Damien rails about the same old cliquey gang going to Barcamp Galway. I’m not sure how to fix this one personally, apart from not attending 🙂
As an organiser of a previous Barcamp I can tell you one of the big worries is not having enough speakers to interest and entertain your audience, so I embrace all participants who are willing to post on the blog with an idea for a talk. You take your speakers where you can get ’em.
Each Barcamp I have been at has been completely different in character feel and style to the others (and thats a good thing) and I rarely felt like I was seeing the same speaker over and over. The most common complaint across all Barcamps is “gee I want to go to all three sessions” that are scheduled for the current slot, so there is a recurring demand for some of the talks. As it is about 20% of those who sign up for a talk fail to attend, and of the audience much less than 10% will be willing to do an impromptu session. I had to practically press gang poor Karlin Lillington on a panel at Barcamp Dublin.
This is Ireland, I think we might be the first country in the world with 0 degrees of separation, so everything will appear a bit cliquey from the outside. My advice to people who are bored with the regulars is, go hustle up to stranger, there were always plenty at the Barcamp’s I attended. For people who are attending Barcamp for the first time, my advice is, do a talk. There is no better way to get to know people.
Copacetic 