BarCamp Wants You to Rock Their Unconference

If the phrase "tech conference" conjures up images of PowerPoint slides, droning presenters, and dreary snacks, then BarCamp Austin feels your pain.

BarCamp Austin is an "unconference" -- an event that flips the traditional meeting setup on its head. Everything in an unconference is planned, set up, and executed by the participants. If it sounds like a model for chaos, it turns out it's just the opposite.

"People always want to ask us, 'Who do we pay?'", said Richard Goodwin, one of the organizers. "But people can show up and say what they want. It's about people with different interests."

This year's event, set for Saturday at GSD&M Idea City, is free and open to the public. Where past year's BarCamps have been technology-heavy, there's a shift occurring that has this year's events including a knitting group and an improv comedy troupe.

Like everything about BarCamp, that change has come about not from a push from one or two event directors, but from the participants.

"I tell people that BarCamp is like Soylent Green. It's about people," says event organizer William Hurley, known familiarly around the tech community as "whurley". "It's a community event; a participation-based model."

Even with a more diverse program planned, technology topics still rule the day at BarCamp. But the event gives people the chance to sit down with luminaries in the tech community and talk in an informal setting, rather than sit in a conference room and watch a presentation.

Here's how it works: At the beginning of the day, attendees look at a collection of session ideas and vote on them. Sessions with the most votes will be held later in the day so that more people can attend. The day's sessions are assigned to rooms at GSD&M, and off you go. This video shows how last year's event came together.

In fact, if you check out the schedule page at the BarCamp Austin site, you'll only find a handful of slots already spoken for. That's by design.

"The schedule just sort of magically happens. We're the catalysts or instigators, but the attendees decide," whurley said. "The first year was super-tech oriented. Last year it was all about Web 2.0. This year, who knows?"

And when the conference is over, attendees will celebrate with a party featuring a performance by Soulhat.

This is the third year for BarCamp Austin, which has established itself as one of the showcase stops in an international network of these user-generated conferences. So much so that City Councilman Lee Leffingwell is expected to declare Saturday as BarCamp Austin Day in a City Hall ceremony. Although this event occurs on the weekend before the opening of South by Southwest Interactive, whurley insists there's no competition between the two gatherings.

"Most of the folks who come to our event can't afford badges or to take time off to go to the conference," whurley said. "South by Southwest is a big-time, professional conference that takes all year to plan. We're putting this together in a couple of weeks -- and that's early for us."