Robert Janelle

By Robert Janelle

Originally published in National Capital Scan February, 2008

On  a  snowy  Thursday  evening, web consultant Derek Featherstone  stands before a crowd packed into the basement of the Clocktower Brew Pub on Bank Street giving a presentation on accessibility using Google Maps.
He  goes  over  the  difficulties  of navigating  the  online  mapping  service  for  someone who  can  only  use a  keyboard,  along  with  demonstrating what someone with vision  problems  goes  through trying  to  use  it  with  speech recognition  software.

Then Mr. Featherstone goes over the work-arounds  he’s  developed so far to address these problems.

It’s  the  first  meeting  of  Refresh Ottawa,  a  new  common-interest group  focusing  on  web  issues.  Refresh was started by Mr. Featherstone
and  freelance  web  developer  Jonathan Snook.

“We  just  wanted  to  see  the  web community  in  Ottawa  grow,”  says Mr. Featherstone. Ottawa  isn’t  the only  city holding Refresh  meetings.  Many  U.S.  and U.K.  cities  are  holding  their  own gatherings  of web  designers  and  developers under  the Refresh brand.

In fact,  the Ottawa  group  owes  its  creation to a chapter in Texas.

Inspiration  for  the  group  came when Mr. Featherstone was speaking at South  by Southwest,  a  large multimedia  conference  in Austin, Texas.
There he learned of the Refresh group and  discussed  setting  up  an  Ottawa branch with Mr. Snook.

Refresh Ottawa is one the most recent  common-interest  groups  to  pop up with international ties.

There’s Third Tuesday’s for social media discussion, DemoCamp  for developers  to show off  their work and, possibly  the  biggest,  DemoCamp’s
parent group BarCamp.

BarCamp, which stretches globally across North America,  Europe, Asia to Australia  and New  Zealand,  bills itself  as  an  “open  source  unconference.” The conferences are user-generated with presentations often being decided at the event itself by whoever is in attendance.
Topics  tend  to  be  a  mish-mash of  technologies  presented  by  social  media  or  application  developers showing  off  their most  recent work.
Everyone  attending  is  supposed  to participate, whether  they’re  presenting, contributing to the discussion or blogging about the event.

BarCamp  came  to  Ottawa  after iotum CEO Alec Saunders attended the conference  in Toronto and  suggested on his blog  that someone should get it  going  here.

Marketing  consultant Peter Childs  saw  the  post  and  took up  the  challenge,  organizing four BarCamp events to date.

Mr.  Childs  says  it’s  about networking  and  putting  an international banner on the get-together.  It’s  not  just  between local  individuals,  it’s  about networking different cities across the globe.

“It’s like a franchise,” he says.

The  most  recent  Ottawa  BarCamp, held last November, was supposed  to feature a  live  link-up with a BarCamp happening concurrently
in  Leeds,  England,  though  technical glitches frustrated that plan.

Mr. Childs  says  they  were  looking to Leeds  because  of  what  they  share with  Ottawa.  “We’re  high-tech cities  trying  to  find  an  identity  for
ourselves,” he says.

The  aspirations  behind  Refresh Ottawa  share  that  same  desire  for connectedness,  not  just  between individuals but between cities.

We’re  part  of  a  small  community in Ottawa,  but  it’s  like we’re  part  of something  bigger,”  says Mr. Featherstone.

“Having that camaraderie is great,”  adds Mr. Snook.

Being able to work in small groups with  support  from a global community is also helpful when it comes to gathering of those with more esoteric  interests.

Take dorkbot,  for  example.

Formed in New York  City  by Douglas  Repetto from  the  Columbia  University Computer Music Center,  its  tagline  is  “people  doing
strange things with electricity.”

Dorkbot  brings  together  people creating  art  using  electronics,  like sculptures  that  are  actually  complex machines,  robots  and  various  other combinations of science and art.  Like  other  groups,  dorkbot  has chapters  across  the  United  States, in Madrid,  Spain,  and Tokyo,  Japan along  with  Vancouver,  Toronto  and Montreal.

New  to  the dorkbot family will be an  Ottawa  gathering  organized  by physicist Sebastien Bailard.

Mr.  Bailard  had  been  attending similar  groups  in  Wisconsin  and Montreal  along  with  BarCamp  in Ottawa,  but  decided  it  was  time  to
bring the art-geek community in Ottawa together.

“I’m  quite  interested  in  electronic  art,  and  while  Ottawa  has people  doing  interesting  work  in that field,  the community seems  to
consist of gallery openings  and  irregular how-to workshops, without any  kind  of  recurring  community meet-up,” Mr. Bailard wrote  in  an
e-mail.

So  far,  all  of  these  groups  are cost  free  to  join, covering  expenses through  sponsorships.  BitHeads and  Carleton have  provided
space  for  BarCamp  meetings.  Web  Directions  North  covered  the cost of chicken wings for the inaugural Refresh Ottawa meeting.
Advertising  for  the  get-togethers  is  done  by  word-of-mouth  or online, usually with members connecting  through  blogs  or  other
social  media  (almost  any  kind  of  gathering  generates  a  Facebook events page.)

With  the groups being  so  technology  focused,  they  also  serve  to  dispel the stereotype of geeks trapped in front of monitors all day.

“It’s partly about providing that social aspect for people who are usually stuck in front of computers,” says Mr. Featherstone.

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