Barcamp Orlando 2010

Barcamp Orlando 2010 has returned to Florida. This gathering is a “free event joining people from different backgrounds to share and learn,” and is being held from 9 am to 6 pm local time in the heart of downtown Orlando’s nightlife scene, Wall Street Plaza. This this is my second year attending BarCamp Orlando and I’ve been mingling with geeks from the local Florida scene and those who’ve traveled from all over the state to attend. I talked to a few of my fellow “BarCampers” about their experiences:

Christa Watson said today’s BarCamp is “defintely an interesting mixture of people and topics! From Drupal and HTML5 to singing and volunteering.”

David Sikes Tweeted, “So far I’ve learned a whole lot, and met many great new people – seems a little smaller than last year, but the energy is great!”

Gavin Stark enjoyed attending the presentation by WuFoo’s Kevin Hale about “Reducing [Customer] Support through Design”. He added, “their presentations are always well thought-out and the things they speak about they practice themselves. I wish my customer support team was here to hear them.”

I also caught up with Ellen Mitchell who is here promoting Foursquare Day. She said, “I’ve been asking people if they’ve heard of the [Foursquare] event and I’m surpised that an overwhelming number of people have. I think that’s super cool, I’m excited about being a part of this.”

Aside from the event’s scheduled sessions, chatter about the event’s missing WiFi and, of course, the iPad, seemed to float from group to group.

Tom Stovall Tweeted, “No wifi at @barcamporlando FAIL!” and Keith Barrett added, “No wifi at @barcamporlando. That’s going to bo a handicap!”

Personally I would’ve been happy to have paid for a ticket to help cover the cost of internet access, but others felt differently.

Chris Kanclerowicz wanted me to know, “I don’t have a laptop or an iPad with me, I only have my iPhone, so it didn’t bother me. It thought it was fine.”

Nick Pettit, co-founder of <!DOCTYPE> a web TV show for web designers, is also a member of the planning team who helped organize the event. He explained the lack of WiFi (and made no apologies) – “BarCamp should really be more about interacting with each other and listening to the talks, not about the tube. It’s the first BarCamp I’ve been to with a complete lack of WiFi, but I think it’s worked out pretty well so far because it lets people interact more rather than being distracted.”

Jim Hoskins, Nick Pettit’s co-founder added, “BarCamp Orlando 2010 is awesome. There is a huge variety of topics this year and the speakers are great!” (Jim and Nick also own : Done21 and were the break-out stars of last year’s BarCamp Orlando after their talk, “Help Kill Internet Explorer 6.0“)

On the iPad front, I found Jesse Lamb, an attorney based in Tampa Bay, FL surrounded by a small crowd wanting to see his iPad. As Jesse showed off his tech, his wife Shawn sold T-shirts that say “I’m multi-touch, too” from Gadget Widows, a site she co-authors with friend Stephanie Wunder.

As with so many “un-confrences” the best part of the day is connecting and networking with people one knows and new people one meets. Today I’ve met people who’ve offered to help me figure out why my Drupal database (not for this site!) self-destructed at 1 am this morning, fellow BarCampers interested in hearing about Geekistry.com, and others who expressed how excited they are to see the evidence of a growing tech scene in a state often so removed from the up-and-coming.

BarCamp Orlando 2010 has been yet another great BarCamp experience (even without WiFi) and the event planners have put obvious effort into the details. As for me? I’ll be seeing you at the next BarCamp Orlando!

Tags: barcamp, conference, delomni, ikrissi, social, unconference

Category: Entertainment, Social Media, Technology