For a new twist on our keynotes, we are excited that our Thursday mainstage will highlight two community speakers that both have important and intersting topics that all Drupalers can benefit from hearing.  

Submitted as regular sessions, Mike Bell's (mikebell_) proposal about mental health in the open source world and David Rozas' (drozas) talk about the phenomenon of contributing to a community, really struck a chord with the Track Chairs who select the DrupalCon session content.  Although these talks did not fit into an established track, they were important issues that stood out and we felt that they should be brought to light and what better place to get them heard than the keynote of a DrupalCon?  

Mike Bell's proposal highlighted that "Mental health is a subject that touches every single one of us within the community. It's something that people find incredibly difficult to talk about and yet it's so important."  His talk will use his own personal experience as a starting point to provide an opportunity to start disucssions on the topic within the community. With many community members commenting on the session proposal, the consensus is that this valuable talk will make a strong impact on the community and reminding us that we are humans!

David Rozas' talk presents findings from his PhD research on the Drupal Community and Commons-Based Peer Production.  He will highlight empirical data on the types of contribution whose focus of action is directed towards the community, meaning contribution beyond source code.  Once the facts are presented he explains why they are important and how we can use that information to build a stronger community that highlights both code and community contributions.

Presented in two 25-minute Community Keynotes, we look forward to bringing this topics to the Drupalistas of DrupalCon Barcelona and are honored to have our own community members contribute in such a fantastic way.  

We look forward to seeing you at DrupalCon and participating in these keynotes along with you.