OggCamp Part 2

Well the Sunday of OggCamp started a little later as Myself and Olly did not have to be at the venue until 9.30 so we could have a bit of a lay in till 8am. We stopped off at the fast food place for coffee and a bite to eat again, then back up the hill to the venue. This was a little harder as we were both carrying our weekend cases as we couldn't leave them in the hotel. Brownlow Hill is quite steep when you have to lug a case up it :-(

Anyway arrived at the venue and after dumping the said case in the crew room (storage locker under the stairs) I was allocated the registration desk for the morning. I always enjoy doing registration as you get to meet loads of people as they arrive. Some you may know but often new faces, including some new to Barcamp events.

Just before lunch I managed to skive of for a talk given by Mark one of the UUPC presenters and one of the organisers of the event. He was talking about the history of OggCamp and what was involved in organising community events like this. The most interesting thing about his talk was that he said that while the event had been started by the 2 podcast teams there was now ongoing discussion as to how it could be passed on to the community to be more involved in the organisation of the event. Mark invited anyone who was interested in getting more involved to contact the team. This invite extends to anyone wanting to help in any way, such as being part of the crew right through to being part of the main organisation group. Mark also called for ideas on what to do for future events and it was suggested by one person that there should be a young persons track (junior OggCamp) and this was greeted with some enthusiasm as it was felt it would be good have something happening to attract younger attendees to the event.

After Lunch (which was again Pizza and as quickly devoured as the previous day) I was part of the Full Circle podcast Live show along with my co-hosts Les, Olly and Freaky Clown. you can listen to this recording via the website when it gets released soon. Suffice to say we had a good time after we managed to finally get the audio recording equipment set up and negotiated genial heckling from our friend Pete Cannon of Dick Turpin fame.

Then came one of my favorite parts of the week, despite it meaning the event was coming to an end. The live Raffle Cast, it’s always good fun to see Popey running up and down the stairs in the main lecture theater, throwing prizes at all and sundry and getting out of puff in the process. Then sadly it was all over for another year, I helped with a bit of the clearing up but had to miss the after OggCamp drinks and food as I had a train to catch back to Blackpool as I was back at work the next day.

If you have never been to a BarCamp type event have a look on the internet, there are several around the country during the year, Blackpool and Canterbury to name just 2 and of course OggCamp. There is also a thriving community running other events on similar lines such as the Raspberry Pi events (Raspberry Jam's) Python, open hardware and hack days. If you have an interest there is probably a community event that will meet your needs. Also don’t forget your local user groups and hack spaces, its often only a few people meeting over a common interest but it is a case of use it or lose it, if the interest and attendance is not there, these groups go as quickly as they were formed.

Well that's it for now, Happy Geeking and maybe I'll see you at an event sometime, if you see me and you've read this come and say hi.