One of the StarCamp heroes was Stefano Rivera, who set up and ran the video capture of the presentations from StarCamp.  He has encoded the 12 presentations captured from the two days of StarCamp and they're now now available from archive.org.

I haven't watched the videos yet, but the best picks from memory will probably be:

• David Robinson's presentation on some on some of the deficiencies (as well as mitigating factors and benefits) of eVoting.  How cool to have one of the foremost experts in the world talking about a topic, and Associate Director of the Center for Information Technology Policy at Princeton University to boot;
• Phil Barrett's presentation on User Experience - even though Phil's based here now, he also brought years of international experience at the forefront of his domain to our humble get-together

The first Africa Source was in Namibia in early 2004.  The second was in early 2006.  Both experiences really got me excited about open source all over again, and introduced me to people I remain in contact with today.

I guess the regular fix has created an expectation.  After becoming a bit jaded about the state of progress in open source (with a few exceptions, of course) in the country, it seems I need a pick-me-up of the sort of Africa Source.  (The only primarily-open source related event on my calendar in 2007 was UWC's Digital Freedom Exposition, which didn't evoke much excitement from me.  But there was also the iCommons Bring and Braai, which did.)

GeekDinner has been filling some of the gap, and StarCamp helped a little more.  One thing the Source events did was teach me that the surest way to make something happen is to make it happen - do something about it.  So, after StarCamp, I've been thinking of a few events for the coming two years.  Some are probably more likely than others, of course.

Most likely is StarCamp in July-or-so 2008 in Cape Town.  The group that attended StarCamp in December seemed to really enjoy it, and just coming together again for a day or two again will be worth it.  But I think it'll be bigger and better next time round, and I'll be starting preparations for it soon.

Next up is a South African web technology conference.  I want to get the guys who make IOL, Mail and Guardian (including Amatomu), CareerJunction, KnowledgeTree, SynthaSite, Tank, Afrigator, and more together in a room for one to three days (they can leave the room for a few hours to sleep, if they're good).  I want to see them sharing lessons learned and ideas and generally improving the state of the art in the country.  Oh, and there's obviousy the chance and hope that we'll have people from outside SA coming down to attend.

And then there's the possibility of getting international speakers on technologies to come for the conference,  give some public talks in collaboration with GeekDinner, and hopefully to give training before or after the conference.

Although I might not be there, I'm very interested in helping anyone wanting to try replicate the GeekDinner and StarCamp formula to other regions in Africa.  I'll probably be speaking about how to replicate the success we've had with these and transmit some lessons we've learned at a conference in Dakar next month, so there may actually be a good chance... 

The farthest out there is another national, regional, or continent-wide Source event like Africa Source.  Certainly the geographically larger the scope, the larger the requirement for experience with both event organisation and navigating the world of international non-profit funding.

Despite recovering from burn-out and malaria from previous years, 2007 turned out rather well.  I suspect I learned a lot more in 2007 than I have since the skipping lectures in university to hack on things all day.  And, finally, I get what this "experience" thing is about - it takes a while to have a few lessons sink in.

One big lesson, which I learned early on in the year, is how so much in the software development process needs to be about keeping everyone honest.

The programming stage introduces a level of honesty not enforced in earlier stages.  No longer can one hand-wave over how to achieve something, and there's nobody lower down the chain to delegate decisions to.

The most detrimental mistakes in the programming stage of a project are those that stem from ambiguity in the specification of the work to be done.  This is made even worse if the developers are not given the overarching vision and operating parameters of the project - so that they have a better than average chance to realise when an ambiguity actually arises - it'll just feel wrong.

If you've not managed to be honest in your previous stages in the development process, the programming stage is the most morbid phase for everyone.  For those involved in the earlier stages of a project, all they hear is that they've not done their job correctly.  (But, more realistically, I imagine they just think they have bad programmers.  It's amazing how easy it is to just blame it on the programmers for not "realising the vision" or not "knowing how to overcome technical difficulties" or just "being crybabies".)

For all employees, assuming you've not screwed up and not hired people who are good at their job or at least who are enthusiastic about doing their job well, you should practise small government.  Let the default position be that your employees should do their job with a minimum of overhead, with intervention only when justified.

If you want to make someone happy, make it possible for them to do their job the way they want to do them - for a lot of people, that means doing it properly.  Take them seriously when they talk.  If they complain about the light levels where they work, don't simply lament the situation - do something about it.  If they express disinterest in something, try find a way for them to avoid it.  If they think a particular book would be useful, buy it.  Be the facilitator of their success, the filter of outside forces, and the deliverer of praise.  Sure, you can't accommodate your employees every time, but make sure they think that you're doing what you can to avoid the company making their life difficult.

