I need a break
After CUSEC, it wasn’t all over. A TikiFest was scheduled in Ottawa on Tuesday. For those who are not aware of these, TikiFests are similar to CodeFests, except that they are focused around Tikiwiki. I was surprised by how many people showed up on a week day. Ten of us were present, plus two visitors during the pub night before. Numbers are quite surprising for Ottawa and a project with such a small scope.
For me, it was an occasion to do some work on Wiki-Translation and meet the other people gravitating around the project. There was no way I could miss it, even with that cold I caught somehow during CUSEC. Now I need to rest. Three activities in three weeks might be just a bit too much.
Activity has been growing recently. The Montreal area is on a roll. I don’t know if it’s only my perspective or the movement is global, but I have the feeling that the tech scene is really exploding, and open source is getting a good chunk of it. Back in the days, we had monthly meetings and some meet-ups. Activities were small-scale. Nowdays, monthly meetings are still around, *Camps appear everywhere and there are small activities all the time. There are many familiar faces, but many new as well. There is really a transformation going, and I am afraid we will all burn out trying to follow it.
There is also a big change in the type of audience. A few years ago, most of the people attending activities were programmers and enthusiasts. Now, we get to have entrepreneurs, researchers, PhDs and quite a lot of non-tech people. In some way, it reminds me a bit of AQP3L/FACIL where many technology and community people were gathered for the greater good through open source. Only this time, everyone truly benefits from it.
Expect a lot of changes in 2008.