Talk:2009-08-29 52 13

Southern german residents interested in sharing tickets?

I'm basically interested, but travel cost is an issue. However, there might be a chance to considerably cut that down. The idea would be to go to Berlin around wednesday, stay there for a few days, and then return home (and call that a small vacation). Would also need an accomodation, of course. --Ekorren

Cheap travel to Berlin

There's that new offer for weekdays similar to the well known Wochenendticket, called Quer-durchs-Land-Ticket. Like that one and the Ländertickets, it's valid only in local trains, and not before 9 am on weekdays. Unlike those, it is not valid in non-railway-traffic like bus, metro, tram and ferries.

Using only local trains is slow, but in a group that doesn't matter, does it?

The Quer-durchs-Land-Ticket is 34 EUR for one person and 5 each for the second to fifth. #6 needs a new one. This results in the following pricing scheme for a small group:

# people	price per person in EUR
	Mon-Fri	Sat/Sun
	(QDLT)	(SWT)
1	34.00	37.00
2	19.50	18.50
3	14.67	12.33
4	12.33	9.25
5	10.80	7.40
6	14.67	12.33
7	12.57	10.47

SWT includes local traffic within of Berlin on the same day, QDLT doesn't. Starting at 9 from Tübingen allows me to reach Berlin before midnight via either Würzburg or Nürnberg and do a detour or a two hours stopover at a station of free choice along the way (there might be hashes). Throwing another 8.40 EUR into the pot makes that four hours (by starting earlier than 9 am). --Ekorren 11:16, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

dawidi

So I see there's planning going on for a bigger meetup in or near Berlin, with the most likely date now being the 29th of August. From what I'm currently planning for the week before that, I'll be on my way from Kiel to Regensburg (by train, with my bike) on that weekend, so if a meetup happens then I could probably stop by in Berlin for a day and join you :-D

(I voted as ifneedbe for the previous and following Sundays, as I could adjust my plans to fit those dates if you decide against the 29th for some reason) --dawidi 20:29, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

moved from Talk:Berlin, Germany --Davidc 18:03, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Barbecue

A barbecue might be nice if anyone is able to bring one along? --Davidc 18:07, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Back-up plan

In case the hash is not easily reached by public transport, it would be good to have a back-up location available. After all, if people are coming from across the continent, we want to make sure we have a meeting even if the location is impossible - the purpose for this date is the meet-up more than anything else. I suggest we pick a suitable back-up location, central in the city, as a backup plan and then decide on the Friday:

1. Meet-up is at the exact hashpoint
2. Meet-up is not quite at the hashpoint but at a location nearby (e.g. it's inaccessible due to no-trespassing etc)
3. Meet-up is at the back-up location (e.g. too far out for reasonable public transportation)

If we do this, we might encourage more people to attend just by virtue of the fact that the meet-up will definitely happen and definitely won't be a day's hike to reach. See, for example, Hiro's "maybe" on this page. --Davidc 22:19, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Myself I would prefer to move it to a neighbouring graticule in case it's too difficult - there's rather fast public transport available into many directions and in a group, the Schönes-Wochenende-Ticket or Berlin-Brandenburg-Ticket are a quite cheap way to get there. After all, geohashing is also about seeing the unknown. --Ekorren 22:25, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I would agree with that if not for the fact that Berlin is central in its graticule, and most locations in surrounding graticules are even more hard to get to (exception may be the Potsdam area in the east of the western graticule). I would be totally happy to move the meet-up to a neighbouring graticule if necessary - which we'll discuss on the Friday before - but I still think we should make a contingency plan to ensure a meet-up happens, since some people are travelling from far away. I mean, we're likely to be fine, I would estimate 60% of the graticule is easily accessible by public transport, but a back-up plan is no bad thing. --Davidc 23:54, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree with both of you. -- relet 08:48, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Flashmob collision

One of my coworkers just announced she'll be in Berlin on that day - the reason being a Michael Jackson 'Thriller' tribute Zombie flash-mob, at 16:00. While I don't particularly like the whole "undead" theme and I'd rather participate in "classic" exkacedian geohashing silliness than watch people play zombies, maybe we should consider working this into our plans for the day somehow? At least we should be aware of it. So there. --dawidi 14:18, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I can't relate to the Jacksonmania in any respect, and given the current inflational number of flashmobs as well as the growing misuse of the flashmob term to ignore responsibility when starting illegal parties and political demonstrations (like e.g. by nazi groups a few days ago), I actually think the flashmob idea is basically dead. Might be funny to watch, but wouldn't be a cause for me to go out of my way by any means. Not even if it was just around the corner from the hash. --Ekorren 14:36, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I remember our discussion about that, yeah. I just wanted to mention that this will be happening simultaneously with our meetup, so we should be aware of the possibility of running into another internet there. That is, if the hash for that day is even within city limits and we don't pick a different graticule. --dawidi 15:42, 21 August 2009 (UTC)