three years agoSo that was Oxford Geek Night 2

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The second Oxford Geek Night last night went well and was by all accounts a success. We came across various hiccups in setting up but several totally ingenious solutions and a few friendly geeks later we were all set.

The talks were great, and in my mind they really made the event what it was. So, a big thank you goes out to all the speakers. Also in my list of thanks is our very generous sponsor Torchbox who kindly funded the event, keeping it free for all to attend.

Most of the slides and links from the talks are up online already and the remainder will follow shortly. Also to come soon are the videocasts and podcasts of the event. I'll keep you posted as to when they are ready.

The photos are now up online too. If you are uploading any then the official Flickr tag is 'oxfordgeeknight2'. If you tag them they will appear on the site for the event.

Jon Hicks

If you were at the event last night you may have noticed two women with fancy video cameras interviewing and filming, they were from BBC Oxford South Today. The media coverage has all been a bit of a surprise really, I guess when it got picked up by the Oxford Mail after the last one everyone else wanted to have an "and finally, geeks leave the house" type story! :)

Interview with BBC Radio Oxford (Wednesday 11th, 11:30):

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(Download Interview)

Oxford Geek Nights on BBC South Today Oxford (Thursday 12th, 18:30)

See high resolution Quicktime version (4.8 MB)

I am really keen to get other people inspired to organise their own, more specialised events. So if anyone wants to start up, say, a JavaScript meet-up, Oxford Pub Standards, Oxford 2.0 or anything really, then that would be absolutely fantastic! I would be happy to help.

I would really love to hear your feedback on Oxford Geek Nights in general and on the last event. I have set up a (optionally anonymous) feedback form, so you can let us know what you enjoyed or how we can improve the next one.

We have set up an announce only email list as a Google Group for Oxford Geek Nights, or you can use our new Atom feed to keep up with news and information.

The Oxford Geek Nights are every two months so watch this space in June/July for the next event!

Posted at 12:28 am on the 13th of April 2007. 7 Comments

7 comments

  1. A great evening. Excellant speakers and a good group of people. Will come again. Well done to all.

    Steve 13th April 2007 07:54permalink.

  2. Congratulations on organising what looks to have been an immensely successful event. Will definitely try and make it up for the next one. - Neil.

    Neil Ford 13th April 2007 09:21permalink.

  3. It looks like a great success apart from the few technical glitches at the start. That BBC news item doesn't make us nerds look too great though - they would use a clip of someone saying "I don't watch television." At least Mr Willison proved that we do have outside interests (even if it did resort to wildlife). You'll have to come to a Multipack meeting and advise us on how to organise some formal events with proper presentations.

    Si Jobling 13th April 2007 09:22permalink.

  4. Nice one! I'm sorry I couldn't be there, seems like I left Oxford at just the wrong time :) I'm constantly disappointed at the media's insistence on over-emphasising the sterotypes of "geekery." The word is a journalist's stumbling block. Maybe it's a challenge to cover something that's such an obvious target for mockery and still maintain credibility, but I wonder how long it'll take for hackneyed pre-conceptions like "geeks don't like socialising" to go out of fashion. Sadly, complaining about this online only strengthens the image of a snivelling pedant, rejecting the mainstream from his parent's basement. Anyway, you're doing a great job Natalie, keep it up!

    James Wheare 13th April 2007 09:55permalink.

  5. Excellent work Nat! Media angle is annoying and predictable - but definitely worth it for the coverage.

    Jason Cartwright 13th April 2007 10:04permalink.

  6. Nuclear Sledgehammer: here's one local event. if anyone wants to come to another session on Ruby on Rails, we have a talk at BCS Oxfordshire branch this Thursday night (26 April). Details at http://www.oxon.bcs.org/program2006-7.htm#Apr All welcome - members and non-members.

    Adrian Walmsley 24th April 2007 14:14permalink.

  7. Did he say MEGABYTE? Geek!

    Robert Andrews 27th April 2007 11:16permalink.

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13th April 2007

You are reading "So that was Oxford Geek Night 2" written by Natalie Downe on the 13th of April 2007 at 12:28 am.

Previously hosted at http://notes.natbat.net/2007/04/13/oxfordgeeknight2/

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