After a fulfilling and enlightening day at WordCamp Miami, I can’t help but use one of my favorite expressions: The event lit a fire under my butt. For the generously cheap $30 attendance fee, I was able to accumulate a list full of things I can’t wait to tinker and play with. The brain cogs are turning with full speed and the inspiration is flowing rapidly through my veins.

Pete Bernardo kicked off the day with a fantastic presentation about WordPress plugins.  I, along with most of the audience, were “ooo-ing” and “ahhh-ing” over some of the plugin demos he performed on the spot for us.  I found this presentation to be absolutely perfect for someone like me who is fairly comfortable with installing WordPress for client sites, but often hit a wall when it came to enhancing them with advanced features like forms and higher levels of user controls.  Thank you, Pete. Thank you, thank you. *Updated* Check out Pete’s presentation from WordCamp below.

WordCamp Miami 2010 – WordPress Plugins for your Next Project from Pete Bernardo on Vimeo.

We all felt like insiders during the “What’s Coming in WordPress 3.0″ session with Jane Wells of Automattic.  A cool new default WordPress theme and “The Merge” between WordPress and WordPress MU are on the horizon. Aside from that, hearing from a super well-versed user experience expert who happened to be a female among a sea of male developers was a breath of fresh air in itself. It led to an awesome brainstorming session between a few of us chicks in the group. Lori Todd wrote a fantastic wrap-up of what we took from that session and our goals moving forward.

Willie Morris tweeted a thought that was also one of my biggest sentiments of the day: It felt like being in college again.  Big lecture halls. Lunch on the lawn with friends. Note-taking.  It was a throwback to my days at UF and I was overjoyed that they chose to host the event on a college campus. There is no better way to foster higher learning than to put your attendees directly into that environmental setting.  Excellent venue choice (even though I hate the Canes. Go Gators!).

Another stand-out presentation for me was Tammy Hart’s session on using WordPress with clients. Amen. I’ve been looking forward to a presentation like this for the longest time because of my experience level. I hate the frustration that I get when potential clients bring me WordPress requests but I am unable to meet their needs.  Tammy’s session made me feel okay about that and gave me some guidelines about where to go to find solutions.  Aside from the tips that she shared (and there were many) I was more inspired by the presence and expertise of yet another female who has been able to build a successful business around WordPress development and maintenance with clients. She is also completely self-taught. My hat is off to Tammy.

As Lori said in her post, I’m really pleased that the organizers of this event decided to plan it separately from BarCamp Miami this year.   I recall last year being torn between several WordCamp and BarCamp sessions and losing out by having to chose.  The separate camp remedied that and because it was tailored to three different levels of interest, there was something for everyone.

Bravo to David Bisset, John Carcutt and the rest of the WordCamp organizers. The motivation from the fire that is now lit under my bum to get up and do something was worth every penny. See you all at BarCamp tomorrow!

So you’re a Twitter rock star with an impressive list of followers. You’ve got a killer score of 99.6 on Twitter Grader, you carry on interesting conversations with @reply after @reply and get retweeted a decent amount, too. All is well in your Twitterverse, except…

…none of it is doing you any good in real life. Close your laptop and turn off your iPhone. What happens to your Twitterverse now? Exactly.

GIVE TWEEPS A CHANCE

If for any reason you’ve been weary of making your way to a tweetup in your area, I beg you to get off your rump, take a shot of social courage and meet these virtual tweeps in reality. Sure, there may be a brief moment of awkward introductions. “Hey, so… you’re @johndoe…you look nothing like your avatar…nice to meet you.”  And even after that it may seem like there isn’t much to talk about besides the last four tweets you’ve read from each other or the hottest tweeted link of the day. This is not the case.

Your tweeps are more than handles and avatars and links and hashtags.  Because you share interests (Why else would you follow them?) and converse with them throughout the day, there’s a pretty strong chance you’d have a great time at the pub/bar/pizza joint shooting the breeze for an hour or two.  It solidifies the connections you are using Twitter to establish anyway and like any good relationship, it needs work.

