one year agoUpcoming geek fun and frivolities

So there looks to be a particularly busy period of fun things to do as a geek in and around London! Not being so close to the capital I won't be going to all of them but, for your information I thought I would briefly sum up some of the happenings. The first of which is a bout of Werewolf games in a London Pub tomorrow night (Monday). Werewolf is a fun role playing social game played a lot at the moment on the geek conference scene, for more information about the game see the entry on the geekdinner site or wikipedia for information about the dynamics of the game.

This Thursday (18th Jan) holds two events! Pub Standards and the Google Open Jam. Pub standards describes itself as "Where the worlds of web and booze collide, slap-bang in the middle of London ... " - and has always been a fun group of people to meet up and chat with. This second Google Open Jam I haven't seen publicised anywhere, so I am not sure if it is an open registration but if you can get a place it is quite an original event with a decent amount of free pizza!

Three events I know little about are 'Beers & Innovation 7: Do Agencies Innovate?' (upcoming) an unfortunately sold out new-media event on the 30th January, organised by NMK. ' Chinwag Live: Wobble 2.0' (upcoming) is described as 'When Web 2.0 collides with Bubble 2.0 is the result real, sustainable business or faddish pipe dreams?', Tuesday 6th February. 'Innovation technology' (upcoming) is on the 13th February and looks to be aimed more at theory of technology and business, though I could well be wrong about that.

Barcamp London 2 is one of the events I am most looking forward to. It is on the 17th and 18th of February and follows the time-old Barcamp format of a a fun relaxed adhock mini conference. People attending are not required to present though it makes it more fun if there is that solidarity of 'so what are you presenting', there is also less pressure to have good presentation skills when everyone is in the same boat.

The future of Web Apps (upcoming) was much anticipated last year and indeed a successful fun event. However I for one am undecided if I will be attending this year, the price has been jacked up to £195 and the conference now stretches over two days. I don't doubt it will still be good, but for me I'm not sure it is worth it.

You may also be interested in the MediaGuardian Changing Media Summit on the 22nd of March. This one-day conference is 'billed as bringing together senior execs grappling with the challenges facing traditional media in the digital age'. It has an interesting array of speakers though may not be aimed at a general web developer audience.

I'm sure I will have missed out some events worth going to over the next month or two, but I couldn't finish off a listing of this type without mentioning SxSW. So, an event packed period culminating in the pilgrimage many of you will make to Texas in March of this year. I wont be attending because of prior commitments, though I'm sure I will see you at something or other soon.

One final note, there has been recent talk on the Guardian that the web 2.0 bubble may have burst. The conference they are referring to was Upload 2007 due to be held on the 20th February, the first I heard about this was that it was an event that had already been canceled from lack of numbers, inadequate publicity may well have played a part here. I however, think that from the levels of continued enthusiasm and people's willingness to meet outside of work to discuss issues, exciting new techniques and just to generally have fun with like minded people; any bubble is far from bursting!