should we do GSoC 2021?

[Trevor Woerner]

Hi everyone,

There are discussions regarding whether or not we want to participate in
GSoC this year. Org applications are open now until Feb 19.

Last year at the GSoC Mentor Summit (Oct 2020) it was announced that
changes were coming to GSoC 2021:
- the amount of time a student is expected to spend on a project is halved
- stipends are halved
- overall duration is shortened to 10 weeks
- lowered eligibility requirements

As a result, project expectations are supposed to be reduced as well.
Whereas previously a student was expected to work 350 hours and had to be
enrolled in an accredited university programme, now projects are expected
to take a student 175 hours and accredited colleges and coding camps are
acceptable.

What this means right now is that our list of ideas (
https://www.x.org/wiki/SummerOfCodeIdeas/) needs to be checked to see if
it's still suitable. Are the project ideas still valid? Are they something
a student could do in 175 hours?

Some people feel that 175 hours might not be enough time to contribute a
significant coding effort against an fd.o project. At this point my gut
feeling is to hold off on the application. If I can't find anyone to help
go through the ideas list or who are willing to mentor under these new
changes then we'll need to consider our options.

Thoughts?

Thanks so much for reading, best regards,
    Trevor
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