Category: socialware-offline

So PlugLondon a event run Christian of Yahoo's Developer Network, kicked off yesterday. It was a good event and I hope it will carry on through next year. I'm going to start calling it the Minibar for Developers, as its a simular format but more developer focused. I think throught-out the time we had about 10+ presentations and some time for chatter between. I did wish at some points people would be a little quieter but generally people would float off to the back of the great skype offices for a natter.

So to improve the event I would move the presentations to a set area maybe away from the entrance and kicthen. Then allow that area to be setup for adhoc networking or natterings. It might also be worth timing the presentations as some did go on for a while. I did love the idea of people saying who they were even near the end of the event. This meant even people who were really late could still feel part of the overall crowd. Having it on a Saturday was interesting but I don't know if thats a good or bad thing for people. I was thinking I could do some shopping then go the event. But it didn't happen, instead we ended up going to the Bricklayers Arms (I don't get why people love that pub but its so popular with developers) and after that going to a restaurant with Dave Sifry of Technorati. So in actual fact, the whole Saturday afternoon and evening was used up at the event and the stuff which followed. I did suggest to Chrisitan that it should be a Friday night instead. Chrisitan is talking about moving the event around different offices in the future, so that would be very cool, specially if it grows over time.

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So finally I got around to fixing the metadata on my Flickr photos which I've uploaded from BarCampLondon3. Please note I tried to take a picture of every single person during the introductions and 3 tags. This time I got a good selection of everyone.

Anyway how did things go? Well from my point of view – great! Without a douht it was the best BarCamp i've arranged or ever been to. Not only that but it was one of the best weekends I've ever had in my life. the whole event became a geek wonderland. After filling our skulls with ideas and inspiration it was on to a great dinner supplied fresh from the Google on site chef.

And lets just pause on that. Saturday morning a nice decent lunch. People were already impressed with the large fridges stocked with drinks and ice creams. Then for dinner a full thanksgiving meal complete with veg and vegan options, just perfect for the last weekend in November. Google's chef wanted to do a live BBQ on the tereace of the 5th floor office but it was a little cold for a real BBQ.

If things couldn't get any better they did. At midnight a chocolate fountain with marshmellows and strawberries plus freshly made crepes (pancakes). I mean check out the pictures of the hour of pure sugar.


Breakfast and lunch on Sunday were also great but how can you beat such a great midnight feast?

So the food and drinks were spot on. The Google offices are great lots of character and lots of well equipt rooms. For BarCampLondon we had a good selection of rooms and even some rooms without projectors. We thought we might try that out this time and I did see some sessions in them during the weekend.

One thing we should have done is added a couple more rooms, as that would have eased the conjestion in some rooms. However I didn't want to spread the people too thinly by opening to many rooms and it would have caused Google even more problems with security. Can I also say how brave Google were, having people wondering past working peoples desks. But wow you really got a feel of what it might be like to work in such a dynamic place.

What sessions did I go to? (thanks Jeremy keith again for doing the microformats transformed version).
Saturday

• Caja and OpenSocial.
• BBC programmes API: a first look.
• Messaging scales
• Build your lifestream with Yahoo Pipes
• Take your camera out of auto.
• Geeky Kids

Sunday

• TV tubes – automating your TV downloads.
• Hacking people.
• 101 uses for Twitter.
• The desktop is not dead.
• Using puzzles, stories and ARGs in brand marketing and the perils therein.
• Talking about the future of BarCamps and the past of some volunteer-run events.
• Data portability.

Ones with emphases are my own sessions. I actually uploaded the slides for the data portability one .

more to come…

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One of the highlights of Minibar this time around was Mike Butcher's rant about the industry, startups and a bunch of other things. It contains a lot of swearing and to be honest Mike had already had a drink already. I also went out to dinner with Mike and others later which was great fun.

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If your in London, the next few weeks is blocked solid with events and exhibitions for the London Games Festival. Just a quick scan down the schedule is enough to start marking down your calendar. What I love is the mix of Fringe and official events, there's stuff for everyone. From Parties like the GLAM Academy Party (Games, Life, and Media) to the Women in Games Mixer social. Looking at my own Calendar, there is something of interest every single day for the next 10 days, including next week Monday (29th Oct) a great event involving live large screen wii gaming from Geekdinner.co.uk, certainly one not be missed I would say (but I would say that). I think this video gives people the idea of what fun it can be…

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So someone you don’t know, starts talking to you on Facebook and through a couple of blog comments. Then invites you to an exclusive private party in Central London. Would you go?

Well thats what happened to me. A woman going by the name (redacted) invited me and it would seem quite a few bloggers to a un-official future of webapps after party. I thought well I’ll give it a try, what could go wrong? So on to Drinks & Canapes in St. Martins Lane Hotel. Well thats how it was advertised along with this little blurb…

A perfect opportunity to chill out and relax with drinks and canapes at the luxurious Light Bar, at St. Martins Lane Hotel in the heart of London.

