A few months ago I decided to set up a conference about a subject that excites me (Language Oriented Programming). The subject was easy to pick, naming the conference was harder. With the help from a few colleagues, we finally came up with "myConf".
Maybe you wonder why I think that's a good name?
First, "my" could mean "micro" and I think micro describes the format of the conference. Many other good conferences are very large with at least seven parallel tracks and a thousand or more attendees. That means a plethora of possible presentations to choose from. But in this micro conference, the experience will be quite different. Since there will only be one track, you can expect everyone to have listened to the same talks and that makes the discussions between presentations typically richer. And since there will only be around 50 attendees, you will meet the same people all the time during the day and learn to know a few new friends who share your interests and you will have lunch and dinner with the speakers as well. It's also the case that in a micro conference you will not get a boxed lunch, but a sit down lunch and a very nice dinner, again with your new friends and the speakers. Finally, the conference won't either crash a full work week. After a single, but long day, you will find yourself back at the office, full of energy and inspiration. So, just as I value a very small codebase, I think there are merits to a very small conference as well. :)
The second reason for "my" in the name is that this year the conference is "mine". I picked the subject and invited the speakers that I wanted to listen to. (Of course I got loads of help with all the practical things from colleagues.) For example, I picked speakers that are living legends such as Erik Meijer (creator of Linq and Rx) and Martin Ward (who wrote the initial LOP paper found here: http://www.gkc.org.uk/martin/papers/middle-out-t.pdf). But next year all the fun of picking the subject and the speakers will move on to someone else who will have the feeling of having his or her own conference. Therefore, it will be a conference created out of passion each and every year.
See you at http://myConf.io !
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