I contemplated what success is, especially in terms of technology within business.  Basically:

Success can't be measured only by what you have achieved - the resources, the accolades, and the good will.  More important than those, it should be measured also by what you can achieve from this point on.

I also became a lot more elitist, and decided that the IT industry in South Africa (and I'm sure elsewhere) are the major cause of the problems finding good IT staff - because they hire by quantity, not by quality.

The reason there are fifteen billion other graduates is because the companies are asking for quantity of staff, not quality of them.  People see lots of jobs open, and so decide to go "into IT".  Those people who go "into IT" because of the available jobs are just not worth as much as those actually interested in the particular subject.  10 low-experience programmers earning R5k a month (take home) aren't nearly as valuable as 2 higher-experience programmers earning R25k a month (take home), and the 10 low-experience programmers also cost more because they use more desk space, more parking bays, and so forth.

That's bad enough, of course, but now they're calling IT graduates lazy, because the average IT graduate probably is lazy, because the average IT graduate is in the wrong field.  If you want someone who isn't lazy, don't ask for 10 graduates - ask for 2 higher-experience people.

After a bit of a break, I started thinking more about project roles, and about some of the things I've got wrong in previous projects, and about non-granted and granted power in projects.

To me, it seems the project leader is the person who lives the project - the one who has the clearest idea of what the vision of the project is (and probably the goals), and who keeps this in mind in approaching every decision that is made.  The leader is the person who cares the most about the project, and who seems to make the most cogent arguments about the project as a whole ("Which feature should we drop?", "How do we best fulfil the spec in this case?", and so forth), and to whom these questions tend to become asked of first.

The last third of the year was dominated by thoughts of StarCamp.  Growing the pool has become a passion of mine - because I think there's a tipping point around the corner for South Africa and especially Cape Town in terms of technology innovation, and it needs a bit of help to come sooner.  It needs for people who are interested in technology innovation to know of each other, so that they can team up, and so that they can be counted.

Growing the pool is making new connections, bringing new people into the community, providing new people to learn from and new opportunities for work or play.  It isn't necessarily about bringing new people into the field (but it is a by-product) so much as it is about making everyone in the field more aware of each other.

...

Nobody is going to put on fancy conferences like SXSW, LugRadio Live, OSCON, Emerging Technology Conference, or Ubuntu Live, for us in South Africa until we show that there are enough people for such a thing.  And who wants somebody else's formula anyway? 

That theme continued when I thought on what made BarCamp Cape Town in 2006 so special, and realised why it needed to be a meeting of minds from all around technology innovation - not just geeks, but all the other people who need to be interested in the field and involved for stuff to happen.

One things that struck me about BarCamp Cape Town was the breadth of those who came - anything from hard-core C programmers through the Python/Ruby fanboys to more run-of-the-mill PHP programmers to those who couldn't program at all as well.  Those who work in marketing to those interested in it to those who find the entire field a bit distasteful.  Businessowners to wannabe-entrepreneurs to those who'd just like to code and have pizza slid under the door every evening.  It was a place to meet new people in your area of interest - existing groups weren't really growing the pool, and also a place for inter-pool connections to be formed.

Can't wait to see how 2008 unfolds... 

I don't think I have enjoyed working as much as I have in the last two and a bit months at SynthaSite.

That's quite a statement.  I'm a bit surprised that I'm willing to say that.

I'm not sure of how much of that enjoyment is due to changes in me, but I know it's at least a non-trivial contribution.  Being burnt out last year after over two years of hectic overcommitment to KnowledgeTree and the emotional rollercoaster that entailed has meant many lessons have been learned.  Even though I'm not fully recovered, I think I've learned how to enjoy working again, and this started to be seen last year at CareerJunction.

StarCamp and the GeekDinners also have at least a non-trivial role to play - I'm not only enjoying work a lot more, but I'm also generally enjoying life more.  I'm very upbeat about Cape Town as a venue for technology innovation, and I'm enjoying meeting new friends, and interacting with my existing ones more.

It's strange - the work that I've been doing recently at SynthaSite would probably have driven me mad before.  I've been moving from a systems administration base eight years ago towards full-time developer/architect/lead positions at Independent Online, KnowledgeTree, and CareerJunction, but suddenly I'm doing what I'm sure I would've thought fairly lowly sysadmin tasks last year, and I've got no minions to boss around.

I've been thinking a lot about reward/response in the last 18 months (I'm sure I drove Brad, Bryn and Shaun crazy during this period).  I think a lot of the reason I'm enjoying working at the moment is that it has an obvious impact.  A large portion of the work I've been doing has been around process improvement - ways to make the lives of everyone in the company better.  It's easy to feel good about your work when your colleagues thank you for making their lives easier.

