DrupalCamp Brighton

Hi,

Having just come back from a very successful DrupalCamp Scotland I am very much behind the idea of another Brighton DrupalCamp.

We did start talking earlier in the year (or was it last year?!) about a Commerce Camp but quite frankly I haven't had the time to see this through though there was some interest in getting it to happen.

THe model for Scotland and London is a Business Day Friday followed by a Weekend camp.

To set my own limits up front, I can definitely be part of a committee to set this up - and can definitely bring sponsorship to the event. What we need however is someone who has the capacity to drive it through.

Scotland charged for tickets and employed an events manager - maybe this is an approach we could take.

Gem - very much appreciate your initiative but watch out for the well trodden road of problems such as centralised banking / UK association. Steve has taken the lead on these things in the past but I am sure will welcome enthusiastic support :)

Richard

I'm up for that Guy. I think it's great that Gemma wants to organise this. I'll happily NOT put myself forward to being part of an organising committee as any group putting this on should be as representative as possible. But would want to make sure I'm able to help in any case.

(only just seen this - one day I'll figure out these notifications on gdo!)

So yes... DrupalCamp Brighton - who's up that then?

YES!! I've been to a couple of these Drupalcamp thingies before and want to go to more!

I have been thinking about organising a DrupalCamp Brighton - I have contacted and spoken to a few people but I thought a kick start meeting would be good so we can get all those that want to be involved, involved and to get the ball rolling.

Thanks so much for stepping up to the job and opening up the discussion!

What are people's initial thoughts?

I think it's great, people keep asking when our next one is so good to get things going finally. Our community has grown rapidly over the last few years and it's high time we share the highs, and lows ;)

So far I have been thinking about

*Location - I have contacted the universities and currently waiting to hear from them. I reckon a university would be perfect location - easy to find and get to / enough space / professional.

The university where barcamp was is a fab venue and will strengthen our links with them, we could think about appropriate sessions for students/grads/etc.

It's also super-quick and cheap to get there from town on the train, just outside the station, and lots of space. Not much around there but these sorts of Drupal events are much better when everyone is in one place - everyone just got lost in North Laine at lunch the first camp lol! Also Jo said they're specifically interested supporting these sorts of events, she knows the person to speak to so that should be ok.

*Date - January - gives us enough time to organise it, doesn't clash with other events, D8 may be out.

Agree it gives enough time and doesn't clash with other events. It is potentially close to Drupalcamp London which is quickly growing having over 550 at the last one, so may prove a problem further down the line if the event grows but I doubt it's too much of an issues, in fact could be more of a pull to those in UK/Europe to come to Drupalcamp Brighton to test out their Drupalcamp London sessions!

I'd also like to do something around Digital Brighton time - I think that would be very different and more focused on local community as opposed to one big event i.e. open studios, lunches, etc. so will post about that at some point, perhaps we can discuss if we have a few minutes at the next meetup after we talk about this. Always good to have at least one excuse for people to come visit Brighton in the summer ;)

*Ticket prices - a small amount to cover cost of lunch / drinks and secure places. I have contacted the Drupal Association to see if there's a UK office set up to sort bank etc or if it's something we have to do.

I agree, and we should consider student/job seeker prices, speaker tickets, volunteer tickets, individual sponsor tickets, sponsor tickets, early bird, etc. Drupalcamp Scotland wasn't too over-priced and really well organised with great location, food, content, and of course people!

*Numbers - 100+ ?

We had 80+ at the previous ones which were in a relatively small venue - not sure how many the uni can cope with but I'd love to see this grow 2x 3x or more - the buzz you get at the 200+ is AMAZING! We should be able to do that no problem.

*Sponsors..

I'll be sponsoring in some capacity - if I've still got http://hack.house up and running somewhere then I'd love to host 24h chx coding lounge, I'm sure that'd get a few more of the 'core' interested in coming down as they often go for the sprints more than the sessions (excl. drinking ones ;). One thing I missed in Edinburgh were sprints but the community is so spread out it's tough - they rotate so next year Glasgow. Each community moulds to local needs, I think what's shown the most so far is people like to come to Brighton and it's so close to London it's a viable, cheap option for many.

*Committee - who's interested?

I would love for everyone who's been involved in the growth of our community to be involved. We are at a stage now where everyone reading this needs to get their hands dirty, we have just enough of a participating community to run something like this well which means that hopefully next time round we can pass the knowledge on as we grow.

Alick - I hope you re-consider, of all the people here you've grown the Drupal pie larger which helps all of us and I've always thought you'd be involved in the business day, we could really do with your help!

For me, i_KOS made Drupalcamp Scotland a real winner for me as they followed their http://lush.co.uk story through from the business side to the techie and I think it made all of us proud Drupalers to see such an amazing outcome. I'd love to see similar involvement from Miggle - what's great about our community is when we share the code and learning so we all grow.

*Have a theme ? maybe ? ---D8 ?

Theme, yes, Drupal 8 - maybe. After seeing Robert Douglas' keynote re SAAS I think that may be a key topic/theme to do which would fit timing as well as not just the product name. "Build more profitable businesses so you can contribute more" was the overall theme, and everyone likes money it seems ;)

Other things to think about: Website / Design / branding / marketing

There's a couple of projects here to check out that I know about - cream, event booking by the london drupalcampers I believe. Also JAM's been working on a drupalcamp distro for the last I don't know how many years so would be worth checking out as there's some great ideas about scheduling reminders based on roles so would be good to see if there's anything we could do there to help move that forward (i.e. sprint on it) or at least get the knowledge bits to help.

Obviously these are all my first thoughts, I just wanted to start something to get the ball rolling.

Oooo so exciting, can't wait - so great for things to be moving at last, thanks again!

I was thinking maybe whilst having a drink at the next show and tell meeting we could have a kick start meeting? Or possibly set a side a whole different date for kickstart meeting.

Let's keep to the next show tell etc., we have nothing else planned for it so happy to host @vbrighton. We could potentially stream/video if people can't make it and want to be involved - plus might be a good record to have and perhaps help focus the discussion ;)

After the initial kick start meeting - after reading the notes from the DrupalCamp London I think it would be good to do a monthly BoF to plan / publicise / get everyone involved. We can make notes and keep everyone up to date.

Sounds good - If people are up for Friday's then I've been wanting to start up Drupal Coworking Fridays which is last Friday of every month, happy to host @vbrighton, we can always roam location if we like, just sometimes helps working alongside more Drupalers.

What are people's thoughts?

I have a few ;) Seriously, big thanks for this, super-excited!

Hopefully we can get a great team / committee together to sort an awesome event!

Indeed! Did somebody ring DarkStar Brewery yet so we can make a special recipe???! PRIORITIES PEOPLE!!

Just watching btopro's drupalcon session about elms where he's plugging his local camp. It's a good example, has a theme - "Bridging Higher Education & Industry" - not that we have to have one but here's an example of one, although it's not seemingly on their homepage! They also have a good range of tracks and other info on the site so thought I'd post it here fyi:

http://drupalcamppa.org/about