SPARK Talks at the NEPA Tech meet up in December 2017

SPARK Talks are, by definition, Short, Provocative, Action-oriented, Realistic, and Knowledgeable talks that are loosely timed, on a specific topic (more or less), and allow many presentations to be given at an event. I had never heard of them prior to this month’s NEPA Tech meet up organized by John George.

SPARK Talks remind me of Lightning Talks or Ignite. I have been to a few Ignite events – some where very early like this one 10 years ago. The thing I appreciate most about this style of presentation is that many in attendance can be part of the program. In fact, at this particular meet up nearly every single attendee was able to take a few minutes and describe themselves, something they’re currently working on, or a topic of their choice.

Photo: Ted giving his presentation on Rust.

In all there were 15 presenters. I quickly jotted them down as they happened. I didn’t get full names or all of their web sites, but at least I captured something. Here are the presenters and their topics:

John – spoke about becoming an independent developer
Jared – discussed his ambitions of working in real estate
George – described use IoT in industrial industries
Ryan – talked of learning more about computers, the web, to better do his job
Kevin – discussed some of the WhatNow! journey
Beth – spoke of her passion for the environment
Colin (me) – spoke about not getting hung up on decision making, just start
Jason – discussed some of the projects Sho Technology Solutions is working on
Ted – talked about the advantages of Rust
Anthony – educated us on the xAPI
Chris – discussed some of the challenges and next-steps for NEPA Fiber
Danny – showed us a video demo of Kraken Board Sports latest product
Mark – rallied the attendees to contribute to NEPA Tech
Den – discussed his self-taught history of becoming a front-end developer
Gary – discussed eating odd things for his YouTube channel

As you can see the topics were all over the map which helped to keep the evening interesting and the shortness of the presentations moved the event along nicely. I believe NEPA Tech will do events like this again in the future. If so, be sure to contribute. Most of these were fairly unscripted talks so don’t be hesitant.

Thanks to John George for organizing this month’s event. Onto 2018.

December 28, 2017

Attending Venture Idol 2017 at Ben Franklin TechVentures

In 2007 I visited the area where Ben Franklin TechVentures is now. I was there for an interview with the then CEO of Viddler, Rob Sandie, to see about working there full time. At the time, Viddler was housed in Jordan Hall – a one-story building next to the now incredible Ben Franklin TechVentures complex. It wasn’t until many months later we moved Viddler out of the closet-like space in Jordan Hall and into the future-feeling building next door.

That memory pales in comparison to what exists there today.

I make mention of this fact because the feeling one gets when walking into Ben Franklin TechVentures is that the work that goes on in this building is new, exciting, and is the future of technology in our area. I personally want schools, libraries, incubators, and town squares to feel as though they are leading us into the future. Where the work that I do is raised to meet the expectation of the environment. I feel that Ben Franklin TechVentures does that.

In August when I presented at the local meet up I loved seeing the new wing being constructed. This month that wing was completed and this year’s Venture Idol 2017 event was in it.

But building’s aren’t everything. The community is of even more import. And the community is strong.

This year’s Venture Idol was the best attended year yet and, as Fred Beste (the emcee for the event) pointed out, everyone had a chair for the first time. He’s seen BFTV’s growth and he was as excited as I was to see where it is today.

The presentations by the three finalists were great. Mark Keith and I remarked how polished each presentation was. In my mind there were two presentations that were clearly the best; Channel Ape (from Scranton woot woot!) and Give Gab. Both had impressive results, tight presentations, and a roadmap that made sense. At the end of the night Channel Ape took home the victory.

Photo: Mike Averto, CEO Channel Ape, preparing for presentation.

Yes, it is a big of a jaunt from Scranton to Bethlehem. But it has been worth it every single time I’ve done it over the last 10+ years. I’m looking forward to seeing the sort of growth that region has been enjoying happening in our area too. It is only a matter of time.

November 16, 2017

The Giving Tree Wellness Center, Penn Avenue, Scranton, Pa – September 2017

In September Mark Keith and I poked our heads into this brand-new business in Downtown Scranton. They have a nice spot (and sensory deprivation chambers).

October 13, 2017

Attending January’s NEPA.js meet up

Aaron Rosenberg NEPA.js

Photo: Aaron Rosenberg presenting an intro to Node.js.

January’s NEPA.js meet up, the second monthly meet up for this group, was held on Tuesday evening at the Scranton Enterprise Center. This group, though only a few months old, is starting to get its legs underneath it and it is really great to see the community building.

The meet up’s discussion was centered around an introduction to Node.js and it was extremely well presented by Aaron Rosenberg. Aaron did an excellent job explaining the project’s raison d’être, history, and growth. One bit I especially liked was him showing how the browser’s JavaScript engine processed requests using Loupe. All-in-all an excellent introduction. (Link to presentation slides forthcoming. Check back here.)

Following Aaron’s presentation was Mark Keith showing some real live coding of a simple Node app using Express, a framework for building Node web apps, which quickly devolved slightly into discussions on scope, globals, “this“, etc. which was all good because the attendees were steering the conversation.

After the two hour meet up we made our way through the parking lot to Ale Mary’s for a beer or two. I’m looking forward to February’s meet up.

Thanks goes to Aaron and Mark for putting together the presentations and to tecBRIDGE for the pizza.

January 12, 2017

Attending the NEPA.js meetup

NEPA.js

On Tuesday I attended the first monthly NEPA.js meetup at the Scranton Enterprise Center. Mark Keith, a JavaScript developer who somewhat recently moved into the area, was the organizer and TecBridge – who organizes the NEPA Tech meetup group – helped to coordinate, host, organize and provide pizza for this brand-new group.

The common refrain in our area is that those of us who build software products, enjoy a good bit of nerdery, or want to reach out and socialize with people who know what a npm package is… are somehow alone. That simply isn’t true and the first NEPA.js meetup proved that. Twenty-five or so people made it out to this first meetup even with the snow. There were young and not-so-young, men, women, and even those that didn’t know what JavaScript was but knew it was important for them to understand it.

After some introductions Mark did a great job of giving an overview of what JavaScript the language was and how it can be used. He kept it high-level and, though I’m sure some didn’t understand everything he said, surely they left knowing more about what JavaScript is then when they walked in. We also had those in the room that have been developing with JavaScript for years and years – and even one Mozilla team member.

The group meets again next month and will continue to do so the second Tuesday of each month. The group also has a Slack channel so if it you want in just ping me on Twitter.

December 15, 2016