I got there about 9pm expecting not much but someone to tell me it was all a hoax or some suits party. I did have a thought that this could dangerous too but decided I’m big enough to keep myself out of any trouble, plus most people knew where I had gone. Anyway, so got there, asked the doormen, staff, front desk, restaurant manager, etc, etc and no one knew anything about the party, Fowa or (redacted). So I had a look around myself and went home. No harm done I guess. No Facebook friendship for you (redacted)…. There’s a lot more to this that I first thought, so I’ll fill in the rest of the details below…soon

So it turns out that (redacted) had cancelled the event but the message didn’t get out quick enough. (redacted) had some very bad news which required her presence elsewhere. I received a facebook mail from (redacted) about 10 days later saying how upset she was with my post, which was fair enough but bear in mind I wrote it straight after coming back. So hopefully this clears things up a little.

Ok I heard this for the first time ever today. The context was oh your so geekalicious… So with googling on my phone, I found out it means. Someone who is a geek but has strong social skills. A browse of Flickr would suggest the standard geek stereotype. I honestly don't want to hear the word again, thank you very much.

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So after Edinburgh (which I still need to blog at some point soon) 2 weeks ago and this weekends BBQ party for my new flatmate we're into a new busy work week. Things are crazy because my travel across London is futher hampered by the 3 day tube strike. Now some of you may say, but Ian your on a scooter. Well trust me I tried to get through the Blackwall tunnell today at 10am and it was packed. Every street I turned down was full of cars, so in the end I took a different route through old street and clerkenwell because angel was so hell-ish. it took 25mins just to get from Kings Cross to the A40 fly over because of the amount of traffic. And what is it with car drivers who block the way so not even cyclist get through the narrow gaps? Does it make them feel better or what? Sometimes I feel like raising my legs up and kicking off their side mirrors, or rolling up next to them and shouting get off your mobile phone!

Anyway, tomorrow I'm off to York for a conference titled Towards a Social Science of Web 2.0 in which I'm talking at on Thursday afternoon. In the usual way, I'm tweaking slides to get the most impact for the different audience it will be.

Then on Friday I'm at D.Construct as one of the official sponsors of the conference, so make sure you come by and say hi at the backstage stand. Although I expect most of the time it will be used as a meeting point for interviews during the day. At night there is the d.construct party which is sponsored and run by BBC Backstage and Yahoo! We worked hard to get such a good venue and hopefully enough food to feed the very hungry conference going crowd. There will be free drinks via Yahoo of course. Its going to be a good night and a excellent end to the long day at d.construct, but for those who want to make it extra long the club will open till about 2:30am, so don't rush off back to London if you can help it.

I expect a lot of people to stay around because of course on the weekend is BarCampBrighton. I'm really excited because I'm hoping to chill out and go to sessions and not get involved in the arrangement at all. They also seem to have got it to a decent size of about 80 people and done the overnight. I'm getting a little tired of barcamp's which do one day or don't have sleep overs. I think its essential to the experience and yes I know how hard it can be to do sleepovers. But the thing is you just end up with a un-conferene which is cool but you miss the bonding part. Anyway, thankfully Brighton is a whole weekend, complete with sleepover.

After that weekend I'm going to need to take some time off to chill out, but otherwise I'm off again near the end of the month. This time I'm off to Boston for TTI Vanguard Wealth of Networks conference, thanks to work. No I won't be talking except to ask questions and maybe offer a slightly different view on things which come up. Have you seen the line up? Wow, this is type of thing I would pay for on IT Conversations. Not only is this a conference but they have lunches and dinners together so you get a full day of excellent mind filling conversation.

For the rest of the year, I got to take a couple of holidays one somewhere sunny (Stowe Boyd, suggested Portugal in October), although I may end up going to South of France. I've commited to going to Berlin in November for Web 2.0 open europe which looks good. I'm also helping out where possible with that event, Boagworld 100 and I expect we will run another Backstage Christmas Party (details are secret right now). The last thing to add is that I'm still trying for BarCampLondon3 and who knows what might happen…

I keep meaning to screenshot my dopplr map or using their new api apply a map to my blog. I did however make the brave move of making my calendar publicly available via Plaxo. Oh one last thing, did I say I won a competition recently?

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Here's a quick guide of some of the things I'm doing this month in London. Hope to see you at one or more of them.

• Geekdinner with Brady Forrest at Ye Olde Cock Tavern
  This is going to be a great geekdinner, Brady is a big figure at all O'reilly conferences. He's usually the one asking the tricky questions and chairing the biggest names. Well this time around he's on the hot seat.
XSLUG July Meet at the Business Lounge, in Bush House
In the 3rd XSL user group meeting, we've decided to discuss pipelines in front of a computer instead of at a pub. The BBC will be hosting this small event in Bush House. I'll be explaining why Pipelines are very cool and should be used for anything slighty complex. I'm going to recommend reading Jenni Tensions paper from Xtech 05 first.
• MOO's Hot and Sticky Summer Party at The Ambassador in Exmouth Market
  Not quite sure whats going to happen on the night but Moo.com are launching stickers which hopefully will be very cool. More details on their blog
• MiniBar July in Corbet Place, off Brick Lane.
  Its Minibar again, usual Friday night get together, should be cool.

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