New Event

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Hi all,

I had a great conversation with Jeff today about hosting a really cool event for CooBric'ers and friends. The basic gist of what he had observed on his own and heard from others was that, while meetups like the NY Tech Meetup are fantastic, it's hard to find meetups that can serve as good open forums on topics that the participants choose.

If any of you were at the Tech Meetup a couple of months back in which there were no presenters and instead 20 or so topics were chosen and the crowd was broken into groups, this is kind of what we have in mind. I personally thought that particular meetup model was a really good one and should be done more often.

The basic idea is this:

Let's have a simple meetup for people working on something that they want to talk about-- whether it's something they want to present informally and get feedback on, an idea that needs to be fleshed out, or a topic in the tech world that merits a good conversation. People can show off their in-progress projects in a casual context without the fear of criticism.

It'd be kind of like Barcamp, but in a much smaller way. And, we think, more frequently. Like once every couple of weeks or once a month or so.

We'd shoot for the first event to be roughly 11/8 at 6-7pm in the Gramstand basement (capacity, about 20. enough to have a bit of a crowd but small enough to be intimate). If it gets popular we could move to larger spaces.


What do you think? Does this sound like a good idea? Anything to add to it? Would it make any sense to merge this with the Happy Hour event we're planning?

Thanks!
Tony

[jywa...@gmail.com]

I like the idea that this would be a place to present early-stage or
in-progress ideas... not where you'd rehearse your presentation or
anything, but just boot up what you have on the projector and ramble
for like 5 minutes tops. Then it would be more like an open
discussion than a Q&A session. The audience is likely to be more
developer/programmer/designer heavy; this isn't a pitch, it's a
workshop. Also, while it'd be possible to schedule a demo or two,
others would be encouraged to just present ad-hoc. Brainstorm!

Jeff

On Oct 19, 12:21 am, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com>
wrote:

[Jennifer Hall]

I don't want it to merge with the happy hour event.
for one, gramstand does not serve alcohol (that I know of) but I think the
happy hour event serves a completely different purpose.

I would love to come to the happy hour event, but would hesitate in coming
to the other.

my 2 cents
Jennifer

*********************
Jennifer S Hall
212 731 2508
512 656 0429 (cell)

[David Rosenstrauch]

Sounds like a cool idea to me, Tony. There's a lot of good that can
come out of getting talented people together to bat their ideas around.
I'm curious to see what emerges.

I'm a bit free-time-challenged (got 2 kids!), so I can't guarantee I'd
be able to make these on a regular basis, but I think I'd be able to
make the 11/8 meeting.

Thanks for organizing this!

DR

[Nate Westheimer]

Yeah, I think this is excellent. I won't be in town on the 8th (launching BricaBox in Las Vegas), but will come to the next one.

Nate

--

Nate Westheimer

Company: http://bricabox.com

Quality Advertising: http://npb.com

Personal: http://innonate.com

Call: 513.225.4567 (anytime)

[Lena L. West - xynoMedia Technology]

I think this idea is exciting and it rocks. We all need a space like this to vet ideas and get feedback.

I won't be able to attend on 11/8. I'll be in Vegas at BlogWorld and then speaking at PostieCon but, I'm game if anything's going downin Dec.

Ciao,

Lena

--
This e-mail is [ ] bloggable [x] ask first [ ] private
__________________________________________________
Lena West, Founder & CEO | xynoMedia Technology
914.377.0600 | LW...@xynoMedia.com
http://www.xynoMedia.com
blog: http://TechForward.Entrepreneur.com
xynoMedia Technology helps growing companies
profit from the power of social media & the Internet.

Nate

projects in a casual context without the fear of criticism..

It'd be kind of like Barcamp, but in a much smaller way. And, we think, more

frequently. Like once every couple of weeks or once a month or so.

We'd shoot for the first event to be roughly 11/8 at 6-7pm in the Gramstand

basement (capacity, about 20. enough to have a bit of a crowd but small

enough to be intimate). If it gets popular we could move to larger spaces.

What do you think? Does this sound like a good idea? Anything to add to it?

Would it make any sense to merge this with the Happy Hour event we're

planning?

Thanks!

Tony

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Jenn: Sorry to confuse things; if we merged the events we'd still do it at a
bar (probably Lunasa).

I think we'll keep them separate. Jeff's message helped clarify the
structure of the event as its own entity.

Lena/David, thanks for your thoughts! I hope you can make it at some point. I think part of the
benefit of running it on a regular basis would be that you don't *have* to make any
particular one, because another would be coming soon!

