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OpenMeetings (OpenCoffee,This happened, ...)

26.May.2007

I always get excited with the chance to gather a bunch of interesting people around some place just to chat and discuss whatever is on our minds. For me it was a great honor to organize TakeOff and be able to a get several people from the same area talking to each other, sharing their projects and ambitions. Just like in BarCamp one of the greatest things was the begging discussing on the garden, just a spontaneous conversation that lasted long enough to get everyone comfortable.

I’ve seen the examples of some events dedicated to the communication part. OpenCoffee Club is maybe the most uncomplicated and yet the most effective. Just set a date for everyone to appear at a local place with Wi-Fi connection and pass the word. OpenCoffee is dedicated to entrepreneurs and investors, but there no reason why this couldn’t be extended to a larger audience. Besides the hole coffee part (since I’m not addicted to caffeine), I would love to see this reproduced in my country. There was already one attempt also mentioned on some blogs. I think it would be awesome to have one in Coimbra although the density of web developers here it’s smaller than in Lisbon.

Some months ago I also found out another kind of format for this kind of events that I think would also make a great addition. This happened was an event dedicated to interaction design. But what caught my eye was their speakers guidelines where I found two important characteristics. First, the presentation have to be around 10 minutes, followed by a Q&A session, to keep the talks very focused. Then the speakers are asked to present not the final result, but the process. This is really import because more interesting than seeing a pretty result is to see all the mistakes done, all the decision made and the path it took to reach it. Integrate this thoughts into an event with open presentation slots for everyone and would have a quick and small event, but really rich in terms of content and information sharing.

These were only some guidelines to things I would like to see implemented in a place near me, or at least in Portugal if I can’t come. I think that one of the things our country is lacking of is communication. We need to get in touch with others from our area of work, we need to share what we are doing, we need to be open. Maybe this isn’t only a problem in our country, but it’s one I would like to help create a solution to.

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