• What was the first tech conference you attended?
• What are things you get from a conference that you cannot learn other ways?
• How can I maximize my value out of attending a conference?
• If I’m going to a conference where I don’t know anyone, how can I still have a good time?
• You both have planned conferences. What are some of the things that go into organizing that people might not be aware of?
• What is your favorite conference story?
• How do you learn about new events to attend?
• How do you pick which events you know about to go to? There are a lot, and it can be hard to narrow down when you only have a 1-2 conference limit from an employer, or your own resources.
• What was the coolest piece of “swag” you got from a conference?
• Does the swag at a conference weigh in for you at all? I hear a lot of noise around the big Google events because everyone knows they are walking away with hardware.
• Lets talk about conference etiquette, and discuss some of the points in Bridget's article

Notes:

Check Outs

Jason

• Some of my favorite talks, first a couple from John Rauser:
  • Look at Your Data
  • Investigating Anomalies
• And another recent one from Kyle Kingsbury at Strangeloop:
  • Jepsen II: Linearizable Boogaloo

Bridget

• Local meetups on http://meetup.com (and this is the Minneapolis startup I mentioned: http://congruence.io)
• MonkeyLectric Bike Lights: http://www.monkeylectric.com

Pete

• FPM - http://github.com/jordansissel/fpm
• Deb-S3 - http://github.com/krobertson/deb-s3
• STM Aero Backpacks - http://www.stmbags.com/catalog/laptop-backpacks/aero-small-laptop-backpack/

Trevor

• Borderlands the PreSequel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpgMBivKR-w trailer video is hysterical. Whether you’re going to play or not.
• Jetbrains free for students *(.edu)
• Netflix spoilers http://spoilers.netflix.com/spoil-yourself

Matt

• Tech Douchebags podcast - http://5by5.tv/tdb
• Spoonium (containers for Windows) - http://spoonium.net/
• Columbia Treadlite 10L Backbpack - http://www.amazon.com/Columbia-Treadlite-Backpack-Black-Size/dp/B0058XJXZW (hattip to Ryn Daniels @beerops)