[Lena L. West - xynoMedia Technology]

Tony:

Thanks!

Yeah, I think so, too. It's not about making every meeting - and as a person who leads an abundant life, I appreciate the flexibility.  I can contribute when I can. That's neat.

Hey - totally off topic request...is there any way we can add a "tail" to the subject lines of CooBric email?  [CooBric] will suffice a la NextNY.

Sometimes I don't know if the email is from CooBric or not and I don't want to miss any communication.

Is this possible?

-Lena

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Sanford, I believe you're the group owner-- can you see if there's a setting for this?

[Sanford Dickert]

Done.

[Lena L. West - xynoMedia Technology]

CooBric rocks!

[Julian Tree]

I am still in china till 26th, let me know if there is another event after that. 

Julian Tree

[jywa...@gmail.com]

What do we call the event? Coobric Demo Days?

On Oct 21, 8:44 pm, Julian Tree <julian.t...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I am still in china till 26th, let me know if there is another event
> after that.
>
> On Oct 20, 2007, at 9:04 AM, Lena L. West - xynoMedia Technology wrote:
>
>
>
> > CooBric rocks!
>
> > --
> > This e-mail is [ ] bloggable [x] ask first [ ] private
> > __________________________________________________
> > Lena West, Founder & CEO | xynoMedia Technology
> > 914.377.0600 | LW...@xynoMedia.com
> >http://www.xynoMedia.com
> > blog:http://TechForward.Entrepreneur.com
> > xynoMedia Technology helps growing companies
> > profit from the power of social media & the Internet.
>
> > --------- Original Message --------
> > From: cooperb...@googlegroups.com
> > To: "cooperb...@googlegroups.com"
> > <cooperb...@googlegroups.com>
> > Subject: [CooBric] Re: New Event
> > Date: 19/10/07 11:47
>
> > Done.
>

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Good question... I was just wondering this.

CooBric Demo Days is a good suggestion... do you think it implies the
informal nature of the demos/presentations/discussions?

Any other suggestions?

CooBric Brainstorm?

[Lena L. West - xynoMedia Technology]

How about CooBricStorm? Corny?

[David Rosenstrauch]

Tony Bacigalupo wrote:
> Good question... I was just wondering this.
>
> CooBric Demo Days is a good suggestion... do you think it implies the
> informal nature of the demos/presentations/discussions?
>
> Any other suggestions?
>
> CooBric Brainstorm?

Brainstorm was more along the lines of what I was thinking. (Or maybe
BrainDump or some such.) I think Demo does sort of imply a formal demo
of a product to an audience, like the Tech Meetup does.

Hey - how about BrainShare?

DR

[Lena L. West - xynoMedia Technology]

Me likey BrainShare

--
This e-mail is [ ] bloggable [x] ask first [ ] private
__________________________________________________
Lena West, Founder & CEO | xynoMedia Technology
914.377.0600 | LW...@xynoMedia.com
http://www.xynoMedia.com
blog: http://TechForward.Entrepreneur.com
xynoMedia Technology helps growing companies
profit from the power of social media & the Internet.

--------- Original Message --------
From: cooperb...@googlegroups.com
To: "cooperb...@googlegroups.com" <cooperb...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: [CooBric] Re: New Event

[Sanford Dickert]

Hey - I like them both...

[Tony]

Hello friends,

Talked to Richard at Gramstand about using the downstairs space for
our event.

Here's the basic breakdown of costs:

==Lower-Level Event Rental==
Event Pricing (3-4 hours):

Full Catering - $337
Snack Catering - $276
Space Only - $170
BYOB Corking Fee* - $100

It would be nice to use Gramstand as our location and I think the
basement is a nice space, but I'm not married to it. I'd be game for
another location that's cheaper and/or bigger.

What do you guys think?

Thanks,
Tony

[David Rosenstrauch]

I'm not really picky about the location personally, but frankly the
price does concern me a little bit. Not that I'd have a problem
chipping in (I'd be happy to), but:

a) I wonder whether we'd get enough attendees to cover the cost, and
b) I guess I was thinking this was supposed to a pretty informal
get-together for people to just hang out and toss ideas around. If it
gets pricey, then:
1) we might be forced to try to gather a larger number of people than
might be ideal for the purpose of "brain-sharing" and/or
2) people need to chip in more than they'd like to pay for the space -
so it could scare away attendees.

So I'm not trying to shoot down the idea, but I'm just wondering if
somewhere without a room charge might be better.

