Fri 19th & Sat 20th November 2010 – University of Nottingham
Address: Sir Colin Campbell Building, University of Nottingham Innovation Park,NG7 2TU.
9:30 Registration
10:00 Introduction and WhereCamp kick-off.
10:30 First sessions begin
17:00 Wrap-up and break for dinner.
CC-BY-SA Maps from OpenStreetMap
AGI is extremely pleased to be sponsoring this year’s WhereCampEU drinks and social evening.
Being a long-time organiser of geo-gatherings, we know that great socialising, relaxing and networking is a vital part of an event’s proceedings and the delegate’s enjoyment.
AGI is the UK membership body for all with an interest in geographic information and its associated technologies. We’ve been around for 21 years and have interests and members from all over, including public sector, third sector, academia and private industry. Although administered by a professional office, the AGI’s direction and policy is steered by members for the benefit of its members and the wider UK geocommunity.
We’re seeing a lot of great things happening in the world of geo and significant parts of this involve new and innovative individuals and companies entering the market. AGI is keen to help out and be relevant to new entrants and innovators, just as much as it has been to other parts of the UK geocommunity over the last two decades. We all have a lot to gain from each other, often sharing common interests, opportunities and even challenges. Sometimes, particularly when dealing with government, it can be effective to speak as one rather than many.
Most recently AGI ran the free W3G ‘unconference’ event alongside our annual AGI GeoCommunity conference with help from friends that have also played a part in WhereCampEU. It is now very welcome to have this opportunity to support WhereCampEU, to thank you all for booking to attending this “the geo unconference for Europe”, and to say “cheers, have a geo-beer on the AGI!”
With just two weeks to go, preparations for WhereCampUK in Nottingham are in full swing. We are delighted to say that ESRI UK have returned as sponsors, and will no doubt be running a few sessions like last time. There are a few remaining passes available here.
As one of the original sponsors of WhereCampEU, it is a real pleasure to have them back again. GeoVation’s mission is to help people jumpstart their geo infused plans and give them the support they need to make their ideas happen. It does this by running innovation challenges designed to encourage the use of geography in addressing specific needs.
The current challenge, ‘How Can we improve Transport in Britain’, is looking to you to transform how we all get from A-B, and has £150,000 in seed funding to help you do it. The challenge is open to anyone, using any geography, so get your thinking caps on! The cash comes from the Ideas in Transit project which in itself is funded by the Technology Strategy Board, the Department for Transport and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, with all the funds going to support the winning entrants.
In addition, Ordnance Survey is providing a £7,000 prize for the person that makes the most innovative use of OS OpenData, so there is a big incentive to get involved.
The Ideas in Transit project is a collaboration between the University of the West of England, Loughborough University, ITO World and Ordnance Survey. It seeks to apply “bottom-up” innovations to the transport challenges faced by individuals and society, such as congestion and the rising cost of fuel. So its support for the GeoVation Challenge is a perfect fit.
The GeoVation team will be at WhereCampUK to talk more about the challenge and how geography can make a difference to everyone’s lives. Chris Parker, one of the GeoVation organisers says: “Transport is something that has an obvious geographic foundation and I believe that we’re going to see ideas emerge that could improve our public services and could change how we travel. We need the support of WhereCampers and I’m exciting about what they could come up with.”
So if you fancy getting your hands on a slice of £150,000, the place to start is on the GeoVation website. From there all shortlisted entries will be invited to develop their ideas at a GeoVation Camp before going on to pitch head to head for funding at a “Dragons’ Den” style showcase next year. The challenge runs from 28 September–26 November.
After six long months of no WhereCampEU, I have just confirmed that we are back with WhereCampUK for November 19 & 20th in Nottingham.
WhereCamp Europe is an unconference; it’s open to everyone and you drive the agenda and the sessions. March 2010 saw the first WhereCampEU take place in London, with 180 attendees over two days from diverse backgrounds, including public, commercial and third sectors. It’s what you make it, so come along, listen, contribute and speak. See some of WhereCampEU in action: http://www.flickr.com/groups/1442338@N21/pool/
WhereCamp Europe is open to everyone; from über hacker to beginner, from geo-hobo to seasoned professional, from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0, and from mobile. If you have an interest in geography and how it’s changing the way in which we interact with the world then you should come along.
Seems like people enjoyed the unconference format of WhereCamp.EU:
“This sort of system would bring many academics out into a cold sweat as there is no formal way of ensuring quality presentations and sessions. I didn’t attend a single bad session though” - James Cheshire
“The voice of the individual often drowned out by corporate messaging at traditional conferences is prominent at events likes wherecamp EU, and it is a real step forward to see such events taking their place alongside more traditional industry shows now in Europe” – Ed Parsons
“My geobatteries were recharged at the end of the day and it prompted several thoughts about the conventional approach to running a conference” – Steven Feldman
“…really well organised, with great venues and food, and all that at zero cost thanks to very generous sponsors and a great bunch of volunteers!” – Patrick Weber
Thanks for all the great feedback on the tweets and blogs. If you are blogging about WhereCamp.EU, there’s a section at the bottom of the wiki page to list yourself.
We had another hugely successful day of geounconferencing yesterday at the Guardian offices, thanks mainly to you and your enthusiastic participation. There was even a surprising amount of enthusiasm for continuing the event in the pub afterwards!
So that makes two action-packed days of spatially-location-based-maptastic sessions:
We hope you found inspirational educational conversational value in the sessions you picked to attend (or the ones you ran!), but what about all the ones you missed? Let’s use the wiki to write up some descriptions of each of the sessions including contact details for the presenters, and links to any slides and other related resources. Dive in there and create the pages (green links are empty pages) Obviously if you ran the session, this a great way to provide more information. But its a wiki! Feel free to kick off some description even if you weren’t running a session. We can add to it later:
Wow that’s a lot of sessions! (took me over an hour just type all the session titles)
In addition to that there will of course be some continuing chatter on twitter (#wherecampeu) and tagged photos on flickr, slides on slideshare, etc Tag your stuff with ‘wherecampeu’!
Despite the raucous geo-beer session last night….
Day 2 of Where Camp EU is in full swing, hosted by our generous sponsors the Guardian in their plush offices in Kings Cross.
What a fantastic day! The WallaceSpace venue was just right for an unconference event, and all you geo-people did us proud by presenting, discussing, networking, questioning, debating, and generally participating, just like we knew you would.
So much to digest and report back on! Please tag your photos, videos, etc with ‘wherecampeu’ and tweet with #wherecampeu.
The geo-fun continues tonight with geo-beers at Smithys from 7p.m. (smithyslondon.com, map )