barcamp round-up
The inaugural Auckland BarCamp was organised by Ludwig Wendzich, a 16 year old high school student. I really admire him for getting on and sorting it out (which none of us had done as professionals in the industry).
I attended five sessions & the final session was a demo/short intro full of quick introductions to several subjects, such as the eee laptop and Mukuna’s gig guide by text. I also blogged as much as I could of the day and took lots of photos.
- Charles, by Karl von Randow
- Spaghetti or Meatball: a discussion on the BarCamp Tshirt Design Process, by Mat Allen
- DIY CSS Frameworks, by Darren Wood
- Tales from the Scrum, by Andrew Hedges
- Credit Where Credit is Due: crediting work in a production environment, by Che Tamahori
Other presentations I couldn’t see as they clashed with the sessions above were Robert O’Callahan’s talks on web standards and Firexfox 3.
In a larger community like Auckland we do have the UPA and Auckland Web Meetup meetings already but those are invitation-only speaking which is projected with less conversation than this format allows. I think this really filled a niche that hadn’t been attended to, without taking anything away from the other groups.
I did see a couple of people speak that I have heard before, and as usual did wonder where the project managers, business analysts and designers (to broadly refer to these groups) were. There were a few representatives from each group but essentially it’s a geek thing which would be nice to see change. I know I start to sound like a broken record but for those who don’t attend because there’s nothing for them - talk about what you want to hear!
The food was awesome and to top it all off, we all got tshirts designed by the talented Mata. Thanks to the sponsors and to everyone who came - I really hope we can do this again next year! I’ll even present, I promise!
