Open Source Bridge will be a completely volunteer-run, community effort to connect developers working with open source. We're kicking things off with a town hall discussion and planning meeting on October 30th, 7:30pm at CubeSpace (located at 622 SE Grand Avenue in Portland). We'll talk about overall goals for the conference, then break into small working groups to start tackling the event planning needs. If you can, bring an audio or video recorder to help document the discussion.

Please let us know if you can attend. If October 30 doesn't work for you, let us know as we are considering a second meeting during the day on the west-side. We'd very much like to have your participation in making this conference a fun, educational experience.

You can RSVP by filling in the form at http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?key=p1ZDddPXGskYFX5NnM9FaXA&hl=en

Open Source Bridge will be a completely volunteer-run, community effort to connect developers working with open source. We're having a second town hall discussion and planning meeting on November 6th at OTBC's new location in The Round (next to the Beaverton Transit Center). We'll talk about overall goals for the conference, then break into small working groups to start tackling the event planning needs. If you can, bring an audio or video recorder to help document the discussion.

Whether or not you'll be attending, you can join our mailing lists to receive announcements and join in the planning discussion:

osbridge-announce, low traffic announcement list for events like this one!

osbridge-discuss, possibly high traffic list for discussing anything related to the conference!

You can RSVP by filling in the form at http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?key=p1ZDddPXGskYFX5NnM9FaXA&hl=en Tags

Hi friends! Rick Turoczy asked me if he and the Open Source Bridge crew could lead some discussion tomorrow @beerandblog. I think what they are up to is valuable to the Portland community and her tech scene, so I said yes. If you’re not yet familiar with Open Source Bridge, they are a group of local techies that want to continue OSCON now that they are not coming back to Portland. But, they’re growing into much more than that. Here’s what they say on their about page:

We are advocates, developers, and Portlanders making the world better with open source technology.

Open Source Bridge will bring together the diverse tech communities of the greater Portland area and showcase our unique and thriving open source environment. We will show how well Portland does open source and share our best practices for development, community and connectedness with the rest of the world.

We’re setting out to change the structure of conference planning: asking interested people to come together at a Town Hall meeting, and share their collective experience and wisdom. Following the lead of the Linux Plumbers Conference, we’re enlisting curators for our conference sessions, planning mini-confs for critical topics and including unconference sessions. The focus will always be on increasing interaction between participants and engaging everyone in the content.