It’s usually not hard to find tweetups since they are, of course, arranged via twitter and we spend a good bulk of our day there anyway.  If you are a casual twitter user and not an obsessed fiend, check sites like Meetup.com or Tweetups.org for local gatherings. Also search for local twitter accounts that announce tweetups in your area (i.e. @soflatweetup, @ftlaudtweetup, etc.).

RECESSION FRIENDLY

Believe it or not, it IS possible to have a social life without breaking the bank. Down here in South Florida we are lucky enough to have quite a few tech events/tweetups that have generous sponsors who will chip in for the booze and food.

This is in no way meant to promote twitter mooching. No one likes the guy/girl who hovers around gatherings just for the free stuff.

Last night at Boca’s First Pizza Tweetup, Tucci’s Pizza (@tuccispizza) in Boca threw in all the pizza (which, by the way, was stellar) if you paid for a drink. There was no shortage of food, the owners were grateful and by the looks of it everyone had a great time. Thanks to @lapp for coordinating and @oweno for the awesome video:

So go forth my noble tweetup scaredy-cats. Drop the anti-social front and meet the people who pleasantly distract you from work on Twitter.

I’ve attended a few South Florida tech events in the last couple months (BarCamp, WeMedia, SoFlaTweetup) and last night I was glad to finally add Refresh to the list.  Lots of familiar faces, both people I’ve met at other events and tweeps I met in person for the first time. Thanks to VOIS for the beer and munchies and to Alex De Carvalho (@alexdc) for coordinating.

I got to hear a bit about the concept of co-working, which was new to me, from social strategist and blogger Brian Breslin (@brianbreslin).  Freelancers and independent workers sharing a common space to get their work done, fully equipped with other like-minded brains to bounce ideas off of or swap skill-sets with. Like social media, with co-working, it’s not about the space but about the people you can work and connect with. Super cool idea.

It’s tough going to cool tech meetups as a member of the news industry.  Whether it’s the rough economic times that newspapers are experiencing so publicly these days or the general techy and social media interests that we all share, geeks at the three big South Florida newspapers have found some common ground and a sense of camaraderie (despite a Twitter #rivalry). When we add our organization to our name tags, it’s easy for people to assume we are all reporters, there only to scope out a good story for the local business section or whatnot, members of the media machine.  It’s easy to disspell this once we all introduce ourselves and get to chattin’. Most of us are in the online department at our papers, tweeting on our respective accounts and utilizing social media tools to spread our news online.  We’re tech-heads just like you all!

I know it can be frustrating when a grassroots tech community starts to blossom and flourish and little is said about it in the mainstream media.  When event attendance grows year-after-year and people start flying into Miami from all over the world (I saw Ryan Carson [@ryancarson] from the UK at BarCamp the day before FOWA), I can understand the notion that Florida might be developing its own version of Silicon Valley, and that’s great news. What is easy to forget (well, not for those of us who work there) is that the scope of what newspapers are able to cover is shrinking due to financial hardships. In tough times the bad news often takes over the good news.

I’d personally like to do a better job blogging and covering the geek get-togethers that I’m able to make it to.  I’m not a reporter or an official Miami Herald blogger, but thankfully I’ve got all the bylines I want right here.

PLUG #1: Please stay tuned to @MiamiHerald on Twitter.  We’re planning a tweetup. It’s gonna be SWEET!

PLUG #2: If you live in the Miami area, and want to kick some balls with awesome editors, designers, producers and writers who work at the Herald, start following @HeraldKickball and bookmark HeraldKickball.com.**  We meet every other Saturday at 12:30 pm at Margaret Pace Park on 18th and Bayshore Drive. Next game is April 4th, depending on weather. Props to Lori Todd (@loritodd) and Bill Passonno (@wcpassonno) for organizing and being kick-ass in general. The more the merrier!

**We are not officially affiliated with the paper, but it is the Herald that unites us, hence HeraldKickball.

Refresh pikchurs:

@loritodd showing her Times "T" tattoo to @enzobalc

Refresh Miami turnout