walkah: barcamp

I suppose it's no surprise given that it's Toronto Tech Week this week, but my week so far has been filled with more TorCamp events than my typical week. On Saturday, I had the opportunity to attend my first official BarCampToronto. Seems kind of odd, given that I go to lots of events with the local "barcamp" crowd, and I've been to other official barcamps, but this was my first one in Toronto (technically BarCampToronto #4).

As I've related to some folks who've asked already, I thought BarCamp went really well. My entire morning was packed with very interesting conversation : talk of a Canadian mobile users advocacy group (to help instigate change in our wireless data rates, followed by an excellent discussion about Mozilla with Mike Beltzner, and then a pretty killer debate/discussion about the new Facebook developer platform. Perhaps it was just me, but I was pretty well spent by lunch so the afternoon seemed a little less jam packed. I did lead a session on OpenID which spurred some interesting questions and discussion, but after that I kinda just hung out.

Yesterday, I spent the day at the Enterprise 2.0 Conference down at the Metro Convention Centre. While sometimes referred to as "enterprise camp", this was nobody's unconference. Despite some scheduling snafus (we ended up having to hold both tracks in one room and things ended up over an hour off schedule), I think it went well. Of course, I was there doing my OpenID song and dance again (to a slightly different crowd). There was more interest in OpenID than I had guessed there would be amongst "enterprise" folks. I also learned that a very large insurance company here in Toronto implemented a very openid-like identity system in house a few years ago, and are considering migrating it to an openid-based solution. Very cool!.

Sadly, however, I think that about wraps my participation in tech week. No, for those who keep asking, I will not be attending Mesh today and tomorrow. Maybe next year...

Despite some rather nasty weather, I managed to make it out (along with over 100 of my good friends) to last night's DemoCampToronto12. Personally, I thought this was one of the better events. It helps to start off with some quality demos. I really enjoyed David Humphrey's overview the work his students have been doing with the Mozilla project. I had the privilege of meeting David at FSOSS, and love the exposure to free software development and community he's providing for his CS students - take note, UofT. It was also great to have Will Pate's overview of Flock, not 'cause I learned anything new about flock, but because it means Will's here (and thanks for dinner Will, it's on me next time!). Kudos also for a good demo from Alec Saunders of Iotum for their presence app for blackberries - I'd love to give it a shot when you've got series60 suppoort! Oh, and they said the magic word of upcoming XMPP integration :)

To me, however, the best part of last night's event was the general feeling or realization that there is actually a strong community here. Personally, as someone who can't make it out to all the events, I have found the "Always on Unconference" that we've started lately in the torcamp skype room as a great way to keep in touch, follow up, etc. However, as a relentless advocate for free software and open protocols and standards, I urge the community go pop in to either the #torcamp irc channel or the xmpp group chat - you can find me in both :) Looking forward to the next event!

In their issue released today, now magazine honoured two projects in the city that i've enjoyed being (albeit a small) part of in their best of toronto: tech section.

BarcampToronto (and the related events such as DemoCamp won for "best do-it-yourself conference".

Wireless toronto won "Best WiFi spot" for their location at Yonge and Dundas square.

Congrats to all the people involved in both groups, thanks for making toronto just a little bit cooler :)