Category Archives: General

Waiting for WordCamp 2014? Get Involved in Atlanta WordPress Meetups

We are at work on getting our WordCamp Atlanta 2014 site set up and ready to go. In the meantime, here is a description about WordCamps and WordPress Meetups. For more WordPress goodness, check out the posts on this site as well as WordPress TV to see WordCamp presentations from WordCamps all over the world.

According to WordCamp Central,

WordCamp is a conference that focuses on everything WordPress. WordCamps are informal, community-organized events that are put together by WordPress users like you. Everyone from casual users to core developers participate, share ideas, and get to know each other.

WordCamps are not-for-profit events that grow out of the local WordPress communities. In Atlanta, our community is made up of people that are active in our local WordPress Meetup Groups.

Meetup Groups

Meetup Badge

We have several WordPress Meetups, held all over the Metro-Atlanta area. These Meetups feature specific topics geared to the various levels ranging from beginners through developers. The Meetups are a good way to learn more about WordPress and how to use it, whatever your level is. If you have some degree of proficiency, WordPress Meetups are a great way to share your WordPress knowledge with others by getting involved and speaking. A good number of our WordCamp speakers are drawn from speakers from our local Meetups. Continue reading

Thanks Everyone!

I just want to say how thankful I am for everyone who participated in this WordCamp. It was a great experience and I’m grateful for the opportunity to hear from people about the experiences they had at this camp. I told many people that what makes all this all worthwhile to me is knowing that on Monday morning hundreds of people are going to apply new ideas to the work they do, WordPress related or otherwise.

I heard a lot of cool stories about what people have gone through to get here, both physically and with WordPress. It was very neat to hear that several people from Ashville met at this camp and were inspired to continue getting together once they got home. I enjoined hearing from the owner of a development shop that had brought 5 people to camp. They split up and attended sessions in the user, design and development tracks and all said that they had new things they were planning on working on next week.

There were a lot more stories like this that made being involved with this WordCamp so rewarding.

We couldn't do it without our volunteers.

We couldn’t do it without our volunteers.

These are the people that served on the organizing Committee. We all had teams of people working with us. Thanks to each and every one of you.

Organizer Committee: Judi Knight, Russell Fair, Carel Bekker, John Saddington
Speaker Selection: Russel Fair and John Saddington
Volunteer Wrangler:Kris McInerny
Video & Photography: Michael Wiginton, Frank Neimier
Registration: Kathy Drewien
Emcee for Rooms: Melody-Rose Parker
Social Media Coordinator: Matt Haff, Monica McPherin
Graphics: Diana Simons , Claudia Arkush, Sue Heslup
Location coordination at Loudermilk: Judi Knight
Logo and Website Design: Jared Erikson
Sponsors: Carel Bekker, Eric Flamm, Cindy Elsberry
Location: Judi Knight
QR: Stephanie Truemoss
Speaker Hounds to get SlideShares: Lynne Young and Monica McPherrin
After Party: Judi Knight
VIP party: John and Sue Saddington

Check out the photos on Flickr by Frank Neimier.

Pictures from the Afterparty! See You Next Year!

Organizing Team!

Organizing Team!


Man, what a blast! I’m still recovering from the event and we had some great photos taken at WordCamp by Frank Niemier.

And we have some fun afterparty pics from the photobooth that we wanted to share with you all! Here full round of images here.

A few photos to get you warmed up!

Russell giving a hand.

Russell giving a hand.

Cody Benson and GSU migration team.

Cody Benson and GSU migration team.

Naomi Bush

Naomi Bush

From the organizing team – thank you! We’ll see you next year!

Oh, and if you have any other pictures, please link them in the comments below!

Countdown to WordCamp #2 – Who’s Coming?

friends

One of the best things that you can do before you come tomorrow is get to know your soon-to-be friends!

Check out our “Who’s Coming” page and take a look at who you might run into. Check out their Twitter page as well as their blog. Make note of the people you really want to spend some time with and make sure to drop them a line (again, via Twitter perhaps).

Continue reading

Countdown to WordCamp #3 – Get Your Questions Ready!

One of the best parts of WordCamp is the ability to network with other knowledgable folk who may have been around WordPress longer than you have.

That’s ok! We’ve all started from square one at some point and this is your opportunity to learn as much as you possibly can about WordPress. Consequently, make sure you have your list of questions ready before you get to WordCamp this Friday and Saturday.

Your mission? To get all of your questions answered! Sure, it might be a long list but it’s your responsibility to get them asked as no one’s going to know what you’re questions are until you’ve asked them!

Continue reading

Countdown to WordCamp #4 – Slides Templates? We Got Slides!

Looking for Keynote or Powerpoint Slide Templates for your talk (or just because you’d like to have them)?

