content(newsletter): publish issue 403 and soften two selection rules to suggestions

.claude/skills/newsletter-issue/references/selection.md

@@ -93,10 +93,10 @@ The pool from `candidates.mjs` carries `kind`, `company`, `firstParty` and `ownP
 7. At most one specialised model release per issue, counted separately from flagships: a safety or moderation model (Mistral's Shieldstral), a domain model (DeepMind's WeatherNext). These earn a slot by being different in kind, not by being big. With rule 6 the ceiling is three model stories, and an issue at that ceiling is already unusually release-heavy: this is not the model announcements newsletter.
 8. At most one adjacent-beat pick per issue, in roughly every second issue: data systems, university courses, core systems and compilers.
 9. Same-week or same-month, unless explicitly framed as a classic.
-10. Include one named-individual opinion or analysis piece when a good one exists, provided it argues something rather than venting.
+10. Suggestion, not a requirement. A named-individual opinion or analysis piece is welcome when a strong one exists and it argues something rather than venting. Roughly 3 issues in 5 carry one, so an issue without one is entirely normal. Never displace a stronger candidate to fill this slot.
 11. Include one named-company production-engineering piece when a good one exists.
 12. Keep "big-lab technical/best-practice blog" distinct from "model release"; both count separately.
-13. Weight toward LLMs, agents and ML security; deprioritise generic MLOps process and policy.
+13. Suggestion, not a requirement. Weight toward LLMs, agents and ML security when ranking the pool, and deprioritise generic MLOps process and policy. This is a tendency across issues rather than a per-issue composition check: an issue that lands infra-heavy or research-heavy is fine.
 14. A European story qualifies on a model or research milestone, never on regulation.
 15. Do not manufacture geographic or topical quotas. This rule outranks rule 14: rule 14 says what makes a European story eligible, not that an eligible one must be picked. When a European candidate competes with a stronger non-European one for the same slot, the stronger candidate wins.
 16. Own content is eligible and should be surfaced, never silently dropped. The author's talks, projects and initiatives, and work they are connected to, are judged on merit like anything else: issue 344 opened with `The State of GenAI in 2025`, the author's own WeAreDevelopers talk. Cap it at one per issue and never place it in the final five without the owner saying so. The `ownProject` flag only recognises the author's own domains and repositories, so it will miss a talk on a conference channel or a book someone else wrote a foreword for. Do not treat an absent flag as evidence: the owner says which links are theirs when sharing them.

