This thread refers to this news piece.
If you have any ideas youād like to share with Ministry of Testing or want to send your wishes to the team, post them here 
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Of course the whole MoT team has our love and support at this time. Your thoughts around physical conferences is something Iāve believed for a while. For me personally, TestBash Home was needed much more than I realised. I wonāt get too emotional but my reaction made me see I was lower than I realised.
MoT does the best conferences, with Atelier very, very close, and Home was the best online conference Iāve āattendedā and it was your first go! Iām sure they will only get better and better.
My first week in my new job and I asked about support for MoT so thereās a couple coming (its a small company). Iām sure the community could promote the benefits to their businesses too? Just like Plurasight for developers but much better value for money and focused on testers.
I jumped the gun on buying a Home sticker as sheets came out the next day but why not suggest the community ask for MoT swag vouchers for birthdayās etc.?
Thank you all for everything you have done for me and others and we will be together again! 
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The right decision - but Iām sure it canāt have been the easiest. I second Adyās thoughts - this is an amazing community that should be cherished.
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Weāre here for all of you, MoT! Iāve been worried sick about a number of friends in the conference biz since all of this began, but I can honestly say that none of them are going to receive the amount of friendly āWhat we can we do to help?ā offerings that MoT will undoubtedly get. And not the ā(Please donāt actually ask me for anything)ā offers, but genuine, legitimate interests in helping out a group of people with genuine, legitimate interests in helping out us.
Iād love to see a list of the ideas that come out of this thread that MoT determines would be most helpful!
No idea what any of our futures will look like, but Iām a lot less scared of mine, thanks to those I know I can lean on when needed.
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Hi MoT team and MoT community, I donāt have much to say except that I love you and that Iāll be here supporting you in any way I can just as youāve supported me with my learning when I needed it the most. I still do need it a lot, so the fact that I will be able to attend more TestBashes (even if online ones, heck, your first online bash was AMAZEBALLS) fills me with joy.
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Thank you so much Richard and everyone at MoT for all you do. Testbash Home was absolutely incredible - thereās nothing like it. It definitely feels like it fills the void of the hold on physical conferences from an attendee perspective, as we all still got that Testbash buzz, got all the learnings, got all the socialisingā¦ The only thing missing was you making the lunch for everyone, Richard! Haha!
Seriously though - hatās off to all at MoT for keeping us testers safe, while finding really amazing ways to also keep us learning. Great job! Thank you!!
In terms of the financial gap, hereās a couple of ideas regarding any future Testbash Home events:
- Iām pretty sure most people would be willing to pay a little bit more for a ticket for the next Testbash home, since we can all see the value obtained from it now. Maybe having a sliding-scale pay option, with a minimum price?
- Iām pretty sure companies would be very keen to sponsor the next Testbash home online conference tooā¦ Company exposure to the bigger online audience is a big selling point to potential sponsors.
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Thanks for the care, love and support MOT and the bosses gives to us. Current situation is a new normal for all of us and itās the wise decision to take in this tough time. I would say, we got this together. And letās take this situation as an opportunity to bring in amazing new ideas as MoT always do 
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In terms of revenue, itās probably worth considering having corporate rates separate from individual rates, similar to how PyCon US (and Iām sure other conferences) do. My employer would easily have paid double, if not triple or quadruple, for TestBash Home - easy enough to pitch as a one day training event.
Edit, just in case the PyCon link breaks:
PyCon trusts you to self-select a fair registration rate:
- Corporate Rate ā If your company is paying for you to attend PyCon, register at the corporate rate. You will help keep the conference affordable for everyone, especially students and those needing financial aid. Government employees should also register at the corporate rate.
- Individual Rate ā If you are paying for yourself to attend PyCon, feel free to come as an individual. Employees of non-profits might also choose to register at the individual rate.
- Student/Academic Rate ā This rate is for full-time students and academics. If you are employeed in a school or university you qualify for this rate. However, if the funds available will allow for the Individual or Corporate rates please select accordingly.
The three rates break down to 700, 400, and 125 USD respectively.
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Out of interest @ernie with the sliding scale for TestBash Home did they see it as something like āTheyāre suggesting we pay Ā£49 so we willā? Whereas if there was a corporate rate specifically listed, they would view at as āWe should pay this because weāre corporateā? Or something else? 
I had forgotten it was a sliding scale. Yeah, setting a price makes it much easier to get an approval, i.e. asking someone to pay 100 when it says 50 is a hard sell in most any context.
I think sliding scales work if youāre going the other way - i.e. pay what you can afford, with a suggested amount of n, but asking people to pay more without saying how much more is really hard.
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You made the right decision.
I would highly recommend other people to get the Pro MOT membership - have you ever thought about getting testimonals/recommendations from people that have it? consider for people to pay monthly rather than a big annual some that may make it attractive?
Big hugs and lots of love to all of MoT bosses X
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āWe intend to run TestBash Netherlands, Manchester and New Zealand onlineā
Maybe offer an early bird 10% discount virtual bundle package deal on the above events?
Iād be willing to pay that upfront then add a 10% gratuity later on 
T-shirts are good. WWE sold āI wasnāt thereā t shirts for Wrestlemania, and Iām not suggesting the same, but. Something like, āI was there in spiritā or I was there onlineā or even, āTestBash Home, my heart was thereā would be something Iād buy. Or, you now, just a TestBash Home shirtā¦ Iām sure someone can take this idea and make it work.
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This was my first online conference and I was hugely impressed with how seamlessly everything worked. Really set a high bar for any future online conferences I may attend!
The polls were a particularly interesting feature that I wasnāt expecting. They made me think that user submitted polls could have provided some great insights into the community. Questions like āWhat programming languages do you use for test automationā or āDid you previously work in software development before getting involved in test automation?ā were two of the questions I was particularly interested in.
The StackOverflow developer survey provides great insights into the market for developers but it never seems to provide much information specifically regarding test automation which can be quite separated from the development activities. Having a variety of polls could be a quick way to gather insightful data about the community.
Also, if this kind of information is available in some other form already I would greatly appreciate if anyone could point me towards it!
Still think it should say, I wasnāt there 
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