SocialDevCamp East: Awesome People, Awesome Day

I just want to say thank you to everyone that showed up to make SocialDevCamp yesterday such a huge success. I say it was a success not as an organizer, but as a participant. I learned a ton of practical information yesterday and made contact with dozens of talented people, most of whom are either nearby or a short train ride away.

I can rant and rave about how great yesterday was, but here’s what others are saying:

• “Dude – we were surrounded by talented folks – I think I talked myself out – so many interesting things happening.” — Bear
• “I think its official #socialdevcamp is the best event Baltimore has seen in a LONG time.” — Greg Cangialosi
• “Thanks for setting up #socialdevcamp yesterday. I thought the discussion was quite insightful & well-organized.” — kyeung808
• “@chrisbrogan Morning chris, you missed an awesome SocialDevCamp yesterday” — Jimmy Gardner
• “Good day at socialdevcamp (always a good day when you make friends with an MIT post doc)… also, I’m Bill Pardy.” — James Lombardi
• “Socialdevcamp was perfect. Met so many great people. Totally worth the sore vocal chords.” — Amy Hoy
• “What a day! socialdevcamp was seriously a lot of fun, the after party even a little more so.” — vees
• “After working with the highly esteemed @cyberhorse for 5 years, I met him for the first time today at #socialdevcamp” — Keith Casey

Honestly it all makes me a little emotional.  This is our community.  These people are the future of innovation, and we’re committed to making a go of it here along the silicon rails of the Amtrak east-coast corridor. I am so incredibly proud to be associated with this community, and the notion that we all have a stake in making the east coast a better place to start and run businesses.  More on that later.

I also want to especially thank all of the people who helped make the event possible on the unimaginably short time schedule of 25 days notice: our sponsors (listed here) as well as Melanie Kelleher of Kelleher Consulting for her invaluable assistance with the venue, the catering and at the registration table, Jen Gunner with the Greater Baltimore Technology Council for their support and encouragement, my wife Jennifer Troy for her help with a thousand details and the afterparty, and of course the event co-chairs Ann Bernard and Keith Casey who enlisted the support of their networks and helped shape and promote the event.  People wondered how we could do this so quickly, and it was because everybody involved is a superstar in one way or another; you couldn’t ask for a better event team!

We also need to make special mention of one person who was indispensable in making the event the success that it was: Jim Kucher at the University of Baltimore deserves huge kudos for securing the terrific space at the Thumel Business Center at a deeply discounted price.  Without the University’s support yesterday, as we all experienced it, would not have been possible.  Lots of folks mentioned that the space was really exemplary as a Barcamp-compatible space:  a large common area for mixing and meals, a great auditorium with theater style seating, and four, easy-to-find and easy-to-use breakout rooms.  We really could not have asked for a better space.

Also thanks to Brewer’s Art for putting up with the flash mob that colonized their Saturday happy hour.  We warned them that we were coming, but they might not have expected the sheer numbers and zeal that the SocialDevCamp crowd exhibited yesterday!

• Take a look at the Flickr photos that were generated.
• Jimmy Gardner (@jjgardner3) made a an awesome Animoto photo collage video. Check it out!
• Shashi Bellamkonda created a thorough recap of the day and of the coverage
• Greg Cangialosi has an awesome post that echoes my sentiments perfectly!
• Ann Bernard has a great summary of the content of the day’s events
• Kenneth Yeung made videos of many of the sessions
• We recorded several videos yesterday using Qik: shashi, davetroy
• If you have media to share, please post a comment here!

One thing is certain:  yesterday was a big success and it affirmed our belief that there is a need for exactly this kind of event and community in our region.  We will be planning a second event, SocialDevCamp East Fall 2008, for September.  Date TBD soon!

I will be writing more about my reflections on yesterday in the coming days.  Right now, I need to finish a presentation for the O’Reilly Where 2.0 conference on the openlocation.org initiative I am working on, and get on a plane to San Francisco at 6:00.