Jeremy Smith is a Designer & Rails Developer and Mark Locklear is a Web Developer at the eXtension Foundation. They join the show alongside Chuck to talk about the Blue Ridge Ruby Conference. They go into detail about their conference-attending experiences and what motivated them to plan their own event.  Additionally, they talk about their preparations for making the event successful (finding a venue, looking for speakers and sponsors, and others)

hey. Welcome back to another episode of the Ruby Rogues Podcast This week. On our panel, we have Mark Lockleer.

 

Hello from Ashville

 

We also have Jeremy Smith,

 

Everybody,

 

have we had both of you on before? I know. we've had one of you on before.

 

I have been on before. I think it was maybe last last year, some time earlier, maybe

 

Yeah.

 

a year ago. Eh,

 

And this is. this is apparent number three for for me I did when I did learning Rails Five for Riley. I think we talked about that then

 

Oh

 

and

 

nice.

 

then. I

 

Nice.

 

think I did the developer story. My, my, my developer story.

 

Cool.

 

Yeah.

 

Is there

 

yeah.

 

an

 

I haven't

 

award

 

done

 

I

 

those

 

get?

 

in a while.

 

Is there an award I get or something I can put on my

 

Uh,

 

wall for

 

uh,

 

number three or

 

I don't know.

 

Yeah, you. should you make that happen?

 

Goes

 

Yeah,

 

in the

 

I

 

suggestion

 

should hand

 

box.

 

out awards.

 

Yeah,

 

I'm working on setting up suggestion box right now, actually for people who want to suggest guests or topics. But yeah,

 

Oh nice. yeah,

 

well, we'll give you an award of. I've been on almost as many times as D. H. H.

 

Yeah,

 

Nice.

 

But yeah, you guys are organizing a conference and Valentino thought it was a good idea to have you on to talk about it and I thought Oh yeah, I've got a ton of questions And then he bailed on me, so I

 

Uh,

 

get asked my question.

 

uh.

 

M.

 

That's perfect.

 

yeah, well, well, um, organizing a conference is something that I've wanted to be perfectly honest. I've done probably ople dozen online conferences And so anyway, I'm I'd love to just dive in and you know we can talk about what some of the differences are, but also just yeah, where the idea came from? Things like that. I think I think Valentino sent me a copy of a tweet or somethin. You guys want to

 

Yeah,

 

talk

 

we can.

 

about where the idea came from and then we

 

Yeah,

 

can kind of just work from there.

 

sure,

 

Jeremy.

 

yeah,

 

go

 

I can

 

ahead.

 

start with that mark. Um, so let's see. So our conference is called Blue Ridge Ruby. It's in Ashville, North Carolina. It'll be June, eighth and ninth. That's a Thursday, Friday, and it's a two day single track conference will be ten speaking slots. M. Ashville is a fantastic mountain town in western North Carolina. great beer, great Food, lots of music, lots of outdoor activities and we're planning in addition to the conference to have some optional weekend stuff that people can stick around and do as well, and a big part of it is certainly learning and getting you know. just making professional connections in the conference, but also just making friends and having

 

Uh

 

time with

 

huh,

 

people in a cool town. And Ashville's one of my favorite places. I actually live in our South Mark lives just outside of Ashville, It's fantastic. Lot of people come to Ashville for know vacations. or it's a huge, like wedding destination and it's just a great town, so I feel like it's a perfect place to have a have a small regional conference.

 

Yeah, my role was

 

Nice.

 

just really. My mind is one to support Jeremy. He, we followed one another on. We followed on another on Twitter and he sent out of tweet. You know about a year ago or so now, and just you know, Ask what people thought about. You know. putting on a conference in Ashville And you know I'm sort of like. I'm sort of like you, jock. I thought about it before, but I'm like there's just no. There's just no way I want to go there and I'm not tied in. Although that's probably an excuse. More more than the truth, I'm not. I feel like I'm not just tied in to the community. You know, I've got an eight year old daughter and so like, a lot of conference stuff stopped for me around that time in addition to covid, So really those things are excuses more than anything. But certainly, when I saw Jeremy's Tweed, I immediately set a tweet back and said Hey, I'm here to help in any way you can, or anyway I can. And so After a few months he contacted me again. We did a zoom chat. He came into town. We talked more. and so that's that's sort of what brought us to where we're at Now.

