Nashville Geeks

The fifth annual BarCamp Nashville will be held Saturday, October 15, at Cadillac Ranch. BarCamp is a free, tech-focused "unconference" that's equal parts networking, knowledge-building and fun.

As Nashville's premier digital event, BarCamp brings together the brightest minds from the developer, new media, entrepreneurial and geek communities. This year, nearly half of the pre-scheduled sessions are related to Code, including sessions on responsive web design, Natural Language Toolkit for Python, and both Android and iOS app development. The remaining sessions are split among Content, Design and Gear, including a session about sending a high-altitude ballon into space.

This is the kind of event where everyone is expected to participate — speak, volunteer, ask questions, network. Be sure to bring plenty of business cards as BarCamp Nashville is a great place to get connected. Register for free. Then build your schedule by signing up for sessions on the website.

Got something to say? While the pre-scheduled speaking grid for BCN11 is full, you can still sign up to speak in one of the 10 Impromptu session slots on the day of the event. There will also be Discussion Tables by the main stage where you can meet up for a spontaneous conversation.

Doors will open at 8:00am and the first sessions will start at 9:00. Get there early to avoid check-in lines and enjoy some free coffee and muffins while you check out your new bag of swag. Be sure to plan on attending the After Party starting at 5pm. It's a great chance to get to know all those new people you will have met during the day.

Want to get more involved? It's not too late to volunteer to help make BCN11 a success. Contact Volunteer Coordinator Courtenay Rogers to find out what you can do.

For the most up-to-date news about BarCamp Nashville, follow @barcampnash on Twitter. After registering on the website, be sure to RSVP to the Facebook event to let all your friends know you'll be at BCN11.

Twitter hashtag: #bcn11
Flickr tags: barcampnashville and bcn11

This post is part of the BarCamp Nashville Blog Tour. The previous post was How BarCamp Nashville Made Me a Better Sex Expert – and Will Make You Better Too by Gina Parris and the next post will be BarCamp Nashville & Me! by Kyle Greenwood. Check 'em out!

The first PHP Community Conference will be held right here in Nashville on April 21-22, 2011. Inspired by conferences like Webstock and Brooklyn Beta, the event is designed for people who care about PHP and what they make with it.

The conference is organized by Ben Ramsey, VP of Engineering at Nashville-based Moontoast, along with Lisa Denlinger and Nicholas Sloan, who aim to inspire people to make great things with PHP.

"We believe the PHP community is just about the friendliest group around, and we're going to be sharing stories of successes, failures, and lessons learned along the way. Because this is our first conference, we're hoping you'll join us, roll up your sleeves, and help make this something we can all be proud of."

The PHP Community Conference is a two-day event. Thursday will feature a tutorial day to introduce tools and ideas that you can use in your code right away. The second day will consist of presentations that will inspire you to create something new with PHP. Lunch and snacks will be provided on both days.

The conference will conclude Friday night with a party featuring pecha kucha talks by attendees. The best pecha kucha talks will have a chance at winning one of two iPad 2s sponsored by CakeDC. See the conference schedule for a complete list of sessions and times.

Admission to the entire event is $300. Check out the attendee list and register to attend.

For the most up-to-date news about the PHP Community Conference, follow @phpcomcon on Twitter.

Twitter hashtag: #phpcomcon
Flickr tag: phpcomcon

Innovation Group Nashville is a monthly fireside chat organized by John Pisciotta and Katy Kirby to gather Nashville's thought leaders in technology, entertainment and new media content. Each month, a featured guest will share their best thoughts around what they're working on—in an informal, transparent, non-solicitous environment.

Monthly conversations will be themed around the intersection of three areas: the music entertainment industry, technology, and entrepreneurship. The events are designed to attract thought leaders and the forward-looking companies they lead, who understand the past and are creating the next generation of new media, scalable entertainment companies.

The next event will be held on Thursday, April 7, from 6:00pm to 7:30pm, at the Nashville Entrepreneur Center (105 Broadway, Suite 200).

The featured guest for April will be Jason Moon Wilkins of Next Big Nashville. Wilkins is a musician, writer, consultant, entrepreneur and owner of Next Big Nashville, which has grown in a few short years to become a pivotal event in Nashville's music, entertainment and technology community. He'll be talking to about the evolution of the "non-country" side of Music City, his thoughts on this year's SXSW and where he sees the state of the music industry from a Nashville perspective.

RSVP on the Facebook event for details.

For the most up-to-date news about Innovation Group Nashville, like their Facebook page.

Twitter hashtag: #ignash
Flickr tag: ignash

Following on the success of last fall's BarCamp new media "unconference," tech-savvy musicians, marketers, bloggers and developers will gather this month in Nashville to discuss blogging, social media, podcasting, online video and more. The fourth annual PodCamp Nashville will be held at the Cadillac Ranch on Saturday, March 26, and is designed for anyone interested in online media to share ideas, hear from industry experts, and participate in discussions and demos.

Like BarCamp Nashville, PodCamp promises to bring together creative, tech and business types from across Nashville to exchange expertise and collaborate on developing new ideas and projects. It's a fantastic opportunity to meet people and get involved in local new media development. Speaker's Butler Lucas Hendrickson explains this year's theme as a call to "express yourself on the impact of digital culture on your life." A chance to express "your passion for digital culture — not only talking about the tools of the trade, but the reasons why we love the process and the practice of living the digital life."

