OSfest looking for 2024 conference theme — vote now

(image courtesy OSFest.).

The organizers of OSFest 2024, an annual festival that will be held this coming October, recently opened voting for this year’s theme to their Discord community. Festival participants can vote by reacting with a specific emoji to indicate their preferred theme from a selection of options, either via the OSFest Discord server or by sending an email to opensimfest@gmail.com.

Voting closes on January 24.

“For OSFest 2023, we took a poll to decide which theme we had that year,” said Lisa Laxton, OSFest director and founder of the Infinite Metaverse Alliance and Laxton Consulting. “Since the community liked this approach giving them a voice for this hypergrid community event, we are doing it again for OSFest 2024 but early in the planning based on feedback from last year’s participants.”

An email announcement went out this month with details on the festival dates from October 4 to October 20 and welcoming merchants, exhibitors and performers to take part. The festival takes place on the OSFest Grid, with some free land parcels provided to qualifying merchants and exhibitors.

Suggested themes for exhibitors this year include “Futurism,” “Silk Road and Asian history,” “Burning Man and Woodstock expressions,” “Hypergrid community unity,” “creative art and architecture” or no set theme. Performers and merchants are not required to follow the selected theme.

“Participants asked for a longer lead time and theme so they can plan and create their builds months before the grid is open for them to transfer builds from their home grids,” Laxton said.

Organizers plan to allow voting until January 24 before deciding on this year’s official theme.

“For two full weeks, including weekends, we’ll have music, dance, art, and merchant expos in one place,” said Laxton. “This is an all volunteer effort with a limited number of free parcels for exhibitors and merchants provided by the grid sponsors.”

OSFest organizers are also looking for greeters, performers, artists, builders, scripters, merchants, and promoters.

“The more volunteers we have, the more time we each get to spend visiting exhibits and stores as well as attending events within the OSFest Grid,” Laxton said.

Maria Korolov