#btconf – the aftermath

Der nachfolgende Post ist in englisch. Aus Gründen.

Have been to my first conference ever [1] and it was great! Basically, that says it all. You can stop reading now.

I’m in the web business for 15 years now. This means I own spam that might be older than you. But I’ve never been to a conference before. Going part-time self-employed this year I decided it was time to change this and along with this decision came beyond tellerrand. I not only grabbed the very last very early bird ticket but also a seat in one of the workshops, although I wasn’t sure if it’s a good idea to attend a completely english-spoken workshop and conference. Looking back I can say it was a very good decision.

So my beyond tellerrand adventure started with Seb Lee-Delisle’s workshop on Creative JS and HTML5. Not long ago Javascript had been demonized mostly because of security issues in Internet Explorer. Turns out it was an ugly duckling. It is fascinating to see where it is today and what can be done solely with Javascript in the browser. CreativeJS.com is a good starting point to check out.
Speaking of ducks I didn’t expect to get roasted duck served for lunch. But it was a dish that matched the time-honored location and a great workshop perfectly. Seb is not only a great teacher but also has a lot of other fascinating projects running. I love his large projections as much as I love Kronach leuchtet. Would be really great to see him perform there one day.

So being in town already I decided to go for the smashing meetup in the evening. Finally putting faces to twitter names (e.g. Sandra and Eric). Meeting new fascinating people like Maik or Christian, who are definitely worth a follow. Having great talks with people from all over the world.

Starting the next day at 10am is brilliant. Honestly. And the Capitol is an awesome location! I will only cover some personal highlights, if you are interested in a more in-depth view check here for day one and here for day two or wait for the videos that should pop up on Vimeo shortly.

Chris Heilmann presented lots of interesting stuff from Mozilla, including Tilt, a plugin that gives you a 3D visualization of any webpage, and BrowserID, which finally might become the sign in mechanism OpenID never became.
Seb Lee-Delisle is extremly entertaining when he is on stage and he has incredible live coding skills. What I took from Aaron Gustafson’s talk was that I have to dig deeper into progressive enhancement. Or just stop stacking books on this subject on my desk and start reading.

Also prices for drinks and pretzels had been very reasonable throughout the conference, the free (as in free beer) beer at the party was highly appreciated. Had another evening with interesting talks.

Loved the talks by Jake Archibald and Jon Tan on day two. Jake is really entertaining, or to quote Sandra on this:

If the internet got shut down for good, @jaffathecake could easily make a fortune in stand up comedy. 😀 #btconf

Jon on web fonts covered a topic that I started experimenting with on Frænkisch a while ago, used it on a business project for the first time this year and will push it even further on a project that’s in the pipeline already.

But when I have to name my favorite talk I will definitely vote for Simon Collison. Speaking of web development as a craft, he addressed so much how I think and feel about the industry we’re in. You should check out his slides.

So this was my first conference but for sure not my last one. It’s great to meet so many people who not only love what they do but are passionate about it. This includes the speakers, the people attending and this of course includes Marc Thiele and his team.

beyond tellerrand 2011

[1] Honestly, it wasn’t my first conference. But I decided to start over. Maybe I write about the reasons one day. Maybe not.

I'm a Web Developer based in Mainz/Germany, working for WIBROS as Lead Developer. I love the Internet, Baseball, Softball, beer and the color orange. I used to drink too much coffee.

Comments (7) Write a comment

  1. Thanks, Matthias, glad you liked the talk, and the event. It was a special conference for sure. I have a feeling I’ll definitely be back at some point. Marc did an amazing job, and it was such a good bunch of people to hang around and speak in front of. Maybe see you there next year!

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  2. Matthias, thanks for the roundup which mirrors my impressions. Maybe we are twins seperated at birth? I’m “in the industry” for 15 yrs as well AND this was my first conference, too 😀 Plus, among all the great talks (and I mean each and everyone, all resonated with me and every subject contributed to my already spinning brain), Simon Collison’s was the one that really got to me, b/c, like you, I feel that “craftsman”pride thing is important. And a good thing, often times forgotten for the sake of getting by.
    ~ Tom

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