DemoCamp 21
2009-07-29 – 05:09Toronto’s 21st DemoCamp was held last night in the Rogers Theatre. I enjoyed it: it was good to see friends, and great to see what’s going on in Toronto’s tech community. Here’s my rundown:
- Venue: better than the pub we were in the last couple of times, but banked seating (and no beer) just doesn’t feel right either.
- Jon Udell: I think his ideas about syndicating calendar information are a big deal; I was surprised there were so few questions (maybe because he was first up?).
- Saul Colt/Zoocasa: I was expecting a demo; we got slideware.
- Christine Renaud/ArtAnywhere: very polished Ignite presentation on a new web-based art rental business.
- Brian Sharwood/HomeStars: another Ignite about bringing social media to contractors. Enjoyed it—he clearly likes what he’s doing.
- Alan Lysne/Cascadia: live coding to show off a cross-platform app library for mobile devices. Very cool.
- Shaun MacDonald/MashupArts: in-the-web editor for birthday cards, greeting cards, etc.
- Dan Wood/WeGoWeGo: another “what’s on where” search engine; good demo.
- Ben Vinegar/Guestlist: best demo of the night—guest lists have been done before, but Ben (a former project student) has done a really nice re-think with some cool GUI features.
- Jason Roks/GuiGoog: the other best demo of the night—Jason coped with technical problems (including having to run on IE6) with good, if acerbic, humor.
Overall impressions: several A-grade presentations and good conversations. Our undergrads are doing their demos this morning (Wednesday, July 29) from 10-12 am in Room 1200 of the Bahen Centre at 40 St. George Street; everyone’s welcome to come and see them try to repeat last night’s success.
4 Responses to “DemoCamp 21”
The GUIGoog presentation left me wondering where there’s any value. If people really wanted that Google would have already built it. I did a Google search for advanced search tools and http://www.eccellio.com did this before Jason Roks made his attempt. Did he copy it from their site? Eccellio has a different users interface but you can see that Eccellio seems to work easier and better. I doubt this will get any traction and the bad demo didn’t help. I tried the site and it kept breaking. I guess it needs more work.
By Brent Michaels on Jul 31, 2009
Thanks for the kind words Greg. I’m sorry I couldn’t check out the student presentations the following day. Have you guys thought about doing them in the evening?
By Ben Vinegar on Aug 3, 2009
@Ben Evenings might bring out more of the local tech community, but they’re harder for project supervisors (like me) with small kids at home. If anyone wants to organize a StudentCamp in the off-months when there isn’t a DemoCamp, I’d be all for it…
By Greg Wilson on Aug 3, 2009