Buffalo UnConference
DIG Buffalo / Z80 Labs
Saturday April 18, 2015
On a Sunny Spring Saturday, a conference, no an UnConference, a set of talks about passionate topics happening simultaneously, with no sales pitches, happened at BNMC / DIG Buffalo / Z80 Labs offices. This is a great place for a unconference like this.
I arrived around 8:30 to see if I could help out, and I had to setup projectors, move chairs and tables around and helped setup some of the white boards for the sign ups. At 9:00 a.m. registration opened. When attendees got to the space they were greeted by a sign in desk and Clark Dever, and the rest of the organizers! Special thanks to AT&T for once again being an awesome community partner for this important event and to infotechWNY as we support great events like the UnConference! And of course special thank you to Z80 / DIG and the BNMC for opening their wonderful space up to our groups!
The hall between Z80 / 43North and Dig's spaces was used for the food area and for breakfast, there were bagels and coffee!
The Z80 office space offered 4 locations for speakers. 3 small conference rooms that held between 10-12 people, and the large open area that could hold around 30+ people. You had to show up early to secure a time and location and the whiteboard's were in every section to get you locked in for your talk.
Lots of conversations were happening from the start to the finish and it was great meeting new people and catching up with other folks out in the community!
Clark kicked it off at around 9:45 a..m and explained the format of the day. And once he finished the talks began at 10:00 and away the day went!
I did my talk on Geocaching and it was a lot of fun. Lots of questions and interest in the biggest treasure hunt in the world!
There were talks about, brushing your teeth, BitCoin, Buffalo's Insecurity, Behavior, how to build a robot, take better photos, how to DJ from a laptop, Skills Gap, Branding, Municipal Fiber / Broadband, Integrated Marketing, Marketing Strategy, and more!
DJ Spruke - Bill Boulden rocked it out with his tutorial on DJ'ing from a Laptop! I loved it!
After the unconference ended around 4:00 p.m. everyone helped clean up and then lighting talks continued throughout the afternoon. Talk about committment!
All in all this was a great day, and was enjoyed by all!
Great job Clark and Kelly Dever and all that attended!
