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Guide to Running BarCamp Canterbury

BarCamp

BarCamp is an established format for an free and open 'un-conference'.

Terminology

  • The ethos of BarCamp is free, open, community.
  • Some terms and phrases that do not align with these principles can cause friction.
  • Business terminology is suggested to be avoided.

Feel

  • Small event, real local people.
  • It should feel like you're an invited guest to a conference. There is a personalised name badge for you at reception/welcome.
  • With the personalised mugs; people kept them on their shelf to remember "that conference they spoke at". It might be small compared to the world, but this is an important event for people.

Timeline

  1. Secure venue
    • Catering
    • Risk Assessment
  2. Secure supporter (logo's of local organisations that support local tech community)
  3. Adverting (digital signage in universities + schools?)

Venue

Accessibility should be considered

  • Wheelchair access
  • Parking
  • Distance between rooms/events

Branding

Historically https://github.com/vext01/barcamp-canterbury-branding It would be good to keep all resources in a single repo

Use of the 'University of Kent' logo is restricted to formal university activities only. We can use the Kent logo only in the context of 'School of Computing'. LINK

Catering

  • Refreshments to facilitate attendee's focused and interacting during the day. Sponsorship provides finances for refreshments.

  • Check what are valid/approved food vendors for your venue.

  • Coffee (throughout)

    • Investigate the hire of a coffee machine/cart/supplier? Maybe a sponsor? Venue catering teams can ensure this is managed

  • Lunch

    • For events taking place on the University of Kent campus, authorised vendors should provide catering
    • For events not taking place on the University of Kent campus

  • Dinner

    • Domino's is a registered supplier for University of Kent and provide bulk discount
    • Pizza is the best 'price point'.
      • As this is a free community event, it is regrettable, but we can't provide specialist food

Finances

Investigate https://www.paypal.com/uk/webapps/mpp/not-for-profit Transparent (public)

Website

Supporters

  • Requesting 'Sponsorship' was not effective. Many small organisations did not have money.
    • Sponsor (implys commercial involvement)
  • What we want is 'support'. Logo's of organisation 'legitimise' our event
    • The following terms have formal connertaions and should not be used
      • 'affiliated'
      • 'associated'
      • 'endorsed'

Supporters (financial/donation)

Talks from organisations/commercial-interests are discouraged. They should be relevant to the community.

If we do want to approach supporter for money

Tiers

  • £x
    • ?
  • £xx
    • ?

Posters? Logo? Website? Talks? Prizes?

Advertising

Social Media

  • planable.io
    • Facebook
    • Twitter @BarCampCant #BarCampCant (#bccant old)
      • TODO: A script to possibly extract any twitterhandle that has messaged @BarCampCant or posted on #BarCampCant (within a timebox) and publicly message them to announce the date for the new barcamp.
        • This keeps communication transparent and prevents us from holding personal data
    • flickr (todo: setup group)
    • Instagram
  • buffer.com
    • Charges a fortune

Previous Tickets

Existing Communities

@UniKentComp @cccu_computing @CCCUEdgeHub

  • Societies
    • @TinkerSoc
    • MORE ...

Signs & Printing

Printed

  • Attendee list
    • Collect data on how they heard of the event
  • List of emergency contact people and numbers
  • Volunteer Guides

Outside Venue

  • Direction Arrows (maybe setup official by venue - digital signs)
  • Vinyl banner?
    • Could this be used over multiple years?

Foyer

  • QR Code (barcampcanterbury.com) + URL for The Grid
  • Photography Warning (there will be photos taken)
  • Map (also online)
    • Rooms
    • Fire escape
  • twitter #tag

In Event Rooms

  • (Outside) Room Signs
  • Vinyl stands with logo (reusable)
    • twitter #tag
    • barcampcanterbury.com
    • QR Code (to barcampcanterbury.com)

Swap Shop

  • Everything on this table is Free! Help yourself!
  • (please take away your uncollected shit afterwards)

Money

Tickets

Previous events have targeted 100 attendees. 30% of released tickets typically don't attend.

