BarCamp Rochester was awesome. The turnout was solid, the presentations were informative, and the food was free. En serio, what more could you ask for? Well, I guess you could ask for some free swag. Of course, Stack Overflow and Puppet Industries had swag cravings covered (suddenly one free t-shirt became three).

The variety of the presentations was incredible; I saw everything from a thirty minute piece on quantum physics and teleportation to a five minute lightning talk summarizing all fifty episodes of “My Little Pony”. Most were technical in some way, including a bunch about web development. That makes sense, given BarCamp’s roots in web application development. Other interesting talks I saw discussed brain preservation, wireless power transfer, benefits of static hosting on Amazon, using computers to analyze jazz music and credit card hacks.

Practical Privacy for the Paranoid Poweruser
Practical Privacy for the Paranoid Poweruser

My presentation was “Practical Privacy for the Paranoid Poweruser”, aimed at arming everyday computer users with simple tools to make them a bit more secure here on the ’tubes. Being my first Barcamp, I selected a later time slot so I could see how some more experienced presenters approached their talks, and also hitting a slightly more focused audience. I was very happy with the interactive turnout, and by the end it felt more like a casual conversation than a conference presentation.

Bottom line: BarCamp is definitely something I want to do more often. While I won’t be in town for the next Rochester event, DC hosts the occasional BarCamp that I’ll try to hop on board with. If you haven’t gone yet, give BarCamp a shot. I’m sure you’ll be happy you did.