(Best pic I have! - thanks @jimbobc)

I’m just back from Oxford Geek Night. It’s difficult for practical reasons to get there, so it was my first, and it was a great event with many interesting folks working on some very interesting projects. A real vibrant culture of small companies, startups, and freelancers too; very different to most places you go in London.

I gave a keynote, “Take a Walk on the Happy Path”, expanding on ideas in http://softwareas.com/the-new-registration-and-login-grammars . I’ll post the presentation once the video’s out.

Quick feedback from my talk, while I remember:

• Overall, it was evident this is the kind of content people were comparing to their own work and thinking how they could build things in like Lazy Registration and Email-Driven Interaction.
• I heard a couple of scenarios where Email Driven Interaction would be pretty neat. Mobile is interesting, because for those not toting the latest and greatest smartphones, email support is ahead of the web.
• I ought to mention services like Mailinator. More evidence that we aren’t amused with complicated signup.
• One guy felt a disconnect between Lazy Reg/Email Driven Interaction
• I had a technical issue where my laptop lid was closed; when I went to the stage and opened it, screen was black, so I had to keep turning my head to see the screen, and there was no timer. Not a big deal as I’d walked through the slides in the morning, but next time I’ll avoid that, and take a couple of minutes to get it sorted if necessary. Live and learn.
• People were a bit stumped about BT/Osmosoft doing stuff like this, and generally being involved in open source. It’s a common reaction and I didn’t elaborate on it in the talk, so explained the setup to people afterwards.

Thanks to the organiser J-P (not that JP :)), the sponsor, and all who attended.