 

Nice. Well, I have to say that when I first got into programming and Ruby, M, there was a local conference called Mountain West Ruby Conference

 

Okay, yeah,

 

was put on by Mike More. He just lives twenty minutes half hour from here. And yeah, it seemed like there were a lot of the regional conferences and I don't know if it was Covid that changed it. It feels like it was kind of

 

Hm,

 

slipping off A. You know that

 

Yeah,

 

there

 

tapering

 

were fewer and

 

down

 

fewer of them. Yeah,

 

a little bit. I actually have been looking at, you know, Ruby conferences Dot Org. If

 

Uh,

 

you go back

 

huh,

 

and look at past conferences, they start in twenty fourteen. That was the highest number at forty nine. If you just look at the total listings they had, They had forty nine

 

Right,

 

listings of conferences, or then, that might be even just like one day, one day, events and stuff, But as a rough

 

Hm,

 

measure, there's forty nine and twenty fourteen and it's kind of tapered off Since then, but not like even so right before Co, but it was still, I think in the forties

 

Oh, really,

 

Lo. yeah, I think it might have been like forty, but then yeah, twenty, nineteen, twenty twenty. they've been really down, and then even twenty twenty two. And so I'm hoping that things picked back up, but it definitely like it just took a beating from that, you know, so I think, and I've even wondered if it's kind of like you know all these I don't know about in your area, but we had like all these cool restaurants and things clothes

 

M.

 

during Covid, they just never came

 

yep,

 

back. You know the ones that are like, You're hoping they make it. You know they just start and you hope they

 

Hm,

 

make it And then you know they get T boned by it and then they just can't can't survive, And

 

Right,

 

I almost feel like The. there's so many things that got lost in that and there's like there needs to be this energy that kind of come back in and bring that back. and there's a loss. Obviously,

 

What?

 

Restaurants is like a very minor loss right so in big picture in conference S also like nothing. Nothing is definite, devastating as what a pandemic is. But, but in terms of like there are all these other, there are all these other losses too, And conference

 

Right,

 

Hm?

 

is one of them, and I think coming back maybe a year ago, I, I've never been to a lot of conferences really, But it was a year ago that I really decided

 

Hm,

 

I wanted to like. I needed to. I wanted to, and it was worth it to me to to re invest that way. Kind of going to like four different conferences for Ruby and Rails in twenty twenty two,

 

Right,

 

And I had such a great time by the end of the year. I was like I got to do that like. I just, I've got to do something like this. I want this for other people and there might be some conferences that just don't come back, but I'm hoping other ones will take their place and I'm hoping more

 

Hm?

 

and more people will kind of step up to make them happen because I think it's really important for our community.

 

Yeah, you know, I think that's a good point, Jeremy. There is a vacuum somewhat now, right, I think with, and I mean that's across the board, not just conferences, but whether it's restaurants. Other places in the economy too, so I'm hoping well,

 

Hm,

 

I'm hoping we're going feel some of that that that void by having Blue Ridge Ruby, and the fact that you know we've Jeremy and I've talked about this sum that you know. in the southeast. Of course, Ruby

 

Hm.

 

on Rails has been to Atlanta, there there, they will be there this spring, and then they were there Years ago, But there's not a regular sort of Ruby or Rails Focus conference in the Southeast anywhere, so I think I thought it was an opportunity to sort of feel feel that void, too,

 

Hm,

 

There

 

yeah,

 

used to be like ancient city, Ruby,

 

yep,

 

Um, but that hasn't been around for a while, and like the Rolley area, the Research Triangle areas like really big, but I don't think they've ever had a Ruby conference, So like if you think about big cities in our area, Atlanta, Rolly, Durham, Um,

 

Charlotte.

 

Jacksonville. Yeah, they're They're just you're not seeing any conferences like that and people. I'm sure there are people. There are ruby doves here. I know there are. Um. Yeah, so it's good to have. It's good

 

Hm.

 

to have something down here.

