We're planning to host a few of the regular Monday night meet ups at our miggle office - starting with this one.
The idea is that if we arrange one meeting a quarter, then other businesses or individuals who use Drupal in the area might be able to follow suite - basically to help share the load of running the local group, which we all benefit from.
I also think doing this might simulate involvement from a wider range of people. - i.e. from a general miggle dev perspective we're not always that visible at regular meet ups - less chance of that happening if we host it!
In terms of an agenda/meeting topic we can nail that down nearer the time, but one thing I would like to cover at this session is sponsorship for Drupal Camps.
My thinking is as follows:-
For sponsorship to have value, there has to be some clearer benefits to it - one of which is about having a longer lead time to plan camps. I've got a few ideas on that which I'd like to use to open up discussion.
I also think we need to reach an agreement as to whether we want the camps to continue as a free event, or to have some kind of ticket price. I know opinion on this is split, so we need to agree on some means of reaching a decision.
Key to all of this is having some idea of what it costs to put on the events we've run so far, plus what it might cost to put on an event which ticks all the boxes. Having seen 2 Drupal camps at Brighton now we should all have some good opinions on what works and what doesn't.
I've enabled sign up settings so we have some idea of whether we need to re-arrange a venue depending on numbers - but for now this will be at Premier House, 11 Marlborough Place, Brighton, BN1 1UB
Comments
Reminder for next Monday
Just wanted to send out a reminder for the meet up at the miggle office next week, to which you're all welcome. What can we tell you:-
We'll get a few beers and nibbles in - to get an idea of numbers if you can sign up rather than show up that'd be helpful - also, we have to let people in so it helps to know who to expect - so you'll need to call the office on 665477 when you arrive!
The miggle team will be there, so if there are any areas people want to discuss from a dev or build perspective let us know and maybe we can show some examples of how we deal with it.... OR
If anyone else has something they'd like to share/show - let us know
As per above, I'm keen to talk a bit more about sponsorship for our next event...
Thanks
Alick
Sounds great, looking forward
Sounds great,
looking forward
Great idea
I'm looking forward to coming along too. Also, be happy to chat through how best we can follow suit and co-ordinate.
Count me in Alick!
Count me in Alick!
Meeting follow up
Hi All,
Thanks for coming along Monday. Great to see everyone - certainly worth us holding one again I reckon. More on that in due course.
I think, if I could distill the evening's discussion into a few paragraph it would be as follows:-
Having some kind of event in September seems to make sense given its BDF - but the pulling power of BDF is probably outside of the core community - so perhaps it make more sense to have that one focussed on newbies, business and training. The 'Lighthouse' session we ran a year back worked well on that basis.
For 2013 a full Brighton camp in September seems unpractical because of Prague. In general though Brighton camps could always be a good warm up event for Cons - but, again, having one in advance of Portland in 2013 isn't practical as that would be too near to London's camp.
Whatever we run, there are diverse and distinct audiences we want to reach. We discussed whether a series of one-off events might help achieve that.
In terms of how to make sponsorship compelling we didn't make too much progress. We talked about trying to get more iconic Brighton venues for events, we talked about sponsorships being used to fund scholarships, we talked about the pros and cons of keeping events free. I think the general consensus was that to keep everything free is best if we can. We probably need to pick this up again in the context of whatever event we aim to run next.
I agreed to contact some of the other local associations to see to what extent we could piggy-back on some of what they do. I've started that off today with a mail to Sussex Enterprise. I've also dropped a line to Brighton Uni again.
Dis I miss, or mis-represent anything? Suggest that in any case the next time we run a meet up which is focussed around these topics we pick up this list again and see where we've got to against it.
Summary
Thanks Alick - a good evening and a good summary of the evening. The Lighthouse style event in September ticks a lot of boxes so flagging that up early should mean a great opportunity to really prepare and get the most out of it. Looking forward to January - thanks for that. (I hope you get some more of those little scotch eggs in by the way.) Perhaps we can follow up with a New England House gig after that.