scripts/events/data/scout-ledger.yaml

@@ -77,7 +77,7 @@ scouted:
     next_edition: 2027-03-15 to 2027-03-18, Barcelona, ES
     cfp: OPEN - opened 2026-08-10, closes 2026-10-11 23:59 CEST (https://sessionize.com/kubecon-cloudnativecon-europe-2027/)
     owner: keen to submit - CFP now open, flagged in issue-401 scout report
-    note: proposed into events.yaml on 2026-08-23
+    note: proposed into events.yaml on 2026-08-23; proposal still not merged as of 2026-09-06
   - name: AGNTCon + MCPCon Europe
     url: https://events.linuxfoundation.org/agntcon-mcpcon-europe/
     checked: 2026-08-16
@@ -86,22 +86,24 @@ scouted:
     cfp: closed 2026-06-08
     note: proposed into events.yaml on 2026-08-16
   - name: AI Engineer Europe
-    url: https://www.ai.engineer/
-    checked: 2026-08-30
+    url: https://www.ai.engineer/europe
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: tracked
     next_edition: February 2027, London - month announced, exact dates TBA
-    cfp: not open yet (rechecked 2026-08-30; no speaker call surfaced)
+    cfp: not open yet (rechecked 2026-09-06; the /europe page still shows the passed April 2026 edition, so no 2027 speaker call is published)
     owner: keen to submit - flag the week the CFP opens (2026-08-16)
   - name: World Summit AI Amsterdam
     checked: 2026-08-16
     status: tracked
     next_edition: 2026-10-07 to 2026-10-08, Amsterdam - already in events.yaml
     cfp: n/a (curated)
   - name: WeAreDevelopers World Congress Berlin
-    checked: 2026-08-16
+    url: https://www.wearedevelopers.com/world-congress
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: tracked
-    next_edition: 2027 edition not announced; 2026 ran 8-10 July
-    cfp: not open yet; organiser usually opens in the autumn
+    next_edition: 2027-07-14 to 2027-07-16, Berlin, DE - confirmed on the organiser site
+    cfp: official call closed; late submissions reviewed on a rolling basis until slots fill (https://www.wearedevelopers.com/world-congress/call-for-speakers)
+    note: proposed into events.yaml on 2026-09-06
   - name: QCon London
     checked: 2026-08-16
     status: tracked
@@ -141,44 +143,44 @@ scouted:
     status: tracked
     next_edition: 2027-06-29 to 2027-07-02, Moscone West, San Francisco, US - confirmed on organiser site
     cfp: not open yet (no speaker call visible 2026-08-23)
-    note: proposed into events.yaml on 2026-08-23
+    note: proposed into events.yaml on 2026-08-23; proposal still not merged as of 2026-09-06
   - name: MLOps World
-    url: https://mlopsworld.com/
-    checked: 2026-08-16
+    url: https://mlopsworld.com/call-for-speakers/
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: tracked
-    next_edition: 2026-11-17 to 2026-11-18, Etter-Harbin Alumni Center, Austin, US - already in events.yaml
-    cfp: organiser has not published a 2026 speaker deadline
+    next_edition: Austin, US - already in events.yaml; organiser page now says 2026-11-16 to 2026-11-19 (16th virtual, 17th-19th in person), Eventbrite still lists 17-18, so the end date stays disputed
+    cfp: organiser still publishes no speaker deadline; the page carries a "Submit to Speak" link only
   - name: Rise of AI Berlin
     url: https://riseof.ai/conference-2027/
-    checked: 2026-08-16
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: tracked
     tier: cfp-track
     next_edition: 2027-05-12, Berlin, DE
-    cfp: not open yet
-    owner: notify when the 2027 CFP opens (2026-08-16)
+    cfp: OPEN - speaker call live, submissions via https://riseofai.fillout.com/speaker-interest, no published deadline (rolling curation)
+    owner: notify when the 2027 CFP opens (2026-08-16) - NOTIFIED in the issue-403 scout report
   - name: ContainerDays Hamburg
-    url: https://www.containerdays.io/containerdays-hamburg-2026/
-    checked: 2026-08-15
+    url: https://www.containerdays.io/
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: tracked
     tier: cfp-track
-    next_edition: 2026-09-02 to 2026-09-04, Schuppen 52, Hamburg, DE
-    cfp: closed for the 2026 edition
+    next_edition: 2027 not announced; 2026 ran 2026-09-02 to 2026-09-04, Hamburg
+    cfp: not open yet
     owner: not interested (2026-08-16)
   - name: code.talks Hamburg
     url: https://codetalks.com/call-for-paper
-    checked: 2026-08-30
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: tracked
     tier: cfp-track
     next_edition: 2026-11-04 to 2026-11-05, Hamburg, DE - already in events.yaml
-    cfp: open, wave 3 closes 2026-08-31 - TOMORROW (verified 2026-08-30 on the CFP page)
+    cfp: closed - wave 3 deadline 2026-08-31 has now passed
     owner: speaking at the 2026 edition - becomes a talks entry in events.yaml, title pending (2026-08-16)
   - name: Cloud Native AI Summit Europe
     url: https://sessionize.com/cloud-native-summit-europe-2026/
     checked: 2026-08-16
     status: tracked
     tier: cfp-track
     next_edition: 2026-12-02 to 2026-12-03, CNIT Forest, Paris, FR
-    cfp: open, closes 2026-09-18
+    cfp: open, closes 2026-09-18 - inside the 14-day window as of 2026-09-06
     owner: skipped 2026-08-16 - do not re-propose this edition
   - name: Accelerate Tomorrow AI Summit Berlin
     checked: 2026-08-15
@@ -199,23 +201,25 @@ scouted:
     next_edition: 2026-09-23 to 2026-09-24, Cubex Centrum, Prague, CZ
     cfp: none published
   - name: PyCon DE & PyData
-    checked: 2026-08-15
+    url: https://2027.pycon.de/
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: tracked
     tier: cfp-track
-    next_edition: 2027 not announced; 2026 ran 14-17 April, Darmstadt
-    cfp: not open yet
+    next_edition: 2027-04-20 to 2027-04-22, Heidelberg, DE
+    cfp: not open yet - deadline listed as TBA on pythondeadlin.es
   - name: EuroPython
     checked: 2026-08-15
     status: tracked
     tier: cfp-track
     next_edition: 2027 not announced; 2026 ran 13-19 July, Kraków
     cfp: not open yet
   - name: NDC London
-    checked: 2026-08-15
+    url: https://ndclondon.com/
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: tracked
     tier: cfp-track
-    next_edition: January 2027 expected (annual cycle); dates not confirmed
-    cfp: not open yet
+    next_edition: 2027-01-25 to 2027-01-29, Queen Elizabeth II Centre, London, UK
+    cfp: closed - the 2027 call ended 2026-08-30 23:59 CET; next window is the 2028 edition
   - name: Devoxx Belgium
     url: https://devoxx.be/
     checked: 2026-08-15
@@ -226,12 +230,28 @@ scouted:
     owner: not interested (2026-08-16)
 
