If you look at the mission statement on [1], the topic for SCALE is Open Source software. We do not restrict ourselves to only Free Software, nor do we give special consideration to Free Software. SCALE tries to cater to everyone, thus there is a good mix of talks about various aspects of Open Source software.
I definitely understand this portion--in fact, my suggestion is to involve *more* free software, and *not* restrict yourself to Open Source or, really, any specific ideal.
With regards to your claim that Tom Callaway's talk is the only Free Software talk, I would like to point out Bradley Kuhn from the FSF gave a talk as well. While you may feel Oracle projects are not "perfectly" Free Software, as far as I am concerned, BTRFS is licensed under the GPL, and thus equally as Free as any other software licensed under the GPL.
True, but MySQL (which was the talk to which I referred, sorry for lack of clarity) is an example of software whose free-ness is suspect, especially where Oracle is involved!
And I did not claim that his was the only talk--I know Larry Cafiero also presented, and he's another speaker whose presentations, at least those I have seen, are term-agnostic.
Additionally, Debian probably have had a booth at SCALE every year, and the FSF and SFLC have had booths at SCALE in past years.
Of this, I am also aware. Your language, though, suggests that this year, the latter two decided not to come? Perhaps that is another indication of the necessity of what I'm suggesting.
If you feel Free Software is under-represented, please encourage Free Software speakers to submit presentations for future SCALE events, and for Free Software groups to apply for a booth at SCALE.
I will do my best, though my connection to other free software advocates is somewhat limited. My real suggestion, though I think I grasped at how to word it in my original message, is agnostic or at least all-inclusive terms in presentation titles and content, as well as on the website (in reference to your mission statement, certainly). That way, advocates of one side or another don't feel excluded, and the mission (which applies to all people on earth, via your link) is better served! Especially in the case where one side or another has important information, even if both are represented in equal terms __quantitatively__, it could be said that both are injured by feeling out-of-place in the other's presentations. Admittedly, this injury is by choice, but the flaming that occurs between OSS and FS is certainly not to be ignored.
Thanks for the quick reply!