  • Eventbrite (free ticket event)
    • Accept donations from attendees
    • Ask under 18
    • By signing up to this event you have read and agree to code-of-conduct + privacy-policy
  • https://github.com/vext01/barcamp-tickets
  • Laser cut wood badges with drinks tokens?
  • Investigate mechanisms to return/cancel/recycle a ticket in the case of non attendance
  • Ticket batches
    • Previously the event has been popular and tickets have been released in batches
    • Additional tickets have been available by solving online puzzles

Badges

Providing pre printed named badges help the event 'feel' like a conference. This create an important atmosphere. I would highly discourage 'just' writing name badges with pen and stickers.

Under 18's

  • With parent or guardian
  • We do not vet or control the attendees or the content
  • See code-of-conduct.md

Timetable

Time Activity
09:00 Arrival/Registration
10:00 Welcome and Introduction
10:30 Talk Slot 1
11:00 Talk Slot 2
11:30 Talk Slot 3
12:00 Talk Slot 4
12:30 Talk Slot 5
13:00 Lunch
14:00 Talk Slot 6
14:30 Talk Slot 7
15:00 Talk Slot 8
15:30 Talk Slot 9
16:00 Talk Slot 10
16:30 PowerPoint Karaoke
17:00 Closing
17:30 Tidyup
18:00 Dinner and Socialise
22:00 End

Activities

  • PowerPoint Karaoke
  • Swap Shop
    • Small working devices or tools that your are not using to be given to other hackers that needs them
    • Ideas
      • Raspbery pi1's, power supplys, nuts/bolts/hardware, fabric, wood offcuts, adhesives, LED's, lights, tools, wire, old laptops, duplicates of games, cards.
  • Mini Lightening talks
    • 5 min
    • Safer than a 30min talk

It is recommended that larger overarching activities are not encouraged. This takes the focus away from the talks. Activities should be time-boxed to a timeslot if needed.

Food/Snacks/Lunch

It is part of the BarCamp ethos to ensure everything is always completely free for attendees

  • Food (venue cantering?)
    • Equipment
      • Paper Tabelcloths
      • Hot Water Urn?
    • Light Refreshment
      • Water
      • Fruit
      • Tea/InstantCoffee/Mink/Sugar
      • Disposable cups
        • Ask attendees to bring cup (in email)
    • Lunch
      • Order pizza (book in advance) Domino's do mad good deals in advance on bulk

Recording Talks

Provide a google shared drive to accept uploads from attendees

  • It would be interesting to record talks

    • Minimal equipment
    • Minimal effort and time

  • Concept

    • Source and GoPro and a XoomBox from the community to each room
    • Use 128gb MicroSD card (£20)
    • Leave devices with mains power recording for the entire 6 hours
    • Minimal post processing: audio volume compression, sycning, title/end graphic (via script), upload
    • If they don't record - not the end of the world - no panic - no stress - no worry

Record of Talks?

  • Could we start to collect details of previous talks
  • Could someone help curate these?
    • title
    • name (not email)
    • image
    • 2 or 3 sentence description
    • permissions to put this on website.

Avoid Competition

Concept is "awards" not "competition". The purpose/goal is comedy, fun and participation, not competition and ranking.

We will present a range of "awards" at the closing ceremony. Over the day we should come up with fun award titles that fit a talk/project/thing. These award titles will be dumb and comedic. They can be hilariously low bar (tiny plastic trophies with hand written stickers on). e.g. Categories like "Least Cheesiest Talk" (Because it was about vegan cheese), "Bringer of Anarchy", "Most likely to smash the loom" Things to avoid "Best Talk", "Best Presentation Style". We don't want people to think we've ranked them by some arbitrary criteria.

We should come up with these award title on the day because they should be related to the people and things that happened at the event. If (most of) these awards could be decided and written before powerpoint karaoke, that will allow us to enjoy the final segments of the event. If each organiser(?) could come up with 2(?) award titles each, that would give us 8 awards. That's pretty good going.

Real poor cheap plastic trophies? or maybe 3D printed.

Emergencies

  • Have an emergency site contact - security?

Community Beyond the event

What events/gatherings/activities/communication can we use to facilitate a community outside of Barcamp?

  • Sunday Activity?
  • Further informal gatherings over the year?
    • Board games?
    • Meals?
    • Trips?
  • Forms of communication?
  • Code Dojo?

IRC/Discord

  • Pros
    • Could facilitate further community engagement outside of the event
  • Cons
    • Would require ongoing moderation

References

https://www.eventmanagerblog.com/20-resources-for-a-smooth-barcamp