459 proposals, the majority of which are exceedingly high quality, incredibly interesting and completely community driven, the program committee is under immense stress and an astounding workload. So, to relieve some of it - and to be able to s...

PyCon is  a lot of things . It’s the largest Python conference around in many aspects, with more talks, more tutorials, more days, and more people than any others. It’s one of the cheapest big conferences around, with ticket prices that haven’t changed in years. It’s the largest gathering of the best minds in the community. With the conference back in Silicon Valley for a second year and an expanded capacity of 2500 attendees, you will not find a bigger gathering of the best Python users around. We’ve had people consider PyCon their vacation. We’ve had people in attendance from all around the world. We’ve had people bring their kids. We’ve had people try to buy next year’s tickets before the current conference was over. This community loves PyCon, and we love working on it. What we need is more  sponsorship . What does the community get out of sponsorship? Financial Aid PyCon prides itself on being an affordable event for attendees starting with the low ticket prices, and extendi...

With PyCon 2012 we happily adopted a  Code of Conduct/Non Harassment Policy . We derived our version from personal experiences within the community and the ten year lifetime of the conference, and the community as a whole. We discussed it with staff, volunteers and debated it publicly. In 2012 we had an internal policy and set of guidelines for enforcement - inspired by the  Ada Initiative's   excellent work  we are publicly publishing our guidelines for Attendee and Staff responses to harassment or Code of Conduct violation incidents. Attendee Procedure for Incident Handling Staff Procedure for Incident Handling We hope that providing these documents and procedures publicly, we reenforce our dedication to providing a safe and welcoming environment to everyone. We also hope to inspire other conferences - big and small - to adopt similar procedures and public documentation. We would like to once again thank the  Ada Initiative  for their work ( donate here ) - as well as all ...

The PyCon team is happy to announce that registration for the March 2013 conference have opened at  https://us.pycon.org/2013/registration/  - note however, there have been some changes this year. Early bird rates are available for the first 1000 registrations , which is a departure from previous time-based systems. With PyCon 2012 having been a quick sell out, we’re expecting this one to be the same. Keep in mind that attendance is strictly limited to 2500 attendees . We recommend not waiting. Individual and corporate ticket prices remain the same as they have been for the last few years, with early bird rates of $300 and $450 respectively. The regular rates of $350 and $600 for individual and corporate are still an incredible deal. Sponsorship of PyCon includes conference passes - and in many cases those passes pay for the sponsorship itself! For 2013 we’ve reduced the cost to students by 50% , bringing the early bird rate to $100 with a regular rate of $125. Providing a more af...

As highlighted in my initial post highlighting some of our  PyCon 2013 sponsors  - sponsors are critical for the conference as I have said before, they give back to the community as a whole, they allow PyCon to keep ticket prices low, they're a constant source of jobs within the community, and their sponsorship allows us to maintain a growing financial aid budget, and work with outreach groups such as Women Who Code, PyLadies, and many others for grants for people who would not otherwise be able to to come to PyCon. Sponsorship  is more than just about money - sure, there are  tangible business benefits  - but the  social benefits  are equally important and large. Keeping this in mind, I emailed our sponsors and asked them a few simple questions: What is your company using Python for, and why is it important to you (as an organization)? Why does sponsoring/attending PyCon 2013 make sense for your organization? Continuing the series - here are some more awesome responses! AWe...

A little under 24 hours ago; I sent out an email to our current  PyCon 2013 Sponsors  - sponsors are critical for the conference as I have said before, they give back to the community as a whole, they allow PyCon to keep ticket prices low, they're a constant source of jobs within the community, and their sponsorship allows us to maintain a growing financial aid budget, and work with outreach groups such as Women Who Code, PyLadies, and many others for grants for people who would not otherwise be able to to come to PyCon. Sponsorship  is more than just about money - sure, there are  tangible business benefits  - but the  social benefits  are equally important and large. Keeping this in mind, I emailed our sponsors and asked them a few simple questions: What is your company using Python for, and why is it important to you (as an organization)? Why does sponsoring/attending PyCon 2013 make sense for your organization? I immediately started getting responses - all of which were e...

Time sure flies when you're writing Python! That's right folks - the  PyCon 2013 Call for Proposals  ends on the 28th of September: 24 days from now ! While Poster session proposals will be accepted on a rolling basis until January - the 28th means the end for submitting main conference talks and tutorials! Don't wait until the last minute - we encourage every one to submit talks on subjects ranging from Robotics, to Core Python, to web frameworks and success stories. If you need help? Check out  SpacePug , a sample proposal the team put together. Need talk ideas? Check out: More information in regards to speaking at PyCon. Collection of suggested ideas from the Python community on the PyCon blog. Melita Mihaljevic  - Suggestions Calvin Spealman  - Suggestions a great Reddit thread  on topic ideas Anna Ravenscroft  - Suggestions Shawn Brown  - Suggestions Barry Morrison  - Suggestions Short version? Talk about something you love - Raspberry Pi hacking and Pyth...

This is a guest post by Sancho Panza about his experiences at his first PyCon... Pycon... My visions of the Promised Land… I was fortunate enough to go to PyCon 2012 in Santa Clara and I cannot be more serious when I say that it was a life changing experience. I got there in time of the tutorials and was so excited that I arrived an hour early, but that didn't matter because I WAS AT PYCON!!! The tutorials were crash courses that took me from zero to hero in a few very fully packed hours of both lecture and lab work. My brain was on overload and smoked after the 2 days of classes… and I had not even hit the opening event. As a first timer to PyCon, this was when the fear and uncertainty set in.."How am I going to take all of this home with me if my brain can't reset?" The opening of PyCon was, not overstating this, an event that enthralled the mind and ensnared the senses. The atmosphere was electrified with some of the brightest minds on the cutting edge of the...

Guest Post By Rupa Dachere - Founder, Chapter Lead - Bay Area, Software Developer - CodeChix.org I didn’t know about PyCon until a friend of mine mentioned it to me about a month before PyCon 2012.  At the time, I was job-hunting and figured, why not go since it’s a language I’ve dabbled with briefly and it might be interesting to see what’s going on with it.  Also, it would be a good opportunity to see if  CodeChix -Bay Area could be involved in some way. I think it was one of the best decisions I made.  I asked for and received financial aid to attend and volunteered for bag stuffing - this involved an assembly line of several layers of sorting of stickers (about 8 different kinds), stuffing bags and carrying full bags to various bins for distribution.  There were all kinds of people helping out - organizers, geeks, programmers, artists etc.  We finished stuffing almost 2500 bags in record time (I don’t remember the time) and were rewarded with Pizza, Beer and hobnob-time. I atten...