A series of calculated jibberish, courtesy of

Timothy Luke Hopkins

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Brooklyn Beta 2011

Photo by Jon Tan

Brooklyn Beta at the Invisible Dog in Brooklyn, New York -- photo by Jon Tan

Last month, I had the distinct privilege of attending Brooklyn Beta, a “small, friendly web conference aimed at the ‘work hard and be nice to people’ crowd.” During the three-day emotional rollercoaster (Honestly, it consisted mainly of the “Hands up and say Weeeee!” part), I have concluded that – my apologies for flipping to Kanye mode on you – it was the most inspirational and fun conference of all-time.

Hear me out.

Every conference has its core purpose – to teach, to discuss best practices, to inspire, to network, etc. Brooklyn Beta made it very clear from the onset that its purpose was to pair talented folks up with problems that need solving:

“We hope to not only inspire you to work on your own ideas, but we also want to highlight problems that matter. Problems like education, charity, and finance. Our speakers will inspire you and help you understand how your skills can help.”

Brooklyn Beta succeeded on all counts. They filled the room with talented folks (check the attendee list), lined up a fantastic group of inspirational speakers from all over – Apple, Awesome Foundation, Department of Health and Human Services Department, charity:water – and, judging by the glowing responses I heard personally from attendees, to those written up on the interwebs post-conference, that inspiration was infectious (Jessica Hische even created a sweet-looking site, 52x52.org, encouraging folks to pledge $52 for 52 weeks, all benefit great causes) and has carried on into a month later.

Photo by placenamehere

imageThe conference was broken into three days. The first day, Wednesday Whatnot, broke attendees into separate, small groups to discuss ideas and gather feedback for projects, work styles and spaces (stand-up desks are all the rage right now), among other things. Wednesday Whatnot was inspired by Greenville Grok. According to both the Brooklyn Beta founders, Cameron Koczon and Chris Shiflett, and the Greenville folk, part of the encouragement was to generate these types of gatherings in every city possible. Matthew Smith even went so far as to say that you needn’t go to Brooklyn Beta 2012, but instead opt for your own version in your own home town. I don’t know about missing out on the next Brooklyn Beta conference (I plan on being there – for sure), but making that kind of day spread like Fight Club isn’t a bad idea at all. Everyone: get your Tyler Durden on, folks.

Thursday and Friday were more traditional conferences, with a great lineup of speakers I’ve never heard before on stage — Viktoria Harrison (charity:water), Cameron (Brooklyn Beta cofounder, Fictive Kin, GimmeBar), Tony Fadell (he who helped created Apple’s iPod), Todd Park (Dep’t of HHS CTO), Tim Hwang (Awesome Foundation and others). They spoke of different areas of do-good, but kept with the theme of using your talents – be it content strategy (listed first on purpose, fist-bump to Kristina Halvorson), design, development, project management, or whatever – to better the world for the greater good.

At one point, Mr. Park got down on his knees and pleaded with the audience for help on using their talents to design products and services that can save lives. No pressure.

Sidenote:
I love Brooklyn Brewery beers. I own much of their swag – my way of professing my love. Unfortunately, I was unable to do a brewery tour, due to the awesomeness of the week. Next time…

Each day had a very relaxed feel, which combined with a fantastic group of attendees, locally delivered food and drink (Bark Hot Dogs, SixPoint Craft Ales and Brooklyn Brewery, to name a few), made for a special, incredible week.

Before I go to other shout-outs, I must start with my eternal gratefulness to the wonderful Brooklyn Beta cofounders, Cameron and Chris, for weaving together such a fantastic event. They rounded up sponsors to help with costs and, especially, supply beer; lined up speakers doing awesome things (some very literally) to provide inspiration; opened up the event to some of the best and brightest “movers and shakers” in the field (I am not including myself in this list at all, unless we are talking about dancing); and, of course, performing all the other conference-y magic that goes on behind the scenes that we don’t see but appreciate nonetheless. All this amounted to an open, loose, fun, informative and, above all else for me personally, incredibly inspirational “conference.” You, sirs, are true gentlemen and scholars, and it was a pleasure to take part in such an amazing week.

Other notable highlights of the week included:

  • Staying the week with a very kind stranger (Thank you, AirBnb) and not being violated (Yay!).
  • Free web nerdery books!!
  • Watching the movie premiere of Girl Walk // All Day and the post-movie dance-off.
  • Chatting with Simon Collison briefly about responsive and adaptive design – specifically how designers need to continue to take the extra time to design for a web that is forever changing.
  • Discussing conference organization goodness, Brooklyn wonderfulness and, most importantly, vowing to help put together a cigar night at Brooklyn Beta 2012, with Cameron and Chris.
  • Finding out that there is an Awesome Foundation DC Chapter – I would absolutely put up the money to be on their committee!
  • The beautifully designed Brooklyn Beta swag sporting the awesome tagline: “MAKE something you LOVE”.
  • Watching the fellow from Twilio break up the general talks with a pure “code and awe” session showing the wizardry found in the app, moments after David Desandro and I discussed how great that would be.
  • Chatting up Brooklyn Alpha conference founders, Tom and Tyler, about creating web apps in three days, the importance of emailing me in a timely manner and black pale ales (Speakeasy is the sh*t).
  • Going hundreds of miles out of town to hang out with my fellow DC-area residents, Dave Desandro and Andrew Cohen (Soon-to-be Colorado resident)
  • Chatting with Jenni Scwartz about Brooklyn’s crazy wonderful good vibes.
  • Watching the crazy cool Brooklyn Beta timelapse thrown together by Beep Show.
  • THE BEARD TAKEOVER (I’m in there somewhere)
  • Taking a walking tour of Brooklyn with a local, from Park Slope up to the new area on Atlantic Avenue where the Nets stadium will be, to Brooklyn Heights, where I saw a fantastic view of the Brooklyn Bridge, Freedom Towers and Manhattan.
  • Visiting a cool little spot on the Lower East Side with my talented homie, Jenna, for a shindig (not to be confused with a brouhaha), where web nerdery, old days, good times and drinks (a common theme of the week) were discussed.
  • Meeting some very cool folks who made the week extra special: Justin Childress, my “official conference bro,”, with whom I discussed design, coffee beans, going to bed early and how he’s two sets of triplets away from a solid baseball lineup; Lachlan Hardy, an all-around great dude, and Good Samaritan, who let me drop my heavy arse bag in his hotel room before commencing a long, crazy night of bar-hopping; Dan, Ben, Dave, Eugene, Adam, Greg, Steven, Brandon and several others I am forgetting at the moment – I just want to say that you all freakin rock.
  • *Insert random other stories I’m forgetting or that inside joke we had – you know the one – here*

Since that week, I’ve already begun some cool projects at my full-time, and am in the process of ironing out my portfolio to share more of the work I’ve done in copywriting and design on the interwebs, so I can team up with others to help further the do-gooders’ movement. All this, largely inspired by a single, awesome week in New York at Brooklyn Beta. Thanks, guys.

Other Brooklyn Beta stuff:

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