Hmmm .... not sure where to suggest as an alternative though -
particularly since I'm not sure how many people we're talking about.

Here's a thought: I once held a small users group meeting at The Apple
bar/restaurant in the Village (http://www.applerestaurant.com/).
Although they have a private party room (which again costs bucks) we
didn't need it. I basically just made a reservation for a big table for
dinner (maybe 12ish people). Place wasn't overly crowded or noisy (it's
a mellow place, plus it was a weeknight) so it worked out OK. Pros:
pretty cheap. No need to pay for the room, just everybody paying for
their own dinner and drinks. Cons: the "long table syndrome", where
the group wound up sort of splitting into a bunch of smaller
sub-conversations. Might not be such a problem for the purposes of
something like BrainShare though.

So perhaps there - or somewhere similar?

Anyone else have some thoughts on the matter?

(And by the way, thanks very much for looking into this Tony.)

DR

[Jennifer Hall]

I'm not sure about the price either.
it does sound a bit high but don't know really how to do it cheaper.

jennifer

*********************
Jennifer S Hall
212 731 2508
512 656 0429 (cell)

[Julian Tree]

So where are we today?

[Sanford Dickert]

Gramstand...

[MattCoop]

Brainswarm

On Oct 22, 12:12 pm, "Sanford Dickert" <sdick...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Well it looks like the word "brain" is going to be in there for sure :-D

They all sound good to me.

Here's the deal with this event. We need one of the following two things:

1. A free space to host it
2. A sponsor to kick in money to support the cost of hosting it at Gramstand (not a lot of money, should be easy to find!)

If you're up for tackling one of the above tasks, pick up the ball and run!

T

[MattCoop]

I was hashing out a plan for a similar event for the New York Web 2.0
for Grassroots Cause Meetup just last night with that group's
organizer. We want to put social change leaders in the same room with
technologists who may want to help out. We're shooting for January,
so maybe our event can be one in the series of meetings being proposed
here.

I threw together this pbwiki for it today: rootstechnyc.pbwiki.com

We're researching locations for January anyway, so I'll see what I can
do to find something sooner.

BTW, I'm upstairs at Gramstand today sporting the white macbook.

Matt Coop

On Nov 2, 10:39 am, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Well it looks like the word "brain" is going to be in there for sure :-D
>
> They all sound good to me.
>
> Here's the deal with this event. We need one of the following two things:
>
> 1. A free space to host it
> 2. A sponsor to kick in money to support the cost of hosting it at Gramstand
> (not a lot of money, should be easy to find!)
>
> If you're up for tackling one of the above tasks, pick up the ball and run!
>
> T
>

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Sounds great! I like the idea of theming some of the events.

While I see one component/direction being this free-form meetup where
peope can voice their ideas and thoughts, I can also see starting with
a certain theme or problem and then us brainstorming solutions as a
group.

I think this is starting to take shape!

Thanks,
Tony

[MattCoop]

Looks like I have a space for us - gratis.

I work at the Manhattan Village Kaplan Center at 16 Cooper Square. We
can get a classroom in the evening. It'll have room for 40 (at most),
a whiteboard and tables, and WiFi (though we may want to plug in our
own access point as it can be finicky).

We have to keep it under the radar a bit, since they don't typically
rent out or even lend out space to outside groups.

There's usually at least one spare room on any given evening, so let's
pick a date and I can reserve it. Maybe we should move the event
planning to the wiki?

Matt

On Nov 2, 9:39 am, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Well it looks like the word "brain" is going to be in there for sure :-D
>
> They all sound good to me.
>
> Here's the deal with this event. We need one of the following two things:
>
> 1. A free space to host it
> 2. A sponsor to kick in money to support the cost of hosting it at Gramstand
> (not a lot of money, should be easy to find!)
>
> If you're up for tackling one of the above tasks, pick up the ball and run!
>
> T
>

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Hotness!

Your management is okay with having us there, right? We can run a Meetup and limit the number of RSVP's if it helps ease their minds.

[MattCoop]

The management is ok with it, since it's a good relationship to build
for a few reasons. Definitely let's limit the RSVPs for the first go
round, and keep close communication with the attendees. The bad
scenario I'm imagining involves a lot of people showing up right at
the busiest time of today (6-7pm) and bothering the front desk staff
because they don't know where the room is. If this first one goes
over smoothly, it'll increase our chances for free access to this
space in the future.

Any ideas on dates? I'd like to check for room availability before
putting it on Meetup.

