ThrivePDX: Meh

November 11, 2008 by 12 Comments

Tonight I attended ThrivePDX which was billed as a gathering to bring together diverse parts of the tech community. It was a joint event coordinated by some of the more independent Portland tech minds including Dawn Foster and Rick Turoczy in conjunction with the Software Association of Oregon (SAO). I had another blog post that was 6 paragraphs and starting to turn into a rambling rant. Instead I simply ask these questions:

  • Why were there two RSVP systems?
  • Why do I not see the SAO represented at any of the local events that have the momentum over the last couple of years (Ignite, Beer and Blog, WordCamp, etc)?
  • Conversely, are there cool SAO events that I just don’t know about? Are there sources for this information I should be following?
  • Why is the SAO’s social network a walled garden?
  • Why are folks suggesting yet another committee/organization/board of directors? Is there something wrong with the leadership of the SAO and Legion of Tech, which are established groups that both seem to be working for the benefit of the tech community?

I understand that organizers are asking about what to do for the next event. In addition to trying to find the answers to the questions above, I offer up these thoughts:

  • Bigger venue.
  • If it’s going to be at mealtime, more affordable food/drinks. Call me cheap, but $9 appetizers and $6 pints turn me off.
  • Organization or agenda. Preferably published. From talking to various folks, even the event planners weren’t entirely on the same page as to what was (or was not) going to happen.

Overall: meh. Too crowded. Too many formal/bureaucratic things being proposed. I don’t fully understand the problem. Can’t wait to hear what others have to say.

[tags]thrivepdx, sao, portland, tech, events[/tags]

Filed Under: Events, Portland/Vancouver, Technology ·
  • http://twitter.com/stevenwalling Steven Walling

    Aaron, I think everything you said above is perfectly reasonable, and dead on in places. But the last bullet didn’t seem fair to me.

    This was the very first event of this kind, and to that end, it was largely experimental. Throw all these diverse people in a room and see what happens.

    Yes, next time a more precise format/agenda might be nice. But this time around, it was exactly what we needed (in my opinion).

  • http://chuffle.com Aaron

    Ditto on the operationals, Kells is fine and all, but spendy. The format was whack, the place was too loud for conversation, and did that slide show ever actually do anything?

    The talk I was hearing was essentially “We want to form a union”, which is something I can see the appeal – but don’t particularly want a part – of. Tech union stuff hasn’t ever really worked out right where I’ve seen it (notably trying to hook it into the telecom workers union in CA).

  • http://siliconflorist.com Rick Turoczy

    As always, I appreciate your taking the time to highlight the areas for improvement. This may come as a shock, but I often get far too Pollyanna about this stuff.

    I didn’t expect the more formal “speech and testify” portion of the event to occur, but I think they just went with the vibe. I can’t fault them for that. At that point, I just had to shrug and get all utilitarian. Not my cup of tea, but it was clearly working for a large part of the group.

    Someday, I hope “ThrivePDX: The Lost Chapters” surfaces so we can see what you had composed. ;)

  • http://reidab.com Reid Beels

    The (non-SAO) tech community has been a shining example of how well distributed ad-hoc organization can work. I found the talk of “building” a community with “strong central leadership” rather off-putting. I’m not sure why we need _more_ events, instead of perhaps just more SAO participation in the existing community.

  • http://siliconflorist.com Rick Turoczy

    @Reid Absolutely agree, but I also think we’re in very much a “they don’t what they don’t know” situation.

    As much noise as we try to make about what we’re doing, some folks have absolutely no idea how vibrant the non-SAO tech community is.

    So when they say “Why don’t we do this?” we say, “You mean like we’re already doing?”

    So yes, not more events but rather more diverse participation at existing events. I think that’s something in which we all have an interest.

    That’s part of my inspiration for trying to bridge this gap. I think all of the pieces are already here. (And obviously I’m biased to the work that the non-SAO community has already done.)

  • http://jeffthegreat.blogspot.com Jmartens

    Wait, you mean to tell me that the SAO has leadership…and events?

    I kid, I kid.

    I didn’t attend, partly because when I read the initial description of the event I didn’t see what the point was.

    It was billed as a way to bring together the old, traditional technology companies with the young, independent, 2.0-ish community.

    Do these communities want/need to be brought together?

    I don’t know the answer, honestly…I’m just say’n.

  • http://www.technoearthmama.com Kathleen McDade

    I didn’t attend Thrive — but I’m intrigued by the conversation about it, because it seems a lot like what’s discussed in this blog post I read recently.

    Aaron, I think your point about SAO showing up at “existing community” events AND allowing the “existing community” access to SAO events (if any) is a good one. But it would really have to go both ways in order to bridge the two groups.

    Finally, I agree that additional centralized leadership is probably not needed. However, people who are coming from the corporate mindset may have hard time seeing that. I worked with a volunteer team in the Girl Scout organization that honestly didn’t have a single leader or even a leadership team. When we started talking to the council executives, they totally couldn’t understand that. It was beyond their comprehension. The funny thing is that it was the Girl Scout program (which most of us had grown up in) that had taught us to ALL be leaders, and to work together!

  • Dan Blaker

    Most SAO events show up on calagator.org, and of course they’re on SAO’s homepage.

  • http://www.chuffle.com Aaron (the other one

    @Jmartens I don’t see why the communities shouldn’t be brought together, and I think it’s cross beneficial to do so. What I don’t quite see is why we would want to suddenly crystallize what is a very fluid (and therefore adaptive) non-SAO community into a board with a leader and this and that.

    Also, between Lunch 2.0, Tweetup breakfasts, Beer and Blog, Ignite, etc, the calendar is pretty frickin’ packed as regards the “more meetings” that were called for a couple times in the “shout your ideas out randomly” phase of that… whatever that was.

  • http://fastwonderblog.com Dawn Foster

    I think we should keep the remarks about forming a board with a leader for this event in perspective. It was a single suggestion from a person at the event. As an organizer, I think it is completely unnecessary and not something I think we want to do. We already have groups in place to handle this type of thing – we don’t need another one.

    What we are trying to accomplish with Thrive is to further unify the Portland tech community. We want to get people who don’t usually come together at events to come to ThrivePDX. Ultimately, we want companies in Portland working together, hiring each other, and making the Portland economy stronger. I’d like to see Portland companies working together with local independents and freelancers.

    Too many people are facing tough times, the economy sucks, and some cool local companies have cut jobs. We’re trying to make the community stronger in any way we can. Please try to keep this in mind when considering future ThrivePDX events.

  • http://www.technoearthmama.com Kathleen McDade

    Well, since my comment is gone…I don’t think I can re-create it now. But my main point was that although I did not attend Thrive, I am seeing a huge parallel between the post-Thrive conversation and this blog post that I read recently. Found that interesting.

  • http://twitter.com/wajiii Bill Jackson III

    Okay, I’ll take the bait; you’re so cheap, Aaron! ;)

    Seriously though, some good comments but maybe overanalyzing it just a little. I don’t know, I wasn’t there. Let’s just get more people @beerandblog (though it was already uber-packed last week) and call it good!