FLEXible

Last weekend I participated in the first MobileCamp in Germany. Following the principles of a user-generated conference (known as BarCamp) the event dealt with questions around technical trends in the “Mobile Age”.

As it was my first BarCamp I had to get used to some unofficial rules:

1. You do talk about BarCamp.
2. You do blog about BarCamp.
3. If you want to present, you must write your topic and name in a presentation slot.
4. Only three word intros.
5. As many presentations at a time as facilities allow for.
6. No pre-scheduled presentations, no tourists.
7. Presentations will go on as long as they have to or until they run into another presentation slot.
8. If this is your first time at BarCamp, you HAVE to present. (Ok, you don’t really HAVE to, but try to find someone to present with, or at least ask questions and be an interactive participant.)

The two-day event started with a general introduction round. Every participant (out of approx. 230) introduced himself with name and 3 tags to describe his interests. After that the sessions were planned. Everyone was allowed to announce a session, whereas all participants decided if the session should be hold or not. Mobile marketing and advertisement, mobile applications and widgets, mobile communities and services, as well as iPhone and Android development were the most discussed topics among others.

I participated in a lot of interesting sessions, e.g. a discussion about mobile communities led by Willi Schroll, who is dealing with the mobile social semantic (moss) web or a session by Simon Tennant & Matthias Sauer, who introduced the location-based social network buddycloud, where places are seen as a sum of location, meaning and intention.