WordCamp Europe 2026 – Comms Team, Tickets, and Krakow

Simon Kraft: I'm excited to talk to you today because we have quite a lot of things to touch upon. And I would like to start with your, I almost called it a job, because I think it sometimes feels like that, your role in the organizing team of WordCamp Europe 2026. You will be the co-lead, co-team lead for the communications marketing NPR team. Congratulations, first of all. Tell me something about your team.

Luca Rodino: Well, I really think that some days this is an appropriate job, Obviously, at the same time, it's contributions, so I'm very willing to do that. Yes, I'm co-lead of Com's team of communication, marketing, and TRs, but let's just call it Com's team. It's easier for everybody. And Com's team is, I think, the biggest team since ever among the WorldCamp Europe organization. There's a proper reason for this because the communication team takes care of different aspects of communication. Communication means a lot of things, you know. So we are taking care, basically, of social media, mainly of social media, public regulation, and content creation. In fact, the way we organize our marketing and comms team is having sub-teams within the proper team. So basically, the comms team has two leads, as you said. Elli is my co-lead for comms team. And it's a decision that we took year after year because having just one person taking care of the whole team is quite challenging. So we have two co-leads. And... This year, we're going to have 12, we already have 12 people working for it. And these 12 people are divided among the sub-teams I just mentioned. So content, social media, and PR. If you want to go in details on what they do, basically, quickly, because otherwise we're going to spend like one hour for each sub-team. The social media team takes care of managing all the social media channels for Work Camp Europe officially.

Simon Kraft: That makes sense.

Luca Rodino: Taking care doesn't mean like answering questions or just posting stuff, but creating a content plan for the social media channels and also filming, for example, videos that we are going to publish on each channel. Also, during the event itself, we are having people around. You probably experienced that. You are going to see marketing team going around for the whole venue, trying to make and record videos with people, attendees, making questions. So this is the social media team taking care of. The content team takes care of creating blog posts for the WordCamp Europe website and blog and takes care of the newsletters that you are receiving every week or every month. Oh, sorry about that. I just need to say that this year... Specifically, Simon already knows that. This year, we are making some changes in the emailing system we are using. So that's the reason why we are a bit in delay in sharing some information and communication through email. Don't worry about that. If you have been a previous attendee of WorldCamp Europe or a sponsor or a speaker, don't worry about that. We are going to communicate with you everything we are doing starting from January 1st show. So just wait for that. This is an important note for you all. And the last sub-team is the public relation. The public relation sub-team takes care mainly of the relationship with media partners.

Simon Kraft: That's why it's my favorite team.

Luca Rodino: Yeah, obviously. I know that. So what they do, basically, they take care of the relationship with the media partners. They make sure that media partners at Work and Pure has everything they need. And if you remember, a couple of years ago, I think I was your media partner person, something like that. You remember that?

Simon Kraft: I do remember that.

Luca Rodino: And we were working together in having your interviews with all the attendees, the speakers, and so on. And that was my very first role in the WorldCamp Europe organization. Because before that, I only attended WorldCamp Europe or WorldCamps. Around the world, but I was not into the organization.

Simon Kraft: So this is your third rodeo then?

Luca Rodino: Yeah, as an organizer, yes. I'm attending Warcamp Europe. I think the first one was in 2017, something like that.

Simon Kraft: Oh, wow.

Luca Rodino: God.

Simon Kraft: Harris.

Luca Rodino: Yeah, it was like nine years ago.

Simon Kraft: That was my first time as a media partner.

Luca Rodino: Oh, okay. That's nice. That's nice. So yeah, I actually started being an organizer when we had the first Warcamp Europe in Italy. I'm Italian, probably the accent is very, you can understand it by my accent. But yeah, when WorldCamp Europe was in Turin, 2020, no, 24, yes. Yeah, 24, sorry about that. I just decided to try that and get into the organization because I was very willing to contribute not only to the local community, the Italian community, you know, but the European one or maybe the global one. And after that, this is the third year I'm in the communication team. Last year, just to talk about myself a bit, if you wish. So last year, I got into the marketing team once again, or the comms team, call it as you wish. And after some internal changes, the global leads last year asked me to take care of co-leading comms team starting in January because of some, as I said, some changes that we had internally. And this year, I just said to myself, okay, It's stressful, yes. It takes a lot of time, yes. But at the same time, it gives you back a lot of energy, a lot of inspiration. You learn a lot. You get a lot from other people contributing to work in PureOps. I really wanted to do this again since the beginning as a co-lead. And I applied and they selected me and here I am.

