Ben Balbo

I’ve just realised I haven’t written anything here for almost 3 months, and yet I don’t feel I’ve been out of touch or not been updating “followers” with my activities and news. The number of phone calls and emails I’ve made hasn’t increased dramatically, so what’s happened?

Could it be that more frequent microblogs on Identica and Twitter are to blame for the drop in frequency on this site? Or was it just a busy time of year? I’m not sure.

So what’s been happening with me in the last three months? Sandrine and I moved house for the third (and final?) time in one year, and are now finally living in Portarlington on the Belarine Peninsula, 8 minutes from the beach. I still live and work in Melbourne, but I also get a holiday every weekend now!

Sandrine and I also went to Strathbogie; as some of you know, we used to own a bush block up there. We helped them develop a requirements document for a new community web site and portal, and after a few teething issues, they finally went live in November. The Strathbogie Tableland web site describes itself as a new way for residents and landholders to stay in touch and communicate with each other, and has really taken off with residents and others alike. Their community message board is possibly the most used area of the site.

In other news, I went to both RUXCON and the 5th Open Source Developers’ Conference, presenting at the latter on mobile streaming solutions for the open source community.

I’ve also been trying to fit in work on a new community driven web site that I started in October, but have had little time to spend on lately. Hopefully I’ll have more about that soon. Then, of course, there’s the work on the next BarCampMelbourne, which will actually be a StixCamp - more on that in a soon-to-follow post.

I think that’s about it. Of course there have been other things, but perhaps to minor to mention. You could always follow me on Identica or Twitter to hear the day-to-day stuff. If you like. No pressure!

The event was brilliant. I loved it. Everyone says they got a lot out of it. The after party drinks were definitely needed, and tasted so much better for being on Microsoft’s tab. I sat down on Sunday afternoon after getting up at 1pm, had a coffee and reflected on the day. It truly was awesome. Lots of organised unorganisation paid off. It worked. The first successful BarCampMelbourne that actually took place in Melbourne!

The best part is that now the ball’s rolling, quite a few people have put their hands up to help unorganise the next one, so I won’t be on my own this time

Not that I was completely alone - I had a few people point me in the right direction occasionally, keeping me going. But the next will be much easier, and I might actually get to listen to some of the talks!

So, almost two weeks later, I’ve gotten round to rejigging the BarCampMelbourne web site and adding a news section, complete with a press release summarising BarCampMelbourne2008. Check it out, and feel free to distribute or republish verbatim…

The new year typically spawns lots of “Best of …” and “What happened in …” articles and blog posts. It’s a time of year to reflect on the past 12 months. It’s time to look at the highlights, sometimes the lowlights, and hopefully lock a few of those nuggets away for future use.

What I wasn’t expecting while rapidly devouring the 1000+ items in my RSS reader was one post that contained my name accrediting the initiation of a number of Australian BarCamps to me.

Now before you accuse me of blowing my own trumpet, I write this not because I want you to bow before me, rather because I wanted to share how that made me feel. It was great! By simply including that one paragraph in her post, Janet spurred me to get of my Christmas pudding and get BarCamp Melbourne 2008 back on track.

The truth is 2007 was a busy year for me. Most years are - I’m the type of person that can’t say no. After having co-authored a book, organised BarCamp Melbourne 1.0, bought and moved in to a new house, changed jobs* and possibly more that I can’t remember (now you can accuse me of blowing my own trumpet!), I was seriously considering postponing, or get someone to take over the organisation for, BarCampMelbourne 2.0.

* Truth be told, the job change was more of a relief than a burden. It’s great to leave a company that wants you to feel lucky for working in a chaotic environment under bad management with an internal IT department that has an agenda so huge you could swear it’s trying to bring the company down from the inside - a sad end to what once was, debatably, one of the best places in Melbourne to score a job!

So, the good news is that my flame has been relit. In order to make my life at least that little bit easier, BarCampMelbourne 2.0 will be a one day event so I have more venues to choose from. It has also tentatively been brought forward one week.

Thanks Janet! Apologies for the post title…

I promised some extra news in my last post about the PHP Anthology, Second Edition. Well, it’s been out for about 5 days now, and I’d like to give you the opportunity to get your hands on a shiny new copy.

I’m giving a tutorial this Thursday on “PHP Image Manipulation with GD” at the Melbourne PHP Users Group meeting. Drag yourself along to hear about this, plus Ben Cornwell’s talk on “PHP 6: What’s In, What’s Out & Why”. The best question, most thought provoking comment, or other arbitrarily chosen contribution of the evening will be the proud new owner of one of the first copies in Australia!

If you’re not able to make it, or aren’t the lucky winner, you can get your hands on your own copy of the PHP Anthology, Second Edition, for as little as $29.95 for the PDF version. That price is probably in US Dollars…