Geekup Blackpool

Geekupthetower has a new home

lespounder — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 17:34:31 +0000

Hidden from view, above our normal venue is our new home.

We have our own bar, plenty of seats, and more importantly…no noise!

We can use the screen for presentations.

We can comfortably seat about 30 – 40 people.

To get in to the function room, you need to go in via the door on the left.

So for our next Geekup, we will have this space all to ourselves. Just what we need to house our discussion!

Would you like a community space / hackspace in Blackpool

Please, please, please take five minutes to add your thoughts to our Google Doc

What do you want from a community space?

Thanks for reading

Les

Geekup Blackpool 23/01/2012

lespounder — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 20:45:00 +0000

New Year, new ideas!

Well ,it was all change at Geekup Blackpool this month.

With a reduced number of attendees, we decided to have an informal chat about communities in Blackpool. There was no audio recorded at this geekup.

It was quickly decided that Blackpool really has a lack of venues for events, places for groups to meet, and places that contain the equipment needed for various groups.

So what can we do about it?

Well at next months Geekup Blackpool we will have an open floor, a debate / discussion on what we can do to create this space, sustain it, and what services / facilities we can offer.

In the meantime, I ask that you take five minutes, and add your ideas to our Google Document

What can we do to make this a success?

Don’t forget it’s still not too late to fill in the co-working survey

Would you like a space to work with others? Collaborate, network, present ideas?

In other news

Lee aka @FY5 on Twitter brought along the smallest PC I have ever seen.

It’s called a cubox and it is an ARM based PC that can play 1080p video!

It costs €99 and is fantastic. It can run a variety of Linux operating systems (Ubuntu being the default, but it can also run Android) and is very conservative when it comes to power consumption.

Mmm I think I need one.

Thanks for coming!

Les

January 16th – Geekup Blackpool head to Preston Geekup

lespounder — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 16:28:01 +0000

It was a cold night in Preston, but the welcome was warm.

Jon Chamberlain, Arran Gallagher and Les traveled to Geekup Preston, on a cold and dark January night. We had to walk through a dodgy park, but we were safe!

There were around 20 people there, and the chat was very geeky. Legend of Zelda maps, ARM based Linux devices and the upcoming Hack to the Future event. (Which by the way you need to read about, it’s epic!) A full day of workshops and talks for kids. It’s basically a barcamp for kids! I can’t wait to go and Blackpool LUG will be there also. I’ll be interviewing Alan on the Fullcircle podcast in the near future

I spoke to Jon Atkinson and Alex McGibbon about Hack Manchester, it’s a Hack Day, 24hrs, to hack a working product together! Wow! I think I’ll sign up

I also spoke to Martin Ayrton and Tim Hastings about the cubox, an ARM based computer that can run Linux and Android, and output 1080p video!

What with this and the raspberrypi I may be skint!

I had a great night, and will definitely be going again.

October 24th Our 4th Geekup

lespounder — Sat, 12 Nov 2011 16:57:31 +0000

Fresh from Barcamp Blackpool here is another Geekup Blackpool.

First talk this month is by Alan “@teknoteacher” O’Donohoe, and is about recaptcha

Or you can download the MP3 from here

The next talk was from Stephen Mullen, and he talked about radphp

Or you can download the MP3 from here

September 25th Our Third Geekup

lespounder — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 08:15:40 +0000

Sorry this post is a bit late, I’ve been really busy with Barcamp Blackpool preparations.

So without further ado.

This months guest speaker was Liz Hardwick and her talk was about soundtoys.

You can listen to the talk, and see her slides below.

Or you can download the MP3 here

I interviewed Michael Heap (@mheap) about Tweetdig, a new app that lets you control Twitter in the same way as Microsoft’s Outlook application.

Take a listen here.

Next months speaker is Stephen Mullen, who is talking about mobile app development.

The next meeting is on the 24th October.

And in breaking news, @lallyd has created a facebook page for the group, so get over there and check it out. Thanks lallyd!

All the photos from the night can be found here

August 22nd Our Second Geekup

lespounder — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 20:51:03 +0000

Another busy event, with 15 people turning up to take part in 2 talks.

Lots of familiar faces, and a few new faces, so welcome to one and all.

Our first talk was by Carl Whalley (@otamate on Twitter)

Carl’s talk was excellent and has generated an interest in Android app development across the group.

Next up was Alan O’Donohoe, who spoke about the standard of IT education in the UK

You can listen to the audio below

Or download the audio here

Thanks to everyone for coming, and see you next time.

Les

July 25th 2011 – Our first geekup

lespounder — Sat, 30 Jul 2011 09:21:37 +0000

The first Blackpool Geekup was held on the 25th July, at Gillespies pub, Topping St, Blackpool.
The event was very well attended, on average there were 22 people at the event.

At around 7:15pm we started our introduction talk, this was led by Les, and focussed on the 
purpose of the event, and allowed Les to tell us more about himself.



The next talk was by Duncan Hodgson (@tawdryme on Twitter). Duncan talked about his venture, 
Aunty Social / Blackpool Social Media Surgeries. The surgeries focus on surgeons (users of social media 
who offer advice to attendees) working with third sector organisations to create or improve their 
online presence via social media.
You can find out more about these surgeries and aunty social at the following links.

http://duncanhodgson.co.uk/
http://www.auntysocial.co.uk/

After the talks were finished, everyone mixed and chatted amongst themselves, with lots of networking 
going on.

Les showed Stuart Siddons, a local IT contractor, the online tool that was used for the opening 
presentation prezi.com.
Prezi.com uses a large space in which you can drop ideas, and then create path from one section 
to another, as opposed to the standard Powerpoint model of slides.

Carl Whalley, a local Android developer joined the meeting, and spoke about his experience, and 
some of the apps that he has worked on.

Carl has also kindly agreed to give an overview of Android, and app development at our next Geekup.

At the end of the night, everyone left, saying that the event had been a success and long may it continue. 
And with the help of the attendees, I'm sure that this geekup will go from strength to strength.

Blackpool Geekup…it’s nearly here

lespounder — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 21:03:10 +0000

It’s nearly here!!!

I am proud to announce that the first Blackpool Geekup will be on Monday 25th July, 7pm, at Gillespies pub on Topping St, Blackpool!

View Larger Map

Gillespies has very kindly given us a corner of the pub, free WIFI, projector and screen for the evening.

So all we need to do is turn up, grab a drink and enjoy the evening.

I’ve checked with the bar staff, and there will be guest ales on tap, continental bottled beers, and they currently have a cider festival going on. So there is lots to drink, at some quite reasonable prices.

So remember, Monday 25th July, 7pm at Gillespies pub, Topping St.

My thanks to @surlydev for the excellent twitter avatar and for theofficial hashtag #geekupthetower