Tag: conferences
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On the Origin of the Speciated Conference
I go to so many conferences! It’s an awesome and amazing part of my job. I speak at them, but I also attend them. I sit in the front row and live-tweet. I attend talks. I participate in unconference sessions. I talk to people in lines, and at lunch, and at the afterparty. I give…
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Speaker’s Hierarchy of Needs
I’ve been thinking about what I need to be a happy speaker, and what I expect, and what I hope for, and it seems to me like it’s a a hierarchy of needs, like Maslow. This is absolutely not intended to “call out” any organizer or make anyone feel bad. The vast majority of my…
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Saying No, or If This Then Not That
I had to say no to a conference I would have loved to speak at today. I’ve had to say no to several conference speaking offers this year, because it turns out that time, space, and timezones can only be manipulated to a certain degree. I thought about not blogging about this, because it’s a…
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My first year, a personal review
I woke up to a cheery email today telling me that a quarter of my stock options had vested. That means I’ve been with LaunchDarkly a whole year! (there are worse anniversary notes to get). And what a year it’s been. I thought about doing a photo essay of all the conferences I went to…
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Live-Tweeting for Fame and Fortune
That’s a joke. I have made $65 off 4 years of live-tweeting, and it’s more than I ever expected. As far as fame, the point is not for me to get famous, but to promote some amazing speakers as they do their thing. I don’t know about you, but I have about 20 tabs open…
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2017 Speaking Recap
This was the year that I got more organized as a speaker. I took up Airtable as a way to track all of my conference proposals, and so I actually have a record of everything I submitted. Summary Attended 27 conferences, spoke at 24 Spoke at 3 user groups, 2 podcasts, 1 video interview, 1…
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Packing, optimizing, and satisficing
I’m off on a two-week trip that happens to be broken by an 18 hour stop at home. (Nodevember, North Bay Python, SpringOne Platform, LaunchDarkly writing sprint). Every couple months, I try to clean out my bags entirely, get rid of the trash that accumulates, make sure that I have room for all the new…
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Why I Speak at Developer Conferences
I don’t write code for a living, and I never have. Developer has never been part of my job titles, and my Github history won’t impress anyone. I think that’s why people are surprised that I speak at developer conferences — next month I’m going to RubyConf, PyconCA, and Nodevember. When I started speaking at…
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Think Globally, Sponsor Locally
Possibly the most exciting thing about my new job as Developer Advocate (there are so many!) is that I don’t have to scramble and ask conferences to fund me anymore. That means that speaker funds can go to the next generation of up-and-coming speakers, independents, and folks who don’t get paid to go to conferences.…
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Why on earth would developers WANT to write documentation?
This week I was at DevOpsDays Minneapolis, which was an amazing, warm, and inclusive event. There were at least three open spaces on documentation, communication, and related problems, and I didn’t propose any of them! The question the devops world keeps asking, over and over again is, How do I get developers to write anything?…