The work dynamic at SynthaSite reminds me a lot of the early days of KnowledgeTree as a serious project at Jam Warehouse.  Whether you are "management", have a title like "CTO" or "VP Engineering", or are just a lowly untitled employee, your comment is not only respected but expected.  I don't think I appreciated that feeling at KnowledgeTree enough, but having known it then, I can recognise and appreciate it now.

It's also nice to be surrounded by other people who are enjoying themselves - whatever their motivations for that might be.  Certainly, being in line to make some money if things go well is probably high on some of their lists.  For others, just the excitement of being on the start-up ride.  Perhaps it's the perks.  Or maybe just being part of a well-oiled machine.

Anyway, I think this bodes well for 2008, and hopefully some of you will be inspired to try enjoy working again, whatever that might require doing.

Well, StarCamp's over - at least this time around.

I really want to thank some companies that helped us out to make the whole thing work out:

• The African Institute for Mathematical Studies (AIMS) were very gracious and generous hosts, and we were helped a lot by their staff and students over the two days.
• Quirk created and distributed the StarCamp T-shirt.  Send one email, have one phone call, and then all I had to do was follow the great feedback through the process.  All organised at the last possible minute because I left it so late, but delivered promptly and perfectly.  Thanks!
• AlterSage created a whole whack of name tags and generally cool stickers that helped us to know who each other were and occasionally what belonged to whom. 
  
• Sentient Communications gave us almost all of the cash towards two great lunches supplied by Kauai - everyone loved the lunches after spending so much time providing energy to their brains.  Or so I like to believe.
• The Western Cape Linux Users Group gave us a small amount towards the lunches, and also paid for all the cool drinks, coffee, and tea.
• ProsperIS for agreeing way back to provide logistical aid in terms of networking and power cables, projectors, PCs, and monitors, and making sure nobody wanted for anything like that.  (Updated: I can't believe I forgot to mention it!)

And the following people similarly contributed in ways that made the event happen at all, and happen as well as it did:

• Jonathan Hitchcock was my main partner in crime in organising StarCamp, even though he was busy in Johannesburg for some of it and learning for and writing a certification exam, and moved house on Saturday morning.
• Joey da Silva helped out with phoning and finding venues, and took on finding the best way to spend our food money (and got a better deal than I would have ever got), and dealing with my last-minute questions about where to get stuff, and so forth.
• Andy Rabagliati suggested AIMS as a venue, and organised things from the AIMS side for us, and generally helped towards keeping them happy.
• Deon Erasmus for delivering and taking back the stuff from ProsperIS, generally making himself useful, and for making everyone laugh at the "TEH TINK" license plate he bought.
• Nur Ahmad Furlong designed the StarCamp logo
• Christine da Silva and Tim Shier for being the first two people at the venue on Saturday to make sure every person who arrived got a T-shirt and a name tag.
• Stefano Rivera and Jeremy Thurgood for helping to set various things up (and for being the first two to sign up as attendees)
• Joe Botha broke the ice with an impromptu (and very interesting) talk on the state of telecommunications licensing in the recent past (since 1994 or so), and on the license conversion process currently going on.
• Glen Verran, Shaun O'Connell, Ian Gilfillan, Tim Shier, Simon Cross, Adrian Rossouw (currently homeless), Rafiq Phillips, Russell Cloran, and Adrianna Pińska all presented.
• Charl van Niekerk for coming all the way from George just to attend StarCamp (oh, and some other stuff too)
• Tim Allen, for convincing his friends from Princeton to give talks
• David Robinson and Alex Halderman, for giving up a day of their week-long holiday from Princeton in Cape Town, for presenting and talking about the topical issues of Net Neutrality and E-Voting.
• My "boss", Vinny Lingham, for talking a bit about his experience raising funding for our business, SynthaSite, and for bringing along a few people for a few hours before and after his talk.  And my other "boss" at SynthaSite, Brent, for letting me organise things, visit venues, and so forth on work time.
• My former colleagues from CareerJunction, Jam Warehouse and even earlier days, including Bryn Divey, Shaun O'Connell (again), Adrian Moisey,  and Alan Levin, for everything from moral support to continuously offering to help.

Wow, that's quite a few people - almost half the people that attended the event.  Which, I suppose, is how it is supposed to be - everyone pitching in and making it fun for themselves and for other people.

So far, the feedback has been very nice ("Well done!", "I really enjoyed it"), but perhaps not all that useful in terms of doing things better next time. I'll try to devise a way to get better and more feedback.
 