On Nov 5, 12:16 pm, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Hotness!
>
> Your management is okay with having us there, right? We can run a Meetup and
> limit the number of RSVP's if it helps ease their minds.
>

[Julian Tree]

That's great.  You can write a list of rule, such as don't come around 6-7pm, and don't bother the front desk.  Post clear direction on where the room is. Then this will work very nicely. 

Julian Tree

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Let's shoot for 11/14. Matt, what time works best?

Can we say 7-9pm, or should we go 8-10 to be safe?

[MattCoop]

11/14 looks great and 7-9pm will be fine. The center closes at 10, so
we'll want that extra hour in case it runs late.

What's the next step?

On Nov 5, 3:40 pm, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Let's shoot for 11/14. Matt, what time works best?
>
> Can we say 7-9pm, or should we go 8-10 to be safe?
>

[Tony Bacigalupo]

I just did the next couple of steps..

- Sign up for a Meetup Organizer account (check)
- Create Meetup (check)

If you guys sign up for the Meetup, I can make you co-organizers. Maybe one of you can write a snappy description for the event.

Then we can start to promote soon.

PS, I made the address private so you can see it only after you've signed up for the event.

Rockin!
T

On 11/5/07, MattCoop <mattcoo...@gmail.com> wrote:

[MattCoop]

Ok, I'm signed up for the meetup. Are we going to give it a targeted
common goal, or just have it be more of an idea free-for-all? I like
the idea of coming up with specific community building strategies so
that we can ramp up interest in the search for a space, like we talked
about on Saturday.

The other idea was to try to outline a vision of a coworking web
platform, but that seems like it should wait given what's already
underway out at Citizen Agency.

On Nov 5, 4:23 pm, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I just did the next couple of steps..
>
> - Sign up for a Meetup Organizer account (check)

> - Create Meetup (check <http://newtech.meetup.com/75/>)

>
> If you guys sign up for the Meetup, I can make you co-organizers. Maybe one
> of you can write a snappy description for the event.
>
> Then we can start to promote soon.
>
> PS, I made the address private so you can see it only after you've signed up
> for the event.
>
> Rockin!
> T
>

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Yeah, for now I think the best bet is to look at Jeff's and my first two posts in this thread.

Jeff, feel free to weigh in on this when you get a chance. I'll make you an organizer as well.

T

On 11/5/07, MattCoop <mattcoo...@gmail.com> wrote:

[MattCoop]

Ok. Sounds like fun.

On Nov 5, 4:57 pm, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Yeah, for now I think the best bet is to look at Jeff's and my first two
> posts in this thread.
>
> Jeff, feel free to weigh in on this when you get a chance. I'll make you an
> organizer as well.
>
> T
>

[dantekgeek]

Signed up, will be there, great job on organizing this guys!

On Nov 5, 4:23 pm, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I just did the next couple of steps..
>
> - Sign up for a Meetup Organizer account (check)

> - Create Meetup (check <http://newtech.meetup.com/75/>)

>
> If you guys sign up for the Meetup, I can make you co-organizers. Maybe one
> of you can write a snappy description for the event.
>
> Then we can start to promote soon.
>
> PS, I made the address private so you can see it only after you've signed up
> for the event.
>
> Rockin!
> T
>

[David Rosenstrauch]

MattCoop wrote:
> 11/14 looks great and 7-9pm will be fine. The center closes at 10, so
> we'll want that extra hour in case it runs late.

Looks like it's scheduled for 11/15 on the meetup though. Which date is
correct?

DR

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Good catch-- Matt said the 14th works best for him and his facility, so I updated the Meetup.

The 14th it is.

Thanks,
Tony

[MattCoop]

Will we need a projector? Also, would an auditorium with a stage be
preferable to a classroom? There is a whiteboard in the auditorium,
but the seating arangement is less conducive to discussion.

On Nov 6, 12:14 pm, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com>
wrote:

[sblau...@sloan.mit.edu]

Trying to follow this long thread... Sanford invited me to join this
group as I'm a 2nd year MIT Sloan MBA and Cooper grad.
Is the event still on for tomorrow evening? I'll be coming down
tomorrow from Boston and would love to meet some of you.
Sim

On Nov 2, 9:39 am, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Well it looks like the word "brain" is going to be in there for sure :-D
>
> They all sound good to me.
>
> Here's the deal with this event. We need one of the following two things:
>
> 1. A free space to host it
> 2. A sponsor to kick in money to support the cost of hosting it at Gramstand
> (not a lot of money, should be easy to find!)
>
> If you're up for tackling one of the above tasks, pick up the ball and run!
>
> T
>

> > > > DR- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[Tony Bacigalupo]

I can bring some whiteboards if need be.

