Invitation to Microsoft / O'Reilly Northeast User Group Summit
This invitation comes to me from Jim O'Neil, a Microsoft Developer Evangelist. Microsoft and O'Rielly are trying to get together people to discuss the community of Rich Internet Applications.
I think it is a great opportunity, if you're interested in "Crossing the lines" for the sake of community and are in the northeastern area. I did sign up for the event.
Here is the formal announcement:
We'd like to invite you to join us on May 2nd for a special Northeast community/user group leader summit. Together we can help each other by sharing our experiences of running a user group. We'll discuss topics such as building community, finding relevant meeting topics in today's economy, attracting and keeping members, using social media and other tools to get the word out, working with vendors and collaborating on group events like Code Camps and Ignite. Anything goes since we're going to focus on the mechanics of running a group and not the technical content.
We'll have a few set sessions to help get things started but then the rest will be decided by you and your peers in typical Unconference- fashion.
O'Reilly Media and Microsoft are hosting the event at Microsoft's newest campus, Microsoft New England Research and Development Center (NERD), One Memorial Drive in Cambridge, MA which is easily accessible via public transportation and has ample cheap parking nearby. For more information, go here.
We've also invited other industry notables such as Sun, Google, Adobe, Red Hat, SourceForge, Wiley, Wrox, Safari Books Online, Addison-Wesley, PeachPit, Pragmatic Programmers, Microsoft Press, No Starch Press, SitePoint, Apress. Please RSVP by going to http://neugsummit.eventbrite.com/ as soon as possible so we know how many people are interested. Because we have limited space, we can only extend this invitation to you and one additional member of your group.
There is no fee to attend and we'll provide some snacks and beverages throughout the day. We've scheduled activities from 11am to 5pm but you're welcome to arrive as early as 10:30am.
We look forward to a great community event! See you soon.
End the Formal Announcement!
I've been getting a lot of flack lately about giving too much love to Microsoft. Although I'm not sure I agree (can we really have too much love?) feel free to flame me.
I for one am glad that you are going to this event. In spite of all of its moral and ethical issues, Micro$oft is *not* the enemy. If people can cross proprietary and ideological lines to work together and build software that has meaning, that is a great thing. I will look forward to hearing/reading what you learn from the experience.
Thanks! I have no idea what to expect from an event like this..
our communities (Adobe, Microsoft, Java, Open Source) share a lot of the same challenges, and that's the focus of this get together. And, we will be checking egos at the door :)