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What do you do in your day job?
I’ve been getting paid to build websites for around 10 years now, the last 6 of which I’ve been self employed running a small development firm. The first was in London which I exited when we’d had enough of the smoke and my new venture is just over 2 years old, based in the same village as our home on the Worcs/Glos borders.
I’m still trying to strike the right balance between being a manager and developer and I’m not convinced I’ve got it nailed just yet. One thing I am clear on though is that I am much happier keeping the business lean. In London we were a team of 8 full-time and with Siftware it’s just 3, but I’m probably more profitable and I’m certainly a lot more relaxed (though it doesn’t feel like it sometimes).
My skills are quite broad and in addition to the lots of different hats one needs to wear as a small business owner my strongest skills are PHP/MySQL (Symfony ideally), JavaScript and Linux administration. My XHTML/CSS is probably above average though I normally leave the joy of debugging IE6 problems to others.
What do you outside of work, in your 10% time, or when you boss isn’t looking?
Well I’ve 5yr old twins and a 6 month old baby so there’s not much time left over. I’ve definitely jumped on the veg growing bandwagon with this being my first full-on season and I’m really happy with the results so far. I am also about to start a course in carpentry as I feel the need to build something from physical materials for a change. I’m an improving windsurfer and I try to get at least one decent hike in per year.
Why are you attending BathCamp?
The west has one of the most vibrant digital scenes in the UK and every time I go along to a meet-up, whether it’s some informal Underscore geeky beerage, a Skillswap or other industry related event I come away feeling inspired and normally with some new ideas. That and a chance to meet more of the people I’ve encountered on Underscore or Twitter makes it a no-brainer for me and if that’s not enough, a fiver seemed a cheap way to get a new T-shirt.
What are you passionate about?
First and foremost I am determined to see my kids grow up. I am also looking at options that will allow me to be personally involved in producing a percentage of my family’s food every year and we’re (slowly) becoming more in-tune with what food is naturally and locally available in a given season. I also feel strongly that people should return to living within their means and save a percentage of their income for unforeseen circumstances rather than spending every penny on shite that they don’t really need (though I can sometimes be as guilty as the next person when it comes to shiny things with flashing lights)
My wife Cathie and I also have a business idea that we’re working on in our ’spare spare’ time that we’re both extremely excited about, though it’s too early to discuss openly yet.
What would you fill a bath with, and why?
Prosaic as it might be, I’d fill it with hot water. Then, with a large malt and a good novel, I’d lock the door and retire to it for an hour warning the small people in my house that they’d better not interrupt me, or else.
1. What do you do in your day job?
I’m a freelance web monkey /or/ Technical Director of Olivewood, a web apps company based in Bristol (depending on who’s asking). I do front end development right through to back-end code (of various types) and databases.
I first got involved with the internet in 1998 when a friend told me the best way to get a job (I was actually looking for something in conservation, as I have a background in Environmental Science), was to stick my CV on the web. I bought a modem and a copy of “HTML for dummies” and had my first website up 24 hours later, despite having never used the internet before.
That coincided with the dot com boom, and there was a huge demand for web people, so it was only a few months later that I landed a contract as a professional web designer at BT, followed by several years of sweating it out at web agencies before going freelance last year. I’m happy I can make a living out of it, but I know I would still be building websites and web apps for fun if I did something else for a living.
2. What do you outside of work, in your 10% time, or when you boss isn’t looking?
Family stuff and skateboarding mainly – I don’t get much free time though, particularly during this first year of freelance/ running a company. If I did have more spare time i’d probably start a band again – something I spent a fair amount of time doing before jobs, houses and fatherhood! Actually i’m kind of over the band thing – it’s only after a few glasses of wine that I start to feel the need to jump on stage, whereas it used to be an obsession!
3. Why are you attending BathCamp?
Because i’m a geek and I really want to go as I had to pull out of the Bristol BarCamp last year at the last minute. I always have a surplus of ideas going on and i’d like some time to try stuff out and discuss it with other digital people. I’m hoping it will be like some kind of therapy where I can talk nothing but utter geek and not have peoples eyes glaze over!
4. What are you passionate about?
Family, skateboarding, web geekery, traveling, the outdoors (in moderation) – or preferably a combination of all those. Maybe involving a winnebago.
5. What would you fill a bath with, and why?
Pasta and pesto. I could probably eat a whole bath full of that. If not my 4-year old son would help out – he’s inherited a love of pasta and pesto from me.
