the future of conferences?

The organisers of the be2camp event met on-line late Monday evening (well it was breakfast in Sydney, tea time in Illinois, and late here in the UK!) to continue with the development of this project and event.  The agenda and arrangements are now shaping up very nicely. (It was noted that this event development and the communication between the organisers has not yet needed one email between us)

For an excellent  insight as to this type of event, read Pam Broviak’s report of her attendance at a Chicago event. Pam, a Public Works Director in Illinois comments:

I retained more from this conference than I normally would at a more traditional event and met more people

So is the unconference, low cost, free (as in free speech) barcamp event going to replace the high fee corporate control-organised events? .  Time will tell.   But surely, as budgets bite and delegates and organisations question the value from attending high fee conference events, the knowledge gained (and retained) and the networking value, bar camp and other non-conference events will undoubtedly become more common and popular.

Be2Camp – a barcamp type non-confernce event, exploring the use of Web 2.0 approaches in the built environment will be held in London, at the Building Center, Store Street, on October 10th.

Register for free here.

The backstory to be2camp:

The concept for be2camp started as a Twitter conversation between Martin Brown (built environment advisor) and Paul Wilkinson, (Comms Director BIW) following Martin’s attendance at barcamp type events, suggesting we do ‘something’ for the (UK) built environment. This discussion was picked by Jodie Miners in Australia, (Construction Collaborative IT specialist)  again through Twitter, and through conversations within Second Life with Pam Broviak (Director Public Works) from Illinois, USA. The timing of the event has been fixed to coincide with Jodie’s visit to the UK. We do hope Pam will be able to attend, if not she will be coordinating the be2camp Second Life activities. So now you know who to contact, praise or blame!