We’ve got both generated by our community for you to use! Get them here.

You are not required to use these, by the way – but they might help you out!

Countdown to WordCamp #5

There are 5 days to go until WordCamp Atlanta open the door to a weekend of excitement, great content, and WordPress mayhem!

Ok, so maybe not “mayhem” but tons of fun to be had by all! We’re excited that you’ve chosen to be a part of the event and we’re upset that not everyone will be able to attend. There’s a bitter-sweet feeling of being “sold out” of tickets as we’re glad we’ve been able to financially put the camp together but sad that not everyone who expressed interest in being there can actually be there

C’est la vie, as they say.

Continue reading

Open Letter to Campers

Are you all getting excited about WordCamp Atlanta 2013? I know we are!

First, we are sorry that there are a lot of people out there who did not get a ticket before we sold out. We sold 450 tickets and will not be releasing anymore nor will will be able to take walk-ins who did not pre-register.

If you need a ticket or have a ticket that you don’t need, please go on Twitter using #WCATL and find each other. The original ticket holder can go to our site and change the name to that of the new ticket owner.

If you have a receipt from Paypal then you can know your registration went through and you do not need any further confirmation at registration.

Registration: We will open registration at 8:15 on Friday morning and will have coffee, tea and muffins available. Announcements and Keynote will begin at 9:00 AM.

Parking: When you arrive at the Loudermilk Center, there is parking in the deck behind the building. On Friday, there will be a 7.50 charge for parking but Saturday parking will be free.

Happiness Room: Be sure to stop into Happiness Room with your WordPress questions. It will be staffed by some great WordPress talent and for those of your who have been around a bit, we invite you to take some time to offer your help to others.

Internet: We will have Internet available, but this is a new location for us and one never knows just how well it will work. That said, please refrain from live-streaming or doing anything that is resource intensive. We suggest that you put your computers away during the sessions so you can interact with the other campers. If you have specific needs for excellent, internet access while you are at Camp, you might want to bring your own personal WIFI, just in case.

After Party Time: Each day after camp, people are going to meet up about a mile away at The Drafting Table. Wear you name badge to receive a 15% discount on food and look for some beer specials. Directions to the pub are on the website.

Sponsors: We want to give a shout out to all of our 2013 Sponsors. One of our Platinum Sponsors, ORBITR is actually using this opportunity to launch their WordPress Marketing Platform. Our other Platinum Sponsor, vLink is doing all of our video post-production from last year and this year’s sessions.

Volunteers: We want to acknowledge all our volunteers. WordPress itself is an Open-Source platform, which means it is non-proprietary and anyone can use any part of it at no charge. People who have taken part in its design, development or documentation, do so as volunteers!

Along these sames lines, WordCamps are are also non-profit endeavors, backed by the WordPress Foundation and run entirely, 100% on volunteer power. Our organizing committee, the organizing team, the speakers, as well as the minions of volunteers working on the committees to produce this event, are the heart and soul of our Atlanta WordPress community and make WordCampAtl possible. We are truly appreciative of everyone’s involvement in creating this event.

And finally campers, we want you to know a secret. . . the best things that happen at WordCamps actually happen before, after or between the sessions. If what you want to know is not being covered in a session, go seek it out in the Happiness room. Get out from behind your phones or computers and take the time to meet people and find out what they are up to. Go hang-out afterwards at the Drafting Table and make some new friends. You will not find a more open and available community anywhere.

Welcome to WordCamp!

Keynote by Cody Benson

Cody Benson, Keynote at WordCampWe are happy to announce a very exciting Keynote address by Cody Benson, Manager of Application Engineering at Georgia State University and a member of our Atlanta WordPress Meetup Group. Cody’s team at Georgia State team is presently in the process of migrating the entire Georgia State University Website to WordPress.

The story of how this decision was made and how the project is progressing is going to knock your socks off. Cody is looking forward to sharing the awesome work his team has been doing within a public organization, with local private partners, using WordPress as their the Open Source CMS. The choice to go with WordPress according to Cody, “has allowed Georgia State University to improve efficiency and provide more time for people to inspire others”.

After Camp: The Drafting Table

2 Each day when Camp is over, we are heading on over to The Drafting Table to meet up with friends old and new. They say the best things that happen at WordCamps happen in the times out of sessions. This is definitely one of those times, so we hope you take advantage of this great opportunity.

The Drafting Table is located just short of a mile from camp, in the Old 4th Ward Neighborhood. It will be the perfect place to have a beer and then order some of their amazing farm to table food to share with your new friends. And not to worry, there is lots of free parking in a deck right behind the pub and a rear entrance from the parking deck into the building.

I hear tell that owners, Gordon and Doug will round up a few specials for our hungry and thirsty campers.