Simon Kraft: While we're on this more personal note, how much time does it take to be even like a co-lead in the teams for Working Bureau?

Luca Rodino: It really, really depends on the team you are working on.

Simon Kraft: In your case?

Luca Rodino: In my case, I don't want to scare anybody, but I would say two hours per day, something like that.

Simon Kraft: I'll just bleep that out, okay?

Luca Rodino: So now let's say that it really depends on the period, because when you start, when you kick off everything, you are full of tasks. Then you can have many people taking care of different tasks, so you have less job to do. And then again, when the event itself approaches, that's the scary moment.

Simon Kraft: And also during the event.

Luca Rodino: During the event. Yeah, during the event, probably you will never see me.

Simon Kraft: I do.

Luca Rodino: Yeah, you do. You do. But all the other people probably don't see me because what Comsteam does during the event itself is just locking ourselves in a room, the so-called Comsteam room, and work on communication from that room. And that's super fundamental and important. And the only people that you're going to see are the social media people going around trying to contribute and creating content along with the photography team.

Simon Kraft: So you have organizing this gigantic event and then you do not really get to experience it yourself because you're locked in a little room somewhere.

Luca Rodino: Yes, that's the downside of the...

Simon Kraft: That sounds like a brilliant deal. Why not more people doing this?

Luca Rodino: So, let me just say that this is a very specific situation for the comms team. This does not happen to all the teams. Luckily for them, all the other teams or most of the other teams are experiencing the event during the whole time the event takes place. But the comms team, I mean, you need to have comms team take care of the communication in every single minute of the event to solve some communication problems. On social media some specific requests some complaints some issues.

Simon Kraft: So we need.

Luca Rodino: To be there all the time.

Simon Kraft: Very timely job okay thank you i think that was a good insight into what your team does and i'm only half joking when i'm saying it's one of my favorite teams at woodcube europe i.

Luca Rodino: Thought you were serious.

Simon Kraft: I have to say that i know people in other teams as well Okay, let's zoom out a little bit again and take a look at Woodcube Europe as a whole. Because Woodcube Europe in 2026 is coming to Poland and to Krakow specifically. Let's talk about that. I interviewed Sebastian, the local lead, ahead of the 2025 edition. My info is like half a year old by now. I guess some things have changed. One thing that hasn't changed, though, is the date. Luca, when will we be in Krakow?

Luca Rodino: So, yeah, the event is going to take place from the 4th of June, 2026, until the 6th of June, 2026, meaning that the first day, as usual, is going to be Contributor Day, why the? And the sixth is going to be the actual event with all the lectures and the sponsors area and everything that you love about WordCamp Europe.

Simon Kraft: I took the chance this June to visit Krakow because I knew it was coming up and there was a local WordCamp there. So I can say the venue looks really, really cool. I've stood outside the venue, like pressing my face to the glass, looking in. It's really, really fancy. Can you tell us a bit more about what's in store for us there? How many people are you planning with? Anything new about this next edition of Wicom Europe?

Luca Rodino: Well, I can't share any specific information.

Simon Kraft: Right?

Luca Rodino: But actually, the location is amazing, as you said. I mean, the actual location called ICE, the city is beautiful. It's amazing. So we are going to prepare a lot of guides for people coming at Work in Pure of Krakow. We really think that it's important for people to get to know the city itself and what to do. About WordCamp Europe, this year, we want to invest a lot in education. So what we are planning, along with inviting universities from Krakow at WordCamp Europe, is also having some specific moments dedicated to education. And that's something that we always do, obviously, but the investment of this year is specifically on that section. There's nothing I can share right now.

Simon Kraft: But just wait for it.

Luca Rodino: I mean, it's still early. We are in December, but just wait a couple of months and you're going to get some news from the comms team and the whole organization. But it's going to be amazing. We are, to answer your question about attendees, we are really expecting to have around 3,000 people this year. That's our goal. And we do believe we can easily reach that number, even because the city itself is very attractive. Let me also say that it's also cheap in general compared to other cities. So maybe people are more attractive and it's inviting for people to get there. So at the same time, we decided to keep the prices for the tickets as every year, 50 euros. So this is very, very important because obviously everything is getting more expensive and more expensive everywhere in the world. But we decided to keep the price as always because we truly believe that the experience of WorldCamp Europe must be affordable for everybody. In the community.

Simon Kraft: In the past, ticket prices for WordCamps have been capped at $25 a day. Has this guideline from WordCamp Central changed or is that still in place?

