The ReBarcamp Platform
Tonight I listened to an interesting call led my Rob Hahn and Dustin Luther regarding the ReBarcamp platform. I was particularly intrigued by the exchange on the heels of ReBarcamp Orange County.
One of the things I love about Barcamp is the amazing, cutting edge thinkers that show up to these events. As someone that came new on the scene a year ago, this is always the place where the rubber meets the road, so to speak. It’s always good stuff, and yet I think we are missing an opportunity.
With so many fascinating, forward thinkers together at the same venue, it seems like a great time to talk about some of the cutting edge things that are really relevant to the real estate industry. What’s around the next technology bend? What are some of the challenges the industry is facing in the light of some of our newest technologies? What are the current Great Debates in the industry? It seems particularly important because some of the very people at these events are highly influential and potentially ‘game changers’ in the real estate world.
Incorporating 101
Instead, a lot of those great minds are leading instructional sessions. There is such an effort to incorporate enough 101 to take care of the wide variety of attendees, we miss out on some of the great value that can benefit our industry by creating conversation around some of the most pertinent, ‘today’ conversations.
Twitter for beginners is meaningful now, but in a year? What’s next? This is the place to ask ourselves that, it would seem. Some of this great dialog seems to be lost – until after hours anyway. 
I’ll be honest, I expressed some of this after the event in Orange County and I certainly hope that the I didn’t offend. I do think it’s a natural evolution of this medium and not a reflection on their hard work.
Honestly, it was pointed out to me very tactfully by Brad Coy, that if I wanted a different experience, I should consider more involvement. Clearly, a foot in mouth moment for me – duh?! I guess I generally don’t find myself jumping up to lead a session. But next maybe time…I’m thinking…’Around the Technology Bend’ or a free form ‘Industry Technology Challenges’.
Hey, I’m open to ideas. What do you think?
Loading ...
Consumerism, Geo-mapping columnist
Marketing columnist
Digg | Facebook | Linked-in | Technorati | Twitter
Linsey – I commented to a friend of mine recently that one of the difficulties in getting more people involved in social media is that you have a large body of people at different levels of experience. Much like my “blogging class” lesson that I spoke about before (it was terrible for someone who had a little bit of experience and I couldn’t find value in it for someone with no experience either), I think instructors need to look at what they’re teaching from the viewpoint of completely-new-to-the-scene to I-can-do-that-in-my-sleep so that their classes encompass as many people as they can. Leaving any group in the dark or bored will only serve to keep people away from whatever “new” idea is being taught.
I think this post is genius. It would be pretty neat if REBarCamp could have two parts. One for the 101, and one for the future/cutting edge/current issues with the industry. I think both should be open to anyone who wants to get involved or listed. An interesting idea. I like it.
Flickr | Facebook | Linked-in | Twitter
@Linsey, It sounds like the desire is to add to the makeup of the REBarCamp scene by possibly involving app developers, coders and the like that are the actual architects of the future of technology. Without that, it’s a bunch of end users talking about their theories of what could be dreamed up next… there’s nothing wrong with that, but it doesn’t answer for your desire to know what’s around the bend.
Perhaps organizers can reach out to individuals in their city that aren’t real estate related but are constructing these tools we’ll use in the future?
I predict it will be several more years until SM becomes mainstream enough to minimize a 101 trac, think about how long email took to catch on- I had an email in 1997 but there are some people who STILL don’t have an email.
It’s a tricky situation and I think the solution to your specific need lies in who the attendees are since they are the DNA of the topics discussed. Thoughts?
Funny thing is, Rob Hahn told me exactly the same thing after the very first RE BarCamp, almost a year ago. I think it’s a great idea. I told him as well. But as Brad Coy already told you, all it takes is for you to stand up and say you want to do it.
For REBarCamp San Diego, we’re planning to run a full fledged WordCamp (for WordPress users in and out of real estate) concurrently, at the same venue. The idea is to crash real estate and non-real estate social media peeps into the same space. That should be cool.
Linsey,
Great points. Conferences struggle with how to keep early adopters happy and engaged while not being too far ahead (and therefore irrelevant) to the majority. it’s a tough balance and barcamp has the same issues.
In terms of participating to get what you want out of it we actually did just that. We put together a “Geeks at the Beach – RE 3.0″ towards the end of the day which was just an ad hoc gathering of about 10 of us on the sand to talk about what’s next. I thought it was a lot of fun and the type of conversation that I was looking for. I wish there was more of it; but I realized that it wasn’t going to happen without me sticking my hand up and saying “here’s what I want to talk about.”
Some of the most interesting things that can happen at RE barcamp are the things that happen spontaneously.
Be bold. Raise your hand and say I want to talk about something that has never been explored before. I dropped the coin for air and hotel to get down to OC, so I wanted to hear peoples thoughts on CRM, Community building, and Listings (from CMA to close) – your best strategy. I got to do 2 out of 3 and even lead the one on CRM, something I’m clearly not capable of “leading”, but whatever… it still happened.
Next month in SF we are providing the space and audience to do anything anyone would like. It will be completely Ad-hoc. If you are planing on coming out, I invite you all to explore and push the boundaries of this unconference to however you see fit.
Where’s the broker’s session on how to DIY an intranet solution?
Where’s the app developers session for map-based techology?
Where’s the consultants session on how to best create a web-presences in the online RE space?
You bring it!
btw – @Lindsey. Thanks for your involvement in helping put together OC. It was great.
@Morgan. “Geeks at the Beach – RE 3.0? was one of my favorite sessions to date. Can’t wait to see what happens with “From WTF to FTW”.
I have been trying to push a REBarCamp Beginner and Advanced session for the past few months. I’m hoping one of them jumps on the bandwagon. My suggestion is 2 days, day one the experienced folks give back to the community by helping those craving to learn out. Day 2 is the geek out session, such as why can’t I close an online lead? and how should I respond to negative blog comments and what’s the future of a real estate website.
I LOVE to help people learn. There is no greater joy in my life than seeing someone get it; nothing better than getting home and seeing a barrage of thank you emails and people emailing me a month later saying how they rank #1 on Google for a term now. However I crave a session to brainstorm with other people. Rob Hahn and I have talked about having a session about nothing. Meaning lets just get people together and see what happens. I think that could spur on a GREAT session!
Linsey thanks for raising this on AG. I think it’s something we need to have some discussions about, maybe at REBCSF.
Brad, I wanted to email you off list since this is off topic but couldn’t find your email address on your website, sfsunrise.com. Question: “Did you learn anything interesting about CRMs at RECamp?”.
And to add to this conversation – now that a few of us are in the process of organizing REBarCamp Miami on September 14th – if you have any ideas or want to get involved, give me a call, email me, tweet me. Organizing these is not easy and takes a huge amount of dedication – rebarcamp needs “doers” not just thinkers.
I am off to Virginia Beach next week to my first REBarCamp… and I am excited since I have been reading how great they are for the attendees.
Honestly, I love to share what I have learned but really hope that someone there puts even more gas into my creative tank.