After this year’s dev up conference in St Louis, MO I wanted to write my notes and thoughts here on my blog instead of just keeping them to myself (like I usually do).
Sharing with the rest of the developer community … that’s in keeping with many of the speaker’s messages from the conference too when I really stop to think about it. So hey, maybe I’m growing and branching out already!
The theme of this year’s conference was inspired by the movie Ready Player One with our conference theme being titled Ready Dev One.
The folks from ArchitectNow, some of my very favorite people in our local community of nerds, created a game that was well … just pretty friggin’ awesome. They actually built a text-based game totally in a throwback to the 80’s games that some of us …. um, more seasoned … folks grew up with.
The response to it was more than I think even they anticipated. To say the game was popular among conference-goers would be a major understatement. Players stayed up all night pitting their skills against Zork and Zork 2 games which were embedded into the Ready Player One scenarios that ArchitectNow came up with. They had so many layers of creative play baked into this it was just crazy!
As a child of the 80’s I was blown away by the folks at ArchitectNow’s commitment to both their craft and to our conference. Hats off to those folks!’
For experiences like what ArchitectNow gave us and so many others, dev up is always so valuable. This year did not disappoint.
I was fortunate enough to reconnect with many friends that I don’t often see but always manage to catch up with at dev up. It’s one reason I buy a ticket every year, use vacation time and go. It’s my time to invest in myself in a very unique and positive way. It recharges my nerd-batteries to maximum capacity.
Going to a conference should be about being inspired, reconnecting with friends, reminding yourself you’re part of a larger community and networking with new friends.
It’s why I go. It’s why you should too.
If you didn’t go this year, what did you miss? Well here is what you didn’t miss. (and you shouldn’t expect this from a conference experience)
- You didn’t miss sessions on “how to program”
- You didn’t miss any sessions on “how to fix your biggest problem in your code right now”
- You didn’t miss any sessions on “how to master Angular or React in one hour flat”
Here is what you DID miss.
- You missed the chance to see what other developers are doing and talk to them about it.
- You missed the chance to connect with industry leaders who travel the WORLD giving these talks but still have time to talk to YOU.
- You missed the chance to make new friends or re-connect with someone you may have worked with years ago.
- You missed the chance to maybe .. yes .. hear about a better job opportunity.
- And last but not least, you missed the chance to win amazing prizes by competing in an online gaming competition.
Gosh, Rob, that sounds awesome. What did that cost you? Well, I’m glad you asked. I bought my ticket during the early-bird sale and paid less than $300 for the whole shin-dig. Took two vacation days.
For that paltry sum, I got all the above. Totally worth it.
If you’ve ever wanted to go to dev up but have never been, just put it in your calendar .. right now .. for next year. Sign up for the mailing list so you can get the early-bird notification.
It’s totally worth it.
I personally learned a ton and will be sharing it right here.
Over the next few days/weeks, my blog is gonna get caught up on some content. I’ve got about 6 pages of notes taken and 2 hours of voice-recorded notes. I’m going through all that to create content for this site … hopefully, helpful content … stuff to share back with the community about what I learned, who I connected with, and who impacted me most at the conference and why.
I’ve been inspired by these folks for years. It’s high time I started sharing what I’ve learned from them, in my own unique way, in the hopes that I can perhaps inspire someone too.
“If you wait until you can do everything for everybody, instead of something for somebody, you’ll end up not doing nothing for nobody.” ~ Malcom Bane