Register in advance to get a preprinted name badge (and maybe a t-shirt). Admission is FREE. Then sign up for sessions that you'd like to attend.

If you're attending, speaking at, or sponsoring PodCamp, you can promote your involvement with special web badges.

If you're looking for a way to get more involved in the social media/tech community, volunteer to help before or during the event by contacting Sam Bradley.

For the most up-to-date news about PodCamp Nashville, follow @pcn on Twitter.

Twitter hashtag: #pcn11
Flickr tag: pcn11

Fellow geeks are getting excited. The fourth annual BarCamp Nashville will be this Saturday, October 16, at Cadillac Ranch.

BarCamp is a free, new-media focused "unconference" that's equal parts networking, knowledge-building and fun. BarCamp is Nashville's premier digital event, bringing together the brightest minds from the new media, tech, entrepreneurial and geek communities.

This is the kind of event where everyone is expected to participate — speak, volunteer, ask questions, network. Be sure to bring plenty of business cards as BarCamp Nashville is a great place to get connected. Register for free. Then build your schedule by signing up for sessions on the website. Also check out BCN Social, a new webapp created by BCN10 speaker Chris Ennis where you can share schedules with your friends on Twitter and get a nice mobile view of your schedule.

Got something to say? While the pre-scheduled speaking grid for BCN10 is full, you can still sign up to speak in one of the two Impromptu Rooms on the day of the event. Just sign up outside one of the rooms when you arrive. There will also be tables by the main stage where you can meet up for a spontaneous discussion.

Doors will open at 7:30am and the first sessions will start at 8:30. Get there early to avoid check-in lines and enjoy some free coffee and muffins while you check out your new bag of swag. Be sure to plan on attending the After Party upstairs at Karma Lounge starting at 5 p.m., featuring free beer from Yazoo. It's a great chance to get to know all those new people you will have met during the day.

Want to get more involved? It's not too late to volunteer to help make BCN10 a success. Contact Volunteer Coordinator Sam Bradley to find out what you can do.

You can also give back for all the good stuff you'll be getting at BCN10 by bringing some canned food donations for Second Harvest Food Bank of Middle Tennessee. Just drop your contributions in the container at the front entrance.

For the most up-to-date news about BarCamp Nashville, follow @barcampnash on Twitter.

After registering on the website, be sure to RSVP to the Facebook event to let all your friends know you'll be at BCN10.

Twitter hashtag: #bcn10
Flickr tags: barcampnashville and bcn10

Firefly Logic, sponsors of the monthly Geek Social, is helping to organize Nashville's first GiveCamp as part of Microsoft's National Day of GiveCamp. GiveCamp matches local charities to teams of IT pros for a marathon weekend of coding to produce small, effective projects that the charities otherwise wouldn't be able to take advantage of.

Organizer Chris McPherson, Partner/Senior Software Engineer at Firefly, says, "If I know our Geek community, Nashville is a perfect fit for this kind of event and it's going to be a total blast..."

Nashville GiveCamp will be held the weekend of January 14-16, 2011, at a location to be announced.

Chris is looking for candidate charities, sponsors, and of course, coders and other geeks:

• Charities with projects that a small (but mighty) team can pull off in a weekend.
• Coders, designers, project managers, DBA's and mentors (We need Geeks!).
• Event sponsors.
• Organizers and folks who "get things done".
• Food.
• Caffeine.
• Prizes and snacks to keep those dedicated teams working through the night.
• Help getting the word out about GiveCamp.

If you know a company who might like to sponsor Nashville GiveCamp, or provide some of the items listed above, give them the heads up. If you're a coder, designer or other geeky type, get in the game! Know a great local charity with a busted website, running their membership database from a 1991 educational copy of Excel? Hook 'em up!

For the most up-to-date news about Nashville GIveCamp, follow @nashgivecamp on Twitter.

Twitter hashtag: #nashgivecamp

Yesterday, ReadWriteWeb reported on the launch of location-based publishing via Foursquare by the Independent Film Channel. Following earlier experiments by Canadian newspaper chain Metro and the Wall St. Journal, IFC's "tips" go beyond restaurant reviews and news tidbits to add crowd-sourced content from the channel's "Always on, slightly off" fan-base.

Foursquare users can now opt-into getting those tips pushed to them whenever they check in near one of the annotated locations. It's a chance to effectively say, "I want to see this town as IFC fans see it." For marketers, this has got to be incredibly appealing, and for urban explorers it could be one of the best examples yet of effective Augmented Reality.

You can probably see where this is headed. We've created a Foursquare account for Nashville Geeks and started loading Geek-related tips for places around Nashville. You can opt-in to receiving the tips when you check in by friending Nashville Geeks. And, of course, you can go a step further by submitting your own Geek tips. Just email the venue ID and your tip to foursquaretips [at] nashvillegeeks.org and we'll consider it for inclusion. We're looking for fun factoids, commentary, and, of course, actual tips—all from a Nashville Geek perspective.

Join the fun and start sending in your tips now.