The counter
argument is that, whatever we do, it's likely to be more
expensive here than in Egypt, which may discourage some people. We can
try and get all kinds of sponsorship, but the basic costs are just so
much greater that I can't see us getting the prices down as low as
they were this year.
That's a pretty defeatist attitude! If we ever want to justify Wikimania
happening in UK, we will need as much sponsorship as we can get - and that
could include things like Oyster cards for London (credit to JamesF for
idea). Sufficient sponsorship would allow us to provide accommodation at a
more reasonable absorbed cost, not the actual booking cost, etc etc.
Cormac
Not defeatist, realistic. The UK is far more expensive than Egypt, so
we would need far more sponsorship. Presumably the Alexandria team got
all the sponsorship they could, can we get more than them? UK
businesses might have a bit more to spare, but I can't see it being
enough to completely counter the extra costs. Remember, it's not just
the costs we're paying that will be more, the costs attendees have to
pay (food, any kind of non-Wikimania entertainment they may want in
the evenings, transport to non-Wikimania things, etc) will all be more
expensive too.
There is a strong desire to host Wikimania in a variety of places, so
the extra cost isn't going to make it impossible but it probably will
remove any advantage we have.