“Fixing” Technology Meetups in Chicago

I found this while browsing through one of my old attempts at a blog and decided to move it over here since Jelly Chicago is getting really close to the “ideal” that I laid out a while ago….

From Feb 22nd 2008…

Last night I attended TechCocktail here in Chicago, a great event that makes you feel good about some of the exciting things that are sprouting up in this city. However, while it was great to see such enthusiasm and turnout for a technology event here in Chicago, my disappointment with technology based meetups will continue.

As I see it there are several problems with the popular meetups. There is too much noise at these events (and I don’t mean the audible kind).
There are so many people there doing so many different things that it often becomes difficult to have any sort of meaningful or worthwhile interaction with them or to contribute something meaningful or worthwhile to others.

It seems often that the sheer size of the event and, in turn, the different goals each type of person has for the night ends up fighting with the premise and ideals the event had in the first place.

Some people come for the free beer and to have a good time, some come to find people to work with and share ideas, some come to catch up with each other, and some come to demo their latest product or site. Add to that those who come to pitch you (and those that come to hound you and pitch the same crazy idea that they’ve been hounding people with at every tech meetup since the dawn of tech meetups) and you get a pretty awkwardly interacting mass of people.

Hardly a place that generates anything other than excitement for the tech community in the area which is a great thing but doesn’t do a whole lot for the other 361 days of the year when the event is not happening.

So not being one to let things sit, I’ve been doing some thinking about how to fix them and how to create meetups that are functional, productive, and worthwhile. Still less intense and focused on one group of people than a BarCamp or an Unconference but still an improvement upon the large scale meet-and-greets.

So what would make these events productive? I think I’ve narrowed it down to several key factors all related to the idea that the best business relationships emerge from meaningful real-life interactions:

Increased Frequency – Its difficult to form meaningful relationships with people you only meet in passing and speak to briefly a couple times per year.

The ability to be productive – The ability to show someone something or elaborate on an idea is key and its just not optimal to whip out a laptop or brainstorm in a large and crowded space.

Filter out the Noise – While a large group of people may seem optimal for meeting new people its actually quite difficult especially when that large group of people is compressed into a short time. Lets face it, a series of elevator pitches is not a conversation

Less Self Interest – If the idea is to grow community, then sponsors shilling for exposure, people trying to sell you things, and people trying to randomly network are counter productive

More Community Ethos – Like I’ve stressed, you’re there to learn from and interact with others who are doing cool things, not figure out how they’re useful to you or what you can get from them.

Its funny but the best solution I’ve thought about seems to come from the support group model, i.e. they meet frequently, have some form of accountability for like-minded or like-interested people, and they allow for personal interaction and meaningful relationships within medium sized groups.

The solution I had been tossing around is sort of a founders anonymous, a weekly or bi-weekly meeting of people perhaps in a coffehouse backroom (yes I know about OpenCoffee and ChicagoBeta but the sponsors and the pitches there sort of throw me off) or rotating through company conference rooms where people begin to know each other over time based on the cool stuff they’re making and only indirectly on the businesses they’re trying to grow. Realizing this, there is also no incentive for people to show up, I’ll give a hat tip to techcocktail and bring beer into the mix…

It seems like the ideal setting would be a “founders hour”, a biweekly time after work at a local bar where founders could wander in and get to know each other over a relatively quiet drink and with a frequency and intimacy that allows for work to get done and meaningful relationships to be built.

The size of the gathering also helps to act as a filter as theres no room for hucksters and hangers on, if they don’t have something meaningful to contribute to the conversation they’ll eventually just stop coming or people will stop talking to them.

No sponsors, no pretense, no pitching… just cool ideas and the intent of fostering a tech community. I’ll keep thinking but I would like to announce my intention to start something like this here in Chicago and anyone who is interested should drop me a line to brad at unchartedventures with the .com and the @ of course.