Luca Rodino: No, actually. I mean, we don't have restrictions right now. I mean, if we decide that we want, I mean, as far as I know, but yes, we don't have specific restrictions if for any budget needs we have to set the price of the tickets to 100 euros 1 million euros we can even propose that that's not a problem obviously it's gonna be a problem for the event and stuff but we could have decided to be honest we could have decided we thought about that to increase a bit the price of the tickets but in the end when we voted about this most of the people basically everybody in the end decided to just keep the price at 50 euros because that's, That's why we really think that the experience of Warcam needs to be affordable for everybody. And that's great.

Simon Kraft: That's really nice to hear. And I think Krakow will be a big factor in this as well, especially compared to Basel. Don't get me wrong. I loved being in Basel. It was a really cool experience. But hotel prices and general cost of living in Krakow is slightly different from Basel. And even like in a walking distance of a couple of minutes around the venue, I think there are four or five hotels at vastly different price points. Yes. At least as of last week when I last checked. So I think there will be a lot of affordable options for people.

Luca Rodino: I love the bezel. Like every other city, we have had a work in Europe. But it's objective that Poland and Krakow is more affordable. And this is gonna be a good a good thing for having more people that are interested in visiting the city visiting the country and also obviously attending World Camp Europe with affordable prices so we truly believe that this year we are gonna meet all the goals in terms of a tendency that we set then.

Simon Kraft: To wrap things up because we're already well into this what I thought to be like a 10-minute conversation. Let's mention all the stuff people can do today already. Of course, like book your trip to Krakow. There's, by the way, really cool train options from Berlin starting in early 26. It's a really quick train connection. Just dropping this here for everyone interested. What calls are open at the moment? What kind of submissions are you already accepting? Let's walk through those.

Luca Rodino: I really invite people to have a look at the website at Work and Pure 2026. We have three calls right now. That are open, first one, the call for speakers, that's going to end the 31 of January, 2026. So end of January. The day after, the other call, the call for media partners, in which you probably are interested a bit, is going to end. So you still have the whole month of January to apply for being a media partner or being a speaker. I really invite people to at least have a look and try to understand which are the benefits to apply for being a speaker or a media partner. Because there's a lot of benefits that comes from that. The third one, third call open is the call for sponsors. Obviously, we all contribute to the organization of this event, but we really need to sponsor and support the event so that we can still make affordable prices for the tickets. We can still give you all those fantastic engagements and activities that we make at WorkCamp Europe. The call for sponsors right now does not have a specific deadline. That's because we usually keep it open until May, which means one month before the actual event.

Simon Kraft: But supplies are limited. There will not be...

Luca Rodino: Absolutely, yes. There are some restrictions, some limited numbers. So we have different levels. Of sponsorships and you have to take a look and see what's still available so the sooner the better.

Simon Kraft: Definitely okay cool having done all three speaker sponsor and media partner over the last couple of years i can recommend all of these activities that work in europe they're all fun and there will be more calls of course to come like a call for volunteers i guess is in the books again if we're following the usual WordCamp playbook. And those will be on the website, I guess, over the next couple of months spread out.

Luca Rodino: Yes.

Simon Kraft: To all calls open already. I'll add links in the show notes. So everyone interested can click right through to them. Also available now are the first couple of tickets for attendees. 50 bucks. That's a good deal, judging from the last couple of years. So there's more to come but getting those locked in early has some nice perks like knowing you'll be there and being able to book hotel and travel and all of that.

Luca Rodino: Thanks a lot was very uh it was fun was fun and i'm always willing to share information about work camp because we, our hands and our hearts in this organization and we are happy doing that so yeah yeah.

Simon Kraft: Then the important final question is where are we going to be in 27.

Luca Rodino: I don't know or maybe i know oh you can't.

Simon Kraft: Blame me for trying.

Luca Rodino: Okay yeah no no no but you will see uh as you perfectly know you will know where World Camp Europe 2027 is going to be at the end of 2026 edition. Closing remark. You have to wait for it.

Simon Kraft: And I will have an interview with the next lead ready in time for that because that is my sport for World Camp Europe. No one ever tells me where this thing is happening the next year round and I always have to figure it out on my own. And I think the organizing team does this.

Luca Rodino: For tricking you, making fun of you.

Simon Kraft: Yeah yeah yeah yeah i'm pretty sure okay no worries though i just had to try thank you so much thank you for taking the time in a busy time leading up to the end of the year i will see you around soon thank you.

Luca Rodino: Thank you have a great holiday uh thank you very much.

Simon Kraft: Bye bye.