A projector would be helpful but I'm not sure if it's necessary.

Do you have to reserve the space ahead of time? Maybe one or two of us can come check it out?

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Hi Sim,

The event got pushed back to 11/14. However you are still welcome to come
cowork with us at Gramstand!

Just add your information here:
http://cooperbricolage.pbwiki.com/cooperBricolage+Signin+List

Thanks,
Tony

[jywa...@gmail.com]

OK I can bring a projector. Sorry i've been out of this discussion,
i'm embarrassed to say I had trouble finding the thread on google
groups. Looks like it was renamed recently and here I am. Very
psyched for this, especially after the Meetup last night, it's always
exciting to see these projects. I'm hoping people will bring plenty
of less-finished stuff to just show off. I've seen a lot of peoples'
stuff one-on-one at Gramstand -- show off your stuff, people!

On Nov 7, 10:26 am, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Hi Sim,
>
> The event got pushed back to 11/14. However you are still welcome to come
> cowork with us at Gramstand!
>
> Just add your information here:http://cooperbricolage.pbwiki.com/cooperBricolage+Signin+List
>
> Thanks,
> Tony
>

[Tony]

Subject changed.

Psyched for the projector!

[jywa...@gmail.com]

Should someone bring some speakers? I don't anticipate we'll need
them, i guess... but some miscreant may have audio on their website.
OK, then, miscreants must supply their own audio equipment.

[Daniel Packer]

I have some studio monitors with decent volume. Someone point me to the
link with all the event info again? I will confirm after reviewing it. :)

-Daniel

--

Daniel Packer, Principal
X To Infinity, LLC
18 West 27th Street, 2nd Floor
New York, NY 10001
P 646.797.4347 / F 866.833.0673

Web, Code, Software, and Systems. Visit www.xtoinfinity.com for info.

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Details:

Blog Post: http://www.cooperbricolage.com/2007/11/07/coobric-brainstorm-i-open-topic/

Meetup: http://newtech.meetup.com/75/calendar/6682952/

I agree that miscreants supply their own audio equipment.

[MattCoop]

Tony,
I'm the person who schedules events into rooms here, so we have a good
deal of flexibility. If you want to come some day prior to the event
and look at the different possibilities, that would be fine. I'm here
until 6pm today, and until 7 most other days.
Matt

On Nov 7, 9:41 am, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I can bring some whiteboards if need be.
>
> A projector would be helpful but I'm not sure if it's necessary.
>
> Do you have to reserve the space ahead of time? Maybe one or two of us can
> come check it out?
>

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Sounds great. We'll be in touch.

[MattCoop]

Hi All,

The event is still going as planned. The location has wifi, but I
don't want to trust it completely. The rooms have ethernet jacks as
well. Does anyone have a wifi access point that we can plug in?

Also, be sure to sign up at http://newtech.meetup.com/75

What's everyone planning to present?

Matt

On Nov 7, 3:03 pm, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Sounds great. We'll be in touch.
>

[jywa...@gmail.com]

By wifi access point do you mean a router, or are you asking if anyone
knows a nearby wireless network we can use?

I'll be showing off a clothing-related social network. But people
shouldn't have to reserve in advance or anything. I hope we see some
of the cool things I've been seeing around the CooBric, however. Greg,
Robert?

Just to emphasize, we're not showing off finished products here,
although thats fine too... it'd be great to see lots of early or in-
progress ideas, experiments, even just mashups between 2 web services
or something.

Jeff

On Nov 11, 8:04 pm, MattCoop <mattcooperri...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> The event is still going as planned. The location has wifi, but I
> don't want to trust it completely. The rooms have ethernet jacks as
> well. Does anyone have a wifi access point that we can plug in?
>

> Also, be sure to sign up athttp://newtech.meetup.com/75

[Tony Bacigalupo]

Pretty sure we're talking about needing a router.

I look forward to the clothing social network!

[jywa...@gmail.com]

I can bring an Apple Airport Express too.

On Nov 12, 3:11 pm, "Tony Bacigalupo" <tonybacigal...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Pretty sure we're talking about needing a router.
>
> I look forward to the clothing social network!
>

[MattCoop]

Yeah, we need a wifi router if possible. Just to be safe.

On Nov 13, 11:09 am, "j...@vestaldesign.com" <jywar...@gmail.com>
wrote: