ApacheCamp Vancouver is a BarCamp-style event affiliated with ApacheCon North America 2011. The event is free and will have space for 100 people. Like most BarCamps, there's no agenda beyond bringing together a bunch of interesting folks, and giving them space and just enough structure to facilitate awesome discussions. Not familiar with BarCamp-style events? Well, you know how as some... [read more]

ApacheCamp Vancouver is a BarCamp-style event affiliated with ApacheCon North America 2011. The event is free and will have space for 100 people. Like most BarCamps, there's no agenda beyond bringing together a bunch of interesting folks, and giving them space and just enough structure to facilitate awesome discussions. Not familiar with BarCamp-style events? Well, you know how as some conferences, the best part of the event happens in conversations in between sessions or at the end of the day over drinks? You start talking with another about some unlikely thing and suddenly you find that you have a shared passion. Alternately, maybe the other person is an expert in something you need to know or vice versa. These types of interactions have a unique spark - they are impassioned, spontaneous and interactive. BarCamp-style events (which is what ApacheCamp is) seek to recreate this experience with a small amount of structure. There's an opening session where the group rules are laid out. This is followed by participants _very_ briefly introducing themselves. Then there is a quick, chaotic and fun planning session where people put ideas on index cards and then tack them to a schedule board. Sessions get moved, consolidated, altered and scrapped for about 15 minutes and then the conference proper starts with people choosing sessions and heading off to discuss.