19 Feb 2008, Posted by Matthew Reinbold in New Work Ways,Thought & Theory, 1 Comments
Communities as Parties
I recently saw a post recapping a talk by Matt Mullenweg, which linked to a fantastic older piece by Commoncraft. I sometimes find it very hard to articulate why its in a geek’s best interest to socialize. After all, the reason that many of us set out in careers dedicated to bits and bytes was to minimize prolonged exposure to human interaction. However, the afore mentioned pieces detail a simile apt for exploring why communities exist. The revelation?
Communities are like parties.
That statement will not dispel any social phobias – in fact, it most likely increased the apprehension a room of strangers might induce. However, it gives us a platform with which we can start talking about communities and why they are actually good for you. Why are they worthwhile?
- They are fun. Forget those awkward dances, wallflower moments, and failed expectations of youth. Things get much more enjoyable when you take the hormones out of the equation. And finding the right group for your interests and talents means you’re engaging others on familiar territory. Developers are idea connoisseurs and hashing out the latest and greatest in meme space is akin to Christmas when your friends get together with their new toys. A well run community is fun.
- You meet new people. Every programmer’s worst professional nightmare should be becoming stale. If you always go to the same websites, see the same people, and do the same things you are in a rut. Life is good so why change, right? Wrong. Those that constantly seek out new challenges and new ways of thinking will be best prepared when that big change moment inevitably comes (worshipers of rodent fairy tales are nodding vigorously right now). That idle banter with the new guy this month could be next month’s big client/new employee/problem solver/shoulder to cry on. A well run community provides opportunities to meet new people.
- You get perspective. In this day and age fortunes are won and lost on the changing tides of trends. If you want some control over your career do not let those in management dictate to you what the marketplace is doing. Get out and find out how other companies (even other industries) are approaching problems. It’s not hard – it can be as simple as asking “How’s business?”. Communities are a cheap and easy way to get perspective.
What do I do? I throw parties. Granted, I’m still trying to get the kinks worked out on how to distribute the most value to the most people. However, whether its with the Salt Lake ColdFusion User’s Group, CodeAway.org, the Blogging for Business (B4B) Conference, or the newly announced RIA Dev Shed there something building that’s exciting to be a part of. Is it as codifiable as most things in a programmer’s trade? Hardly, but the tacit knowledge is a whole hell of a lot of fun to figure out.
I’ll end with a TED conference talk from Howard Rheingold on the new economies of collaboration: