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NYT Techie Night Life Reprogrammed
securitas writes "Almost a decade after the Internet bubble collapsed, the New York Times reports on the revival of the Silicon Alley technology social scene — with a twist. It's now about substance. Gone are the "glitzy club ... minor celebrities, go-go dancers, an open bar and pricey giveaways" in favor of unconferences, Ignite, Pecha Kucha, ideas and 'a night life that involves actually talking to creative people doing exciting things.' Most major cities have a geek social scene like the NYC Soldering Championship [video link] featured in the article." Not surprisingly (for anyone who reads O'Reilly's Make magazine), Bre Pettis is one of the event organizers mentioned.
Sounds leaden.
I'll take the open bar.
Sometimes balance means shutting off those overly acute powers of perception and going with the animal brain every so often.
Dropping the bubbly excess sounds great, but everything doesn't need to be turned into a intellectual engineering exercise.
"Almost a decade after the Internet bubble collapsed, ..."
The bubble burst in 2001. Internet "decades" are much shorter.
Research shows that 67% of those who use the term "research shows", are just making shit up.
What ever happened to the classic drinking contest? Sure you dont learn something useful like you would in a soldering contest but at least at the end all the girls look significantly hotter.
Yeah, because I work all week with geeks all day long just so I can hang out with them after work on the weekend. Yeah...no.
Give me the old scene any day of the week. The social scene is about unwinding and meeting interesting people who help you expand your mind, not a bunch of people who think exactly like you and only are willing to challenge you in a game of Warcraft or in a heated discussion about design patterns and antipatterns. If you can't do that at work, then yeah, maybe you need that kind of interaction...but most don't because they get it all day long. Unless you're unemployed, of course.
And we finally have a definitive answer to the question asked at least since the time of the Roman Republic: how can we segregate those with new wealth but no cultural sophistication away from the rest of society without isolating their money from the larger economy?
The apparent answer: soldering contests with expensive drinks.
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
I figure just throwing a bunch of nerds and alcohol will produce more "intellectual" stimulating exercises than this whole pre-planning will. I mean, nothing wrong with a soldering contest with beer, but I'll take a bunch of napkins and spur-of-the-moment scribbled ideas after a night of drinking with my fellow guys than attend an organized town-meeting.
I mean, who HASN'T had a a great/horrible idea when drinking?
import system.cool.Sig;
"a night life that involves actually talking to creative people doing exciting things."
Pretension still doesn't count as "substance."
'a night life that involves actually talking to creative people doing exciting things.'
withering away one's life in a dark bar corner with sleazy sluts and calling it fun didnt make much sense ever anyways.
Read radical news here
I predict a total sausage fest.
Come on, ladies.
Geeks are great, once you get to know us.
[citation needed]
Do you mean:
I predict a total sausage fest [citation needed]
or
Geeks are great, once you get to know us [citation needed]
or both?
Rule of Slashdot #0: You and people like you are not representative of the larger population. - A.C.
What about geek ladies?
10 FILL MUG WITH COFFEE
20 DRINK COFFEE
30 GOTO 10
The event was actually pretty fun. It was in a biggish bar/lounge so there was plenty of booze and it was *packed*. The crowd was a mix of geeks, artsy types and business folks. A bit loud, but hey, it's NYC.
The main thing was a bunch of 5 minute presentations. They were NOT demos or requests for funding as someone else implied. The talks ranged from funny (how NYPD conducts undercover prostitution busts) to weird (guerilla knitting) to informative (how to raise money from angels) to cool (a prof from NYU's ITP who showed a bunch of new tactile interface ideas) to preachy (helping out in third world countries). Most of the speakers were pretty good. One guy even did his in rap/hip-hop style.
All in all, it was fun and everyone I know who went was glad they did.
Rob
Woah, really? Then where did I get these? :o
10 FILL MUG WITH COFFEE
20 DRINK COFFEE
30 GOTO 10
Usually they're the shallow ones whose beauty is quite literally only skin deep.
Indeed. You can't really know what kind of woman you've got until you remove the dermis [I recommend a potato peeler for this, along with suitable restraints (duct tape is surprisingly effective)].
They'll try to scream (a ball gag helps here, by the way), but what else can you expect? Nobody ever said true love was easy.
Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go write a filesystem for Linux.