Recently, Open Source Matters received an unsolicited proposal for the management of http://demo.joomla.org. After consideration and consultation with the Community Oversight Committee, the OSM board the Community Oversight Committee determined that, in the interest of fairness, others should also be invited to submit proposals.

Open Source Matters is requesting proposals for the management of the Joomla!^® demo site (http://demo.joomla.org). The existing Joomla!^® demo site has been highly successful, with an average of 25,000 registrations monthly. OSM reasonably expects the number of registrations to increase with more prominent displays of the links to the site on the joomla.org family of websites. The joomla.org sites now receive approximately 5 million visits per month.

This is an open and competitive process. Responses to this RFP ("proposals") received after December 9, 2009 will not be considered.

To learn more about the detailed requirements, please read the complete Request for Proposals.

The Joomla! Project plans to have major multi-day conferences beginning as early as November 2010. Community members in a city or region who would like to consider hosting a major conference are encouraged to submit expressions of interest followed by formal proposals. The Request For Proposals gives instructions for putting together a proposal. The events team will work with interested groups to prepare proposals.

Up to four events will be planned in a 12 month period starting in November of 2010. There will be a maximum of one event per quarter and one per continent. The events will last 3 to 5 days. Local organizing committees will choose the theme of each conference and manage the program with the support of the events team and Open Source Matters. Community members and potential organizers are encouraged to use the events forum for discussion of ideas and proposals.

The first ever Joomla! event specifically for third party developers will be in New York City on December 5 and 6.Focused on the transition to Joomla! 1.6, the Joomla! Developer conference will feature all four development coordinators (Louis Landry, Sam Moffatt, Ian MacLennan, Mark Dexter), master Joomla! developer Andrew Eddie, Hannes Papenberg from the 1.6 release team and MooTools team member Aaron Newton.

Joomla! 1.6 is currently at alpha 2 status, so this is the time for extension and custom developers to begin working with its new features such as Access Control Lists, JForm, nested sets and other enhancements. The conference is appropriate for developers who have experience working with Joomla! as extension developers, custom developers, and in house staff. Tickets are $100.

The Joomla! Project thanks Rochen Performance Hosting, Joomla! Showroom and the Joomla! User Group New York for their sponsorship of the event, which, among other things, is supporting the attendance of six student and young non commercial developers at the conference.