I suggest paying for people who can't afford to come, instead of giving out freebies. --itamar

• Thanks for making this suggestion, which has already been talked of as one possibility should the conference be well-enough attended to make it practical. Well, you were asking how you could help. I suppose, should funds be available for this purpose, we'd need someone impartial to make the decisions about who gets paid for. Also remember that ultimately the decision about whether this happens will have to be the PSA's, since it's their money we are talking about. -- steve

How about a book? From experience I can honestly say that my best Python books have a tendency to "grow legs", and I've been known to lend out my Python books to coworkers who are interested in the language. In fact, for a few of my favorites, I've bought multiple copies so I can give one to a workstudy while I have a copy on my desk. Duplicates of the good ones in an office around here isn't a bad idea. -- John

• Good idea: do you want to solicit help from publishers? Books can be kind of expensive ... -- steve

One year everybody got the _Essential Python Reference_ (New Riders). That really helped users after the conference, and it was a great book to "grow legs". However, we don't want to exactly duplicate that again since many people already have that book now. _The Python Cookbook_ is the current rage now and would make an excellent freebie. Another idea would be to ask each publisher to sell one general-interest Python book at a deep discount (say $20 off or 50% off), for a total of three discounted books (a tutorial, a reference, and _The Python Cookbook_). That way the users could stock up on core Python information (and buy books for evangelization) without busting their wallets, the publishers would get at least some $$, and people wouldn't be taking freebie books they don't need and immediately throwing them into the garbage. -- Mike Orr

CategoryPyCon