If not for this situation, how may Chinese attendees were we anticipating? As of Friday, there were 12 registered from China.



> On Feb 3, 2020, at 4:47 PM, Lars Marowsky-Bree <lmb@suse.com> wrote:
>
> On 2020-02-03T20:59:58, Sage Weil <sweil@redhat.com> wrote:
>
> Hi Sage,
>
> such sad news. I'm afraid it looks this way, especially given that it
> seems very likely our Chinese attendees, speakers, and sponsors may not
> be able to join us.
>
> People in South Korea may also be concerned about such gatherings, as
> Cephalocon obviously would be.
>
> Lufthansa has shutdown most China flights until end of March, even
> Beijing until at least end of February, which would affect
> connections.
>
> And we'd be the subject of the general mood, and even if Seoul is fine,
> many lump all of APAC together into one bucket. (The anecdotal evidence
> had a footer that said "Canada", fwiw, and Canada's government hasn't
> issued a travel warning as far as I can see.)
>
> Personally, I'd (for now) be happy to go ahead - Seoul, at least at this
> point, is fine enough. But that's not what we're dealing with.
>
>> I think we need to cancel (or postpone).
>
>> I'm worried about rescheduling because it's not clear how much later it
>> needs to be to avoid the coronavirus outbreak (and any residual reluctance
>> to travel etc).
>
> Rescheduling would be desirable, but it would likely have to be at least
> by 3-6 months - even after this outbreak has settled, people will need
> time to make new travel arrangements, revisit talks, check new schedules
> etc.
>
>> The challenge with canceling is to pressure the hotel to let us out of the
>> contract using the 'force majeur' provision, which isn't a black and white
>> proposition because many attendees still *can* come (e.g., few travel
>> restrictions to South Korea so far).  Maybe that will change in the next
>> few days.
>
> That'll also affect individual travelers who have booked flights.
>
>> In any case, I lean toward canceling outright at this point.
>
> Personally, I'd still wait another week as the situation continues to
> develop. (And if a force majeur such as a travel advisory from the US or
> within the EU to SK arises, I think that'd help cancellation fees ...)
>
> But if we can neither get the Chinese community to attend, and RH is
> pulling out, then the question really boils down to "how to cancel in
> the least costly way", not "if".
>
>
> Regards,
>    Lars
>
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