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Thus, BarCamps rely on securing [[sponsorship]], ranging from the venue and network access to beverages and food.
Thus, BarCamps rely on securing [[sponsorship]], ranging from the venue and network access to beverages and food.


The origin of BarCamp meeting format are to be traced in the [http://www.hackmeeting.org italian hackmeeting] (first held in 1996 in Florence, running every year up to now). The hackmeeting was born as a spontaneous gathering of hackers to be held in different places across the peninsula once a year; the organization of the hackmeetings is kept completely horizontal and open to any contribution using an unmoderated mailinglist, while the event has been running without any funding and sponsors up to now. Notably, the italian hackmeeting was attended by Wau Holland in Milano 1999 and Richard Stallman in Bologna 2001.
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The first BarCamp was held in [[Palo Alto, California]], from August 19-21, 2005, in the offices of [[Socialtext]]. It was [http://www.tantek.com/log/2006/07.html#d10t0805 organized in less than a week's time], from concept to event, with 200 attendees. Since then, BarCamps have been held across North America, South America, Europe and Asia -- from Boston to Bangalore. To mark the one-year anniversary of BarCamp, [http://barcamp.org/BarCampEarth BarCampEarth] was held in multiple locations world wide on August 25-27, 2006.

⚫
The first event explicitly called BarCamp was held in [[Palo Alto, California]], from August 19-21, 2005, in the offices of [[Socialtext]]. It was [http://www.tantek.com/log/2006/07.html#d10t0805 organized in less than a week's time], from concept to event, with 200 attendees. Since then, BarCamps have been held across North America, South America, Europe and Asia -- from Boston to Bangalore. To mark the one-year anniversary of BarCamp, [http://barcamp.org/BarCampEarth BarCampEarth] was held in multiple locations world wide on August 25-27, 2006.


==See also==
==See also==

Revision as of 10:33, 24 April 2007

Participants in the first BarCamp simultaneously comment, listen, and follow along on their screens.
File:Barcamp chennai.jpg
A BarCamp in progress in Chennai, India

BarCamp is an international network of unconferences — open, participatory workshop-events, whose content is provided by participants — focusing on early-stage web applications, and related open source technologies and social protocols. The name is a playful allusion to its origins, with reference to the hacker slang term, foobar: BarCamp arose as a spin-off and response to Foo Camp, an annual invitation-only unconference hosted by open source publishing luminary, Tim O'Reilly.

BarCamps are organized (and evangelized) largely through the web, harnessing what might be called a Web 2.0 communications toolkit. By "open-sourcing" the organizational process of a Foo Camp unconference, that is, codifying it in a wiki and making that publicly available, BarCamp seems to have struck a chord. It has since been implemented in 31 cities around the world and is serving as a reference for unconferences in other fields. The involvement of key figures in the web development community, such as Tantek Çelik and Ross Mayfield, no doubt has helped its adoption.

The procedural framework of BarCamp is similar to Open Space methodology for organizing meetings, but looser. It consists of sessions proposed and scheduled each day by attendees, mostly on-site, typically using white boards or paper taped to the wall. While loosely structured, there are rules. All attendees are encouraged to present or facilitate a session. Everyone is also asked to share information and experiences of the event, both live and after the fact, via public web channels including (but not limited to) blogging, photo sharing, social bookmarking, wiki-ing, and IRC.

Anyone can initiate a BarCamp, using the BarCamp wiki. Attendance is monetarily free and generally restricted only by space constraints. Participants are asked, though, to sign up in advance. Venues typically provide basic services. Free network access, usually WiFi, is crucial. Following the model of Foo Camp, the venue also makes space for the attendees, a.k.a. BarCampers, to literally camp out overnight.

Thus, BarCamps rely on securing sponsorship, ranging from the venue and network access to beverages and food.

The origin of BarCamp meeting format are to be traced in the italian hackmeeting (first held in 1996 in Florence, running every year up to now). The hackmeeting was born as a spontaneous gathering of hackers to be held in different places across the peninsula once a year; the organization of the hackmeetings is kept completely horizontal and open to any contribution using an unmoderated mailinglist, while the event has been running without any funding and sponsors up to now. Notably, the italian hackmeeting was attended by Wau Holland in Milano 1999 and Richard Stallman in Bologna 2001.

The first event explicitly called BarCamp was held in Palo Alto, California, from August 19-21, 2005, in the offices of Socialtext. It was organized in less than a week's time, from concept to event, with 200 attendees. Since then, BarCamps have been held across North America, South America, Europe and Asia -- from Boston to Bangalore. To mark the one-year anniversary of BarCamp, BarCampEarth was held in multiple locations world wide on August 25-27, 2006.

See also

References

Further reading

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