Call for Participation

Akademy is the annual KDE Community conference. If you are working on topics relevant to KDE, this is your chance to present your work and ideas to the KDE community at large. It will be held at the Technische Universität in Berlin, Germany. The talks will be held on September 6th and 7th. The rest of the week will be dedicated to Birds-of-a-Feather meetings (BoFs), trainings, unconference sessions and workshops.

If you think you have something interesting to present, please tell us about it. If you know of someone else who should present, please encourage them to do so too.

What We Are Looking For

KDE is more than a desktop environment! We are asking for talk proposals on topics relevant to the KDE community and technology such as:

  • How KDE can empower building robust communities in changing political climates
  • Work towards KDE's goals: Streamlined Application Development Experience, We care about your Input, and KDE Needs You
  • Giving people more digital freedom, sovereignty, and autonomy with KDE software
  • Guides on how to participate for new users, intermediates and experts,
  • New developments/plans for KDE Frameworks, Plasma, Applications and other projects
  • Anything else that might interest the audience.

To get an idea of talks that were accepted, check out the program from previous years: 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021 and 2020.

What We Offer

Many creative and interested KDE and Free Software contributors and supporters — your attentive and receptive audience. An opportunity to present your project, share ideas and best practices, or gain new contributors. A cordial environment with people who want you to succeed. This is your chance to make a big splash.

If you would like advice before sending in a proposal, you can email akademy-talks@kde.org to ask. The program committee can answer questions via email or in a call.

Submission

Proposals require the following information:

  • Title — the title of your session/presentation
  • Content — a brief summary of your presentation
  • Description — additional information not in the abstract; potential benefits of the topic for the audience
  • A short bio — including anything that qualifies you to speak on your subject
  • A headshot — your picture that we can use to help promote your talk as part of the final Akademy schedule (not essential but desirable)

Akademy attracts people from all over the world. For this reason, all talks are in English.

Submit your proposal here

Talk Formats & Durations

Your submissions can be in any of the following formats:

  • Talks – 40 minutes (recommended: 30 minutes content + 10 minutes Q&A).
  • Panels – 40 minutes (recommended: 30 minutes discussion + 10 minutes Q&A)
  • Fast Track Talks – 10 minutes (no Q&A).
  • Lightning Talks – 5 minutes (no Q&A, recommended: up to 3 slides, pre-recorded).

Fast Track and Lightning talks are presented in a single track. Lightning Talk slide decks must be submitted one month before the event.

If you would like help and advice with preparing your talk, please request this in the Private Notes section of your submission. We would be happy to support you, as we understand that not everyone has experience with giving talks.

Longer or Special Sessions

If your presentation requires more time than the standard slots, please provide a justification.

Longer talks may be:

  • Split into two or three sessions.
  • Converted into a workshop (BoF) or a special session outside the main conference track.

Workshops

Workshops (BoFs) take place in the second part of Akademy and can last up to three hours. You don't have to submit detailed proposals for the Workshop part at this moment, but you can consider submitting a Lightning Talk teaser to promote participation.

Selection & Preparation

You will be notified about acceptance or not of your submission after the selection process has been completed. The Akademy Team can assist in preparing your talk and schedule a test run for your AV setup if needed.

Recording & Licensing

All talks will be recorded and published online for free to benefit the wider KDE community, along with a copy of the slides deck, and anything else associated with the presentation. You retain full ownership of your slides and materials. We request making them available under the CC-BY license.

The Akademy 2025 Program Committee

This years committee are Albert Astals Cid, Johannes Zarl-Ziel, Neofytos Kolokotronis, Tracey Clark, and Bushan Shah.. Email: akademy-talks@kde.org