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I’m really looking forward to attending the upcoming Unsheffield event which kicks off next Friday evening. It is brought to you by the same team that organised BarCampSheffieldII last year, but they felt that they wanted to deviate a little from the standard BarCamp format, hence the rebranding of this new event.

I will endeavour to write more about the event during or shortly afterwards.

Another trip up the North for BarCampLeeds this last weekend. I had been to OBH for PhotoCampLeeds in February, so knew the venue would provide us with a great space for a BarCamp.

There was much bribery going on during the sessions this time – some lovely ladies baked us cupcakes to entice us into their discussion, and Alistair brought along his trainset so that a few more folks would attend his session:

[The Cupcake Express hauls its cargo]

The afternoon saw lots of geeks outside on the lawn enjoying an impromptu circus skills workshop:

[Alistair juggles with pepsi cans whilst The Hodge falls off a unicycle]

And if that wasn’t silly enough, after we had all enjoyed the party on Saturday night and arrived back on Sunday morning [not] nursing hangovers, there was also Twister to play with:

[Twisted fools!]

… and the trainset was back, this time with added constructions fashioned out of sponsor’s mugs!

[Tom watches Mr Duck watching the train run round in circles]

A few of the participants also managed to find a cache when the fun was over too, so all in all a grand weekend.

Having heard good things about BarCampNorthEast1, I was determined to attend the second helping which was held on 16th-17th May in Newcastle.

As expected, the northern hospitality was greatly appreciated, and there were some really interesting sessions. I was a relatively small BarCamp, but I do like the smaller ones as they seem more friendly and it’s easier to get to talk to people than at some of the bigger ones.

I particularly enjoyed @ajkavanagh’s session on Procrastination (we talked a lot but didn’t find any solutions!) and @sctv’s Hardward Hacking for under a fiver:

[Cannibalising stuff for spares - things bought from the Pound Shop often contain components you would be hard-pressed to buy cheaper than that]

James Rutherford also did a fantastic tongue-in-cheek (or should that be geek?) look back at 20th Century websites and what we thought was good at the time. A sobering thought – what we do right now will often look equally naff in a few years’ time!

[James Rutherford - so last century!]

There was also the usual evening fun and games, including Werewolf and PowerPoint Karaoke organised by The Hodge:

[Alistair waves his arms about during the PowerPoint Karoake, in true Magnus Pike style]

I decided not to run a technical session, but instead taught a few folks to play Carcassonne on Sunday morning:

[Strategic thinking during a game of Carcassonne]

After all the excitement and hard work organising BarCampLondon6 last week, quite a few of the London contingent decided to head to sunny Bournemouth for the first ever BarCamp to be held there, organised by Mark Ng.

Alistair and I went down to the coast a few days early to do a spot of caching too. There are hundreds of caches around Bournemouth so we couldn’t resist.

[Sunset over Sandbanks]

I really enjoyed the BarCamp. Another relaxed, friendly get-together and the University setting was great for that sort of event.

Dom and Tim were up to their usual antics and decided to fill a Smart Car with boxes of the Sponsor’s Tea:

[A Smart Car full of tea. Why? Why not!]

Having attended so many BarCamps over the past couple of years, I thought it was about time I helped to organise one. And so I found myself on the team which put together BarCampLondon6, held at The Guardian’s swanky new London offices in Kings Cross.

It was lots of  hard work, but really rewarding to see everything come together over the weekend. At times, we might have felt a little headless (it happens to the best of us!). I never thought I would spent 2 hours putting together Lego figures for the schwag bag on the Friday evening, but it was fun.

We had some great sessions and loads of people seemed to enjoy themselves. Thanks for all the feedback folks!

Here are some more images I took during the weekend:

[VIP pass for Mr Duck]

[The awesome BarCamp logo made from Lego during the introductory sessions]

So would I do it again? Probably. Just not for a while