1. What do you do in your day job?
I help people figure out what web 2.0 is all about and how it (especially the social aspect) affects them. Once it’s figured out I help them implement web tools and marketing approaches to help them either be more productive in the work place, or help them engage with their audience in this shiny new world of social media.
I do this sort of stuff mainly for Government, Museums and Galleries, and other non-profit style organisations.
When I’m not doing that, I make WordPress websites for people (I’m a designer by trade). I make websites (mainly – but not exclusively – blogs) that have engagement and conversation at their core. And I do this sort of stuff for campaigners and charities and the like.
2. What do you do outside of work, in your 10% time, or when your boss isn’t looking?
I find it very difficult to step away from the internets so when I’m not talking about social media to clients I’m often partaking in it via Twitter, Plurk, Flickr, Last.fm, Facebook…
When I do actually close Firefox, I’m quite partial to producing the odd (musical) mash-up and I sometimes pen my own loops-based tunes too.
And I like seeing live music, exhibitions, going to bars that have rope slides and going ‘ahhh, eeeh’ at Airshows.
3. Why are you attending BathCamp?
I’ve been to a few barcamps (and barcamp style events) and they are always inspiring, creative and lots of fun.
I’ve got a background in museums and galleries and I know there will be some other museum geeks around to learn from and share ideas with. I’m especially looking forward to that.
And it’s in Bath and that is a lovely lovely city.
4. What are you passionate about?
I get annoyed when things are badly designed and don’t need to be. That applies to anything – web interfaces, kitchen equipment, road signs, architecture…
Which means I get a little too excited when things are designed well (especially architectural spaces). Computer interfaces should be designed so well they are invisible, architectural spaces should be designed so well you notice them.
5. What would you fill a bath with, and why?
Puppies! Oh my goodness, imagine that!
About Jenny
Jenny’s personal site lives at www.jennybee.net and she can be found elsewhere on the internets at linkedin.com/in/jennybee and twitter.com/jennybee.
When we opened the registrations for Bathcamp, we needed a logo, and quick. Luckily there’s a standard Barcamp logo, which is available as a vector file, so I knocked up a version in a couple of fetching shades of blue:
All well and good, but fast forward a few weeks, and we started to feel that it wouldn’t exactly stand out in the BarCamp logo gallery. So, in a neat bit of team work, Stephen Pope, Mike Ellis and me, collaborated on this new logo, which oh-so-wittily incorporates an old-fashioned bath:
In the spirit of the event, you can also download this logo as an SVG vector file, for creative re-use! (Feel free to paint it on your laptop or tattoo it on your forehead for the event).
Having designed the logo, we also started thinking about taking the bath joke a bit further. With that in mind, we’re going to bring an actual bath to the event. We’re not sure exactly what we’re going to fill it with yet – although we’re asking attendees for their ideas – but we’re thinking that a bathload of beer would be fun.
1. What do you do in your day job?
At the moment I am working for a start-up in Bristol called Beanbag. As to what I do its a bit hard to describe as there is no job title or job description – basically if its not coding or design I’m involved to some extent. So far that has mainly meant doing some blogging, writing/rewriting some copy, trying to get a bit of publicity from other more impressive blogs and doing a bit of customer service. Its all good fun and interesting to be in on something at the start.
2. What do you outside of work, in your 10% time, or when you boss isn’t looking?
Depends on the sporting season to be honest! During the winter between helping out with a local football club, watching a few Bristol Rovers games, getting stressed out every time England take the field during the Six Nations and Sunday afternoons watching Bristol play the dullest rugby known to man there isn’t much time left. The summer is mainly just recovery time!
In my 10% and other free time I’ve got quite an interest in the idea of using the social web to enhance events and have written a bit about that and put it into practice once or twice. I also try to occasionally update my personal blog.
3. Why are you attending BathCamp?
Because it only 20 minutes away on the train – is that a suitable answer? I like the freedom that unconferences allow you and the opportunity to learn something completely unexpected and interesting. I also enjoy the occasional opportunity to have a beer and a chat with people who actually understand what I’m talking about when I speak about my job!
4. What are you passionate about?
Increasingly my passion seems to have settled on education in particular the idea of literacy. Whether that is traditional literacy, information literacy or media literacy changes like the Bristol weather but its that concept of comprehension – people (mainly young people) being able to do more than just go through the motions with something but to really understand what they are reading (whether its a book, newspaper or webpage) or watching and make their own judgments on its worth. I think thats really important as we are bombarded with more and more information sources.
