Pre-GnomeDex BBQ Retrospective

By leelefever on September 8, 2005 - 11:48am.

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I few months ago, I had a bar-b-cue at my house and invited the Internet to come over. It was the afternoon before GnomeDex and I wasn’t sure what I was getting into. I didn’t write about it much then, but the results were incredible and I hope others will do similar events.

It all stated with the guys at Bryght, who planned to come over that afternoon. I offered a BBQ and someone mentioned that I should have something for other folks coming into town. I accepted the offer and, on a whim, put an invitation on my blog, open to everyone. It was called “Pre-GnomeDex BBQ- You’re Invited”. Word quickly spread to the GnomeDex wiki.

One the first times I felt a hint of panic was this comment from Carrick:
“You just invited the whole Interweb to your house for free beer? You are a brave man.”

My response was:
“Yeah that's pretty much what it looks like Carrick, we'll see how this goes. :) If nothing else, it will be interesting."

As it turned out, I couldn’t have asked for a better group of people. For people who know Open Space Technology, this was great example of the first principle: Whoever comes are the right people. I was impressed and excited by the folks that came. Here’s a somewhat complete list:

• The Bryght Crew (Kris, Roland, Richard, Boris, Colin)
• Will Pate of Rain City Studios
• Scott Beale of Laughing Squid
• Gerry Caballero of AAA California
• Andy Smith of Reoriginalize
• Matt Mullenweg of Wordpress
• Josh Petersen of the Robot Coop
• Chris Pirillo of Lockergnome
• Nick Finck of Digital Web Magazine
• Pete Grondel of Microsoft
• Jay Fienberg of icite.net
• Dan Gillmor of Bayosphere
• The PubSub Group (B6b Wyman, Salim Ismail, Richard Treadway)
• Lee Hammond Geffen Records
• Marc Pincus formerly of Tribe.net
• Mike Buckbee of Feedmail
• Tom Conrad of Pandora
• Jeremy Hubert of http://www.jeremyhubert.com/
• Dylan Greene of DylanGreene.com
• Greg Narain of SparkCast
• Jordan Rule of Jordanrule.com

(I’m sorry if I missed others here)

Despite all the things that could have happened, the best things did. We had enough beer and food. The caliber of folks was high and I think we had a good time. I would surely do it again, if I was going to be around for GnomeDex 2006 that is. Not that this was anything like Bar Camp, but I think there is something about planning for spontaneity that makes things like this work.

Here are some photos, more can be found here:

Andy Face and the Crowd

Boris Mann, Grill Master

Chris Pirillo and Marc Pincus

PhotoMatt

Zinga (Mark Pincus’ Dog)

Dan Gillmor with Nick Dylan and Kris

I really appreicate everyone coming, helping out and being well-behaved. ;-) A BIG thanks for Boris Mann for manning the grill. I hope we can do it again sometime.