I'll have more to say about things after I spend the next few days sleeping, but I had an amazing time, met some cool people, got to spend time with some of my favourite people, and got all soppy watching everyone chatting with everyone else and forging and strengthening connections.  Got quite a few people interested in coming to GeekDinners as well - always nice to have new perspectives and experiences.

After a few weeks of organisation hell, StarCamp is finally here, and I can kick back and relax as it switches to self-organising.  Or something.

Anyway, we have some great speakers already signed up - from Princeton academics on Net Neutrality and E-Voting to my own boss just doing a favour for me, Vinny Lingham of SynthaSite on something about venture capital and/or start-ups, to user experience expert Phil Barrett talking about what he does, Rafiq Philipps on his experience at TED, and Norman Rasmussen on the future of the .NET platform.

We have copious amounts of free food (sponsored by Sentient Communications), and some free coffee (non-filter, unfortunately) and tea and so forth, a big LCD TV and a Wii and an XBox 360 for those who want to relax, and plenty of other stuff to hopefully keep people entertained.

So, even if you haven't signed up, just pitch up today (Saturday) between 9am and 5pm, or tomorrow (Sunday) between 10am and 4pm for as long or as short as you'd like and see what it's all about.

Okay, time to pack everything up and head to the venue, then.  Hope to see you there! 

The guys at Quirk are looking for StarCamp T-shirt designs from the community (in the self-organising style of the event itself) for the T-shirts they're sponsoring for StarCamp.

We may have left this a bit late, but there's a chance for a little glory if you're able to put something together for mid-day tomorrow.  Oh, and a free T-shirt, even if you can't make StarCamp yourself.

(Had a 10-minute chat with Tim Shier from Quirk at around mid-day today, and they seem really keen to be involved.  As usual, it might be too late, but we hope some of the QuirkStars are able to attend and give talks.  In addition to Rafiq's talk about TED, of course.)

So, StarCamp has a venue - we're having it at the African Institute for Mathematical Studies (hereafter simply AIMS).  That was a last-minute re-option after Andy heard of our plight at the Eccentric Eggplant GeekDinner.

Beyond that, since last I mentioned it, we've got sponsors lined up for T-shirts, name tags/stickers, and food, as well as some cash sponsorships that will cover some additional food and coffee.  Still need some help to make sure I don't have to pay for some stuff myself, but it's looking a lot better than even last week.  Will announce more when everything is 100% confirmed.

We've now got 62 attendees pre-registered (you can, of course, just pitch up on the day, but then you might not end up with food, a seat, or a T-shirt), and 16 talks pre-announced by some brave souls.  The topics are starting to round out now - at first they were mostly technical, but we're starting to get more about the business of technology as well, and I've been in contact with more people to try get some more interesting topics added.

One thing we don't have is enough video recorders - we have Jonathan Carter's one that has been used to tape GeekDinner, CLUG, and CTPUG talks in the past, but we could really do with another one (or two, and people to operate them). 

We're up to 78 Geek Diners for Eccentric Eggplant, the fifth Cape Town GeekDinner, to be held at Ferryman's Tavern at the V&A Waterfront on Wednesday (ie, the 28th November 2007).  According to the sign-up page, only 2 more people are allowed, but there are always a couple of last-minute cancellations when people remember that it's their anniversary and their spouse will kill them if they're off geeking instead of taking them to a nice dinner.

(Extra points: Take the spouse to the GeekDinner.  Don't get killed, and get to geek out at the same time.)

This will be our first attempt at Slideshow Karaoke - where we volunteer two victims (Jonathan Hitchcock and Bryn Divey in this case) to give a talk on a subject they know nothing about with slides prepared by others (Russell Cloran and Jeremy Thurgood in this case) and given to the speakers at the same time the speaker is giving the talk to the audience.  If it works, I think we should have a few slideshow karaoke sessions at StarCamp...

Thanks to Nur Ahmad Furlong and a couple of iterations inspired by Jonathan and I, StarCamp now has a logo.  Nur also made a badge to put on your page so that people know that you're going and can find out what it's about - you can get the code on the StarCamp main page.

I'm going to be checking out a venue tomorrow that sounds perfect for us.  Just in time too - only two more weeks to go!  We've had more trouble finding venues than I thought we would, as evidenced by the running commentary on the venues page for StarCamp, and I've certainly learned a lot about what's out there and what people expect and why my "perfect dates" for getting school halls weren't quite so perfect after all.

Hopefully we can finalise the venue in the next day or two, and then we can stop holding back on inviting people.  We have 50 people signed up on the wiki page, which is a good start, but I want to see at last 75 people on that list by mid-next-week.  I know I've delayed sending invites until things looked certain, and they're looking fairly certain to me now.