5. What would you fill a bath with, and why?
Butcombe Gold… any explanation would seem unnecessary!
1. What do you do in your day job?
I’m a freelance writer, mostly about computers and internets. I fell into it. I started life as a trainee reporter on the Cambridge Evening News in the early 1990s. Normal trainee reporter stuff – cats stuck up trees, car crash on the A14, body found in the Cam in the early hours of the morning, phoning Jeffrey Archer for comment on scandals, to which his answer was always “No comment,” and you can see why really – but the big thing that happened was that CB1 opened just down the road from my house.
CB1 was the first cybercafe in the UK outside of London, and after writing an article about it I started going there quite frequently. I taught myself how to use internets while they were still very young. The machines were a mixture of Macs and NeXT boxes. God knows what the software was, I can’t remember.
A couple of years later and a journo friend called from her job in London. “You know about the internet, don’t you?” she asked. Well, sort of, yeah. “Well we need an internet correspondent. Fancy a job?” And that was that. After a few years of London I got sick of it and went freelance. Shortly after that we moved to Bradford on Avon.
2. What do you do outside of work, in your 10% time, or when your boss isn’t looking?
I have a five-year-old. That should be answer enough.
But if I’m honest, I do get time to myself. On Thursday nights I go singing, and after singing we singers go to the pub where the landlord glares at us if we show any signs of singing some more. If I have a free day with no five-year-old and no work (all you fellow freelancers will know about those days), I like to take my camera out for a walk.
3. Why are you attending BathCamp?
Same reason as everyone else. I didn’t get invited to FooCamp. Also, because I think it’s good for my sanity, my career and my sense of well-being if I go to local geek events. I get on with geeks, even though I lack the expertise that a Computer Science degree or a career in programming would have given me.
4. What are you passionate about?
Passions change over the years, don’t they? Stuff I used to get all hot and bothered about doesn’t trouble me as much as it did. These days I’m growing interested in two strands of environmentalism that I label “waste” and “simplicity”. They’re linked, of course. I’m interested in minimising waste, and in all aspects of everything that make life simpler. Other things that start me swearing include: the poor quality of daily newspaper journalism these days; the poor quality of most TV; the poor quality of food offered by most supermarkets. I’m nearly middle-aged, can you tell?
5. What would you fill a bath with, and why?
A cloned copy of myself, who could do the childcare when I need to get on with some deadline-specific work.
About Giles
Giles’ online presence can be felt at http://gilest.org/.
The BarCamp idea is a great one: turn the normal conference format on its head by inviting (nay, pretty much requiring) contributions from everyone who attends the event.
Now, to those people (not unlike yours truly) who love the sound of their own voice, this is like being invited into a sweet shop with unlimited small change to spend. To other more retiring souls, I imagine the concept is a little more daunting.
A BarCamp contribution doesn’t need to be a formal presentation, and doesn’t need slides (though you’re welcome to use them if it makes sense). The picture accompanying this post is of a guy called Adam Armfield. Adam came to BarCamp Bristol last year and did a talk on growing vegetables; not your everyday geek topic but it went down well, not least because Adam brought seeds along to give out to people and spoke about a subject he knew well, but was still learning.
Over the next few days we’ll be posting short interviews with some of the people who’ve already signed up for BathCamp, to raise the event from a slightly abstract concept to something involving real people with interesting things to contribute. If you haven’t subscribed to the RSS feed, doing so will enable you to be informed when new stuff gets published here on the BathCamp blog.
BathCamp is now just over two months away (registrations are open). If you can’t wait that long though, you may be interested in other BarCamps coming up over the summer, which range in topic and in location. Attending other BarCamps is a great way to get a feel for the format, and to give you some ideas for things you might like to talk about at BathCamp.
On Saturday 5th July there’s a BarCampBank in London, focusing on innovation in the financial services sector. Good to see that the format has no bounds! (I love the piggy bank in the logo too.)
On Saturday 1st August it’s BarCamp2, the BarCamp in Cambridge. It’s hosted at the Wellcome Trust Genome Campus and the topic is the ‘interface between science and technology’ – should be interesting that.
On Saturday 6th September (a week before BathCamp), it’s the 3rd annual BarCamp Brighton, which is returning to the University of Sussex. Also on this date is PhotoCampLeeds, the UK’s ‘first photographic-focussed BarCamp’ – perfect for Flickr lovers.
Plus of course there are BarCamps around the world, if you can afford the flights (and the environmental guilt). See BarCamp.org for the full list.
