BarCamp in Review

As Sarah blogged not once, but twice over the weekend, on Saturday we orchestrated the very first BarCamp Manchester at the MEN offices. Over 100 people had tickets with 80-90 showing up on the day. Over 30 sessions happened. We consumed a hundred danish pastries and croissants, around 50 bananas, at least 40 apples and 30 satsumas, 160 bottles of water, 150 cans of fizzy stuff, 250 cups of coffee, 150 cups of tea, 320 slices of pizza, 300 sandwiches, and nearly 100 bags of crisps. Then in the evening we managed to get through more beer and wine than is probably sensible to admit to with even more food on offer.
One thing you can’t say is that anybody went hungry. But why did we do it? Who turned up? Why should you care?

BarCamp is a global movement with events happening somewhere almost every weekend, and some of us thought Manchester was well overdue for one. Somehow I ended up driving and went from “I’ll sort out a venue” to managing sponsors, catering, attendee ticketing, prize-giving and everything else that needs decisions making. I gave myself the title of “Idiot-in-Chief” for the event, and called in favours from numerous friends to help make it all happen.
Whilst there is no schedule in advance of what talks will happen and when, to say there is no planning is probably misleading – we say it to convince you to run your own! It might seem simple to get people in a room and let them shove post-it notes up on a wall, but the devil is in the detail. In fact it took sponsorship from Sun Microsystems, Microsoft, Google, O’Reilly, Adaptavist and Manchester Digital as well as considerable support from NWDC, MDDA and Liquid Bronze to make it all happen.
The staff at the Pizza Hut on Deansgate probably wished they’d never heard of us after I ordered 40 14″ pizzas to be cooked within their first 30 minutes of opening on Saturday too.
Let’s also not forget the MEN in all this – they’d never done this before, didn’t know what to expect, but they had the confidence in the idea to know it would at the very least be interesting. They created a new fan base of people in the technology industry as a result thanks to their great hospitality.
Ultimately, despite the work and management involved, it was worth it. The feedback so far has been astounding, and to those of you who aren’t directly involved in the technology industry it might seem hard to imagine why. What is so special about getting a bunch of people to come up with a schedule on the day? Why are people so enthusiastic about it?
Here’s the thing: traditional business networking events and conferences are dead.
The future is about sharing knowledge and ideas, not trying to develop leads or listening to people who somebody (probably unqualified) has decided is an “expert”. The catch-phrase for events in the future – coined by a friend of mine – is “participants, not punters”. We’re not interested in turning up and listening. We’re interested in discussion, debate, sharing a little of what we all have. We’re peers, there is no hierarchy.
It’s ultimately about finding ways to collaborate. You could say it’s like the parable of Stone Soup, but for information. If you take 100 people who are each experienced in a particular area and get them together in a room for a day, it’s amazing how quickly they discover they can do anything they want if they work together. In the grassroots technology industry money is almost a secondary currency: the main value is derived from sharing insight.
So who turns up to these events? Right now, the people who started BarCamp – and the people who are attending them – are known to some as “alpha-geeks”. They’re like “alpha-males” except they’re not exclusively male, they’re dominant within the industry simply by thinking about the future of it a lot, and generally what they’re doing today will have an effect on you sometime in the future.
Alpha-geeks invented social networking sites a decade ago. Alpha-geeks created the MP3 player and download music stores around the same time. Alpha-geeks started buying Apple hardware 4 years ago, thereby helping make them cool once again. Alpha-geeks were using “video on demand” boxes at least 8 years ago – often ones they had hacked together themselves. Those are just some of the more obvious examples.
Therefore, it’s likely that within a decade you’ll be participating in a BarCamp-format event yourself within your own industry whatever that may be. I’ll put money on the fact at least one idea discussed this Saturday will have a significant impact on your technology experience in the next few years.
Over the last 36 hours whilst getting some rest I thought about what could come next. We’re definitely going to do another one for technologists/geek just like this weekend, but is there a way to do something more accessible to those who aren’t trying to build the future, just interested in it?
What if instead of technologists, we did an event like this for those in the creative industries like artists, writers or actors? What about getting a bunch of teachers, police officers or nurses to share their experiences with each other? I’m not the man to run those events, but I’d be happy to help anybody who thought they were.