Saurabh Garg on The New New Thing

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BarCamp Mumbai 4 is around the corner. For the uninitiated, barcamps are “unconferences” that are organized by volunteers and attendants talk about anything and everything under the sun. Since these kinds of events attract people who love experimenting and networking, the kind of audience that attends is skewed towards technologists, programmers, coders, media and Internet enthusiasts.

And like all the other unconferences, these are open to all and anyone can take and/or attend any sessions. There are no rules. There are no formalities. If you like a session, you interject. If you dont like, you walk out. If you are looking for a job, take a session on showing off your skills. If you are looking for clients, showcase your product/service. Its like one large Kumbh ka Mela where everyone is trying to sell and buy at the same time.

Sounds great but honestly I dont really like the concept. With a large audience, more often than not, sessions tend to be unfocused (is this actually a word?), covering really diverse themes, by often not so good speakers (trying to put another bullet point on their CV rather than furthering the cause) and fail to add any real value to the attendants. Please note that I am not implying for a single minute that the quality of speakers is bad or the sessions are shallow, just that the ones I have attended weren’t up to the mark.

And after all the rambling, there has to be a way to make them better and excite the right kind of people. If I was one of the organizers, I would have done the following things to help the cause …

1. Tweak the format. Let is remain an unconference. Just add a theme to it. Something like a codecamp or a markcamp. Where it attracts only a certain kind of audience. Thus at a codecamp, lots of coders with all kinds of experience levels could come in and talk about coding and other things.
2. Pseudo-Workshop. I honestly believe that doing things is a far far better way to learn and experiment than just talking and listening. What if the barcamps were actually workshops? For example someone might take a workshop on Social Media and participants might brainstorm and plan and implement a social media campaign for a product. (Loknath Swain is trying to do the same at BarCamp Mumbai 4). Can there be more sessions like this?
3. Speed Dating. People might argue that BarCamps are a good way to network and meet new people. In my opinion, the meetings are real short and shallow. Although I have seen very very interesting results come out of networking at unconferences but they can be made better. What if in a huge room, all participants are made to meet every other participant for exactly 5 minutes? In these five minutes, both the participants can talk about anything under the sun and if they like each other and want to continue talking post the event, they exchange contact details. That simple.

What do you guys think? Do you have more ideas on how to fix these unconferences? If there are enough good ideas, may be at the next unconference, will put some to fruition.

Coming back to upcoming barcamps at Delhii and Mumbai, although I am not sure if I will attend any of the two but some sessions look really promising. Please attend and do share feedback.

Schedules

• BarCampMumbai 4 is happening at IIT Mumbai on 4th and 5th Oct 2008 (yes its a two day event).
• BarCampDelhi5 is at IIT Delhi on 11th Oct 2008 (they are still debating if its going to be a two day event or not).
• My posts on BarCamp Mumbai and BarCamp Mumbai 2.

P.S.: I had used the word un Conference about five times in the post and everywhere I got the spelling incorrect. Thanks to Shefaly for pointing out. So much so for my language skills :D

As the entire world discusses Google Chrome, I close this week on a rather happy note. I am traveling to Delhi for a meeting and obviously any travel to Delhi is fun. Home. Friends. How-ever short the duration may be, distances are something that I strive to reduce as much as I can. Physical or emotional. Time for another Friday Update. Most of the week has been busy with work.

Hits

• Google Chrome. After the initial excitement over Chrome, people have started looking at it more seriously. Ars Technica reported an ambiguous EULA, others reported bugs and almost everyone compared Chrome with Mozilla and how Chrome does not support plug-ins etc.. But I remain excited about the possibilities offered by Chrome and cloud computing. (Here is my post on Chrome)
  
• Wall-E. One of the best movies I have ever seen in a long long time. The quality of animation, the story, the concept, I loved every bit of it. If you haven’t seen it, please go ahead and do so. Its worth every penny you will spend on it.
• Leader Paes wins US Open. Leader Paes won the mixed-doubles title at US Open 08 (Rediff reports). This is his 8th grand slam. Only one eluding him right now is French Open. Lets see if he can do it. He is already 35 and still as strong and fit as players half his age. BTW, he later today has his Men’s Double title match too. Lets hope it becomes his 9th.

Misses

• Tata Nano. Tata has pulled out of Singur. I am not qualified enough to comment on the plight of farmers, political parties and Tata Nano but I know one thing for sure. Tata pulling out of West Bengal is a huge dent for the development of the state and the region. No Indian company (leave alone the foreign companies) would now want to risk their money and time in West Bengal. Hope I could teach people and politicians there a lesson or two in evolution and development.

Random Musings

• Recently discovered that I love remote controlled cars. A colleague in office got a car one day and it was awesome fun. I think I will buy one very soon.
• Had an awesome Wednesday holiday. As reported on twitter, I managed Cricket, Wall-E, Dinner, Shopping, Travel, Photography, Reading all in one mid-week holiday. Only thing I missed was thinking.
• Is this blog slowly becoming a personal blog? I was thinking that my last few posts have talked about me more than anything else. Is The New New Thing going the War of Words way? Probably will ponder more on this and see what all changes I need to make so that New New Thing remains New.

All in all, yet again a very non-exciting week. Need to get hold of life soon.