   # One-off candidates.
+  - name: FastAPI Conf
+    url: https://fastapiconf.com/
+    checked: 2026-09-06
+    status: watching
+    reason: owner-supplied lead (2026-09-06). First edition 2026-10-28, Transformatorhuis Amsterdam, single day, single track, official FastAPI-team event with Samuel Colvin among the speakers. No CFP - the 2026 line-up is invited speakers only - and seats are capped, so it sits at community-conference tier rather than the events.yaml flagship bar
+    note: recommended as a cfp-track watchlist addition in the issue-403 report; not proposed into events.yaml
   - name: AI Infrastructure Summit Berlin
     url: https://www.we-conect.com/events/ai-infrastructure-summit-2026/
-    checked: 2026-08-30
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: watching
-    reason: we.CONECT B2B summit; search results give 2026-09-28 to 2026-09-29, Maritim proArte Hotel, Berlin, 500+ attendees, agenda covers AgentOps/inference/observability - organiser site is JS-rendered and would not fetch, so dates unverified and editorial-vs-sponsored speaking still unconfirmed
-    owner: reviewed 2026-08-16 - reopened as cfp-track candidate; confirm slot is editorial not sponsored before approaching
+    reason: 2026-09-28 to 2026-09-29, Maritim proArte Hotel, Berlin now corroborated by several independent listings, though the organiser site is still JS-rendered and would not fetch. we.CONECT B2B summit co-located with Enterprise AI Summit, Big Data Minds and Business Intelligence Summit; editorial-vs-sponsored speaking still unconfirmed and the 2026 edition is too close to enter
+    owner: reviewed 2026-08-16 - reopened as cfp-track candidate; confirm slot is editorial not sponsored before approaching, and target the 2027 edition
+  - name: AI_dev - Open Source GenAI & ML Summit Europe
+    url: https://events.linuxfoundation.org/ai-dev-europe/
+    checked: 2026-09-06
+    status: rejected
+    reason: Linux Foundation folded the standalone AI_dev brand into the Open Source Summit programme in its 2026 events announcement; last European edition ran August 2025 in Amsterdam and no successor is scheduled
+  - name: Academic ML systems venues (MLSys, IEEE SaTML)
+    url: https://mlsys.org/
+    checked: 2026-09-06
+    status: rejected
+    reason: peer-reviewed paper venues, not speaking flagships; out of scope under the fit rules
   - name: CogX
     url: https://cogx.co/
     checked: 2026-08-15
@@ -267,16 +287,16 @@ scouted:
     checked: 2026-08-15
     status: watching
     reason: strong regional cfp candidate; below watchlist bar for now
-  - name: MLcon Munich / Berlin
+  - name: MLcon Munich / Berlin / Amsterdam
     url: https://mlconference.ai/
-    checked: 2026-08-15
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: rejected
-    reason: training conference format
+    reason: training conference format; the 2027 Amsterdam edition (19-23 April) resurfaced this run and does not change the assessment
   - name: data:unplugged Münster
     url: https://www.data-unplugged.de/
-    checked: 2026-08-15
+    checked: 2026-09-06
     status: watching
-    reason: 10k+ but celebrity-skewed German headliners; tier unclear
+    reason: fourth edition announced for April 2027 in Münster with a self-reported ~17,000 participants, 6 stages and 350+ speakers; still celebrity-skewed German headliners, so tier remains unclear
   - name: AI Summit Barcelona
     url: https://aisummitbarcelona.com/
     checked: 2026-08-30