 

Yeah, I have to say that I feel some of that I've been actually doing a bunch of coaching. You can go apply. You get. you can apply for coaching, and then the way it works as I, I do like a half hour session with you just to see if I can help you out. and then we talk about options, but I've talked to whole bunch of people and they're trying to figure out how to move their career ahead. You know, how do I become a senior developer? How do I get a raise? How do I find a better job? How do I Stay current on what's going on? Things like that and a lot of it is. sort of well, Some of it you have to stay current on some of the ideas that are out there, which conferences are really great for M. and then the other one is is you have to go out, meet people right,

 

Yeah,

 

because the way, the way that you find the good jobs is you find the good developers who love their job and you go work with them.

 

Yeah,

 

I

 

yeah,

 

mean in a nutshell, Right and so and most of those people are Ple showing up to the conferences

 

Right,

 

and I've been telling people you know, Yeah, find a confreneyou. can go to, but I've also been people telling people to go find meat ups, And that's the

 

Hm.

 

other thing. That's the other end. That has. really. Just. it's been rough for people

 

Yeah,

 

end.

 

big time.

 

Hm,

 

Yeah,

 

So I feel that To M. so yeah, I love the idea. I think you guys need to put one out here in the mountain West as well, because

 

Yeah,

 

I miss them. I've been to a ton of conferences. A lot of the bigger conferences have actually so like Microsoft and stuff. they've paid me to. well, not paid me, but they paid my way

 

Yeah,

 

in my Airfaren

 

Hm.

 

hotel to come out to conferences

 

I,

 

and interview people at the conferences. So I've

 

Yeah,

 

been to a bunch, but the regional ones are just. They're way more fun because

 

Yeah,

 

you, you meet somebody and you run into him in the hall later and you know

 

Hm

 

it's not seventy five lion people, so

 

That

 

yeah,

 

really

 

that,

 

hit me this past year, so I never really understood that, but this past year I went to to Jason Sweats, Sin City, Ruby,

 

Uh,

 

He did it like

 

huh,

 

a H. Maybe at one time conference in Las Vegas.

 

Yeah,

 

Uh, pretty

 

I found

 

small

 

out about

 

they were.

 

that after he did it, because it's a

 

Yeah,

 

four hour drive, five hour drive from

 

Yeah,

 

here.

 

it was great. I, I saw that and I was like, Oh, I'm doing this and I went and it was. maybe I don't kno. Forty five fifty people. Something like that. I don't remember final numbers, but it was. It was small. I met most everyone there and had great conversations with so many people and a lot of people that I wanted to meet. You know people I've been following on Twitter for years that I always wanted to have a conversation with. I got a chance to have that conversation. Then I go to rails confidence over a thousand people, And

 

Hm,

 

you know everyone's in masks and you can't tell if that's the is that the

 

Hm,

 

shopified group over there in a

 

hm,

 

circle you know Like, Can I go talk to them? Can I even break in? You know where do you go

 

Yeah,

 

right? It's so much easier in that

 

yeah,

 

small conference to find people to talk to and stuff like that. And if I had started by going to a really big conference, I probably would have stopped. It would have been. It's just really

 

Yeah,

 

overwhelming. But

 

Hm,

 

because I made so many friends at the first conference, you get to the big conference and then you've got a bunch of people to say hi to again Like hey, I just you know, we were just talking like a month or two ago. Great to see you again, you know, and then you've got Another group to join. And for me, like as an introvert, that was like so helpful. it was just so helpful. So for people that are either first time conference goers introvert, if you don't have a group to go with, going to a smaller regional conference is probably a better bet. Like you, it's not going to have the glamor of a really big conference, but you will more likely have good conversations you know. Make friends that you know. Will you know? continue? you know, friendships that can conti You an

 

M,

 

um.

 

M.

 

beyond just acquaintance. And and so I feel like that's that's the angle. That's that's that's my tip for for new conference goers And it was also the thing that I like. I just wanted to be able to provide other people like that's. I want that same experience for other people.

 

Chuck.

 

Right,

 

I'm curious to hear I love that idea and I hadn't thought about that. Now it's now. it's making me think I'd love to do something like that at Blue Ridge Ruby. Of this idea of either interviewing or interview prep, what does that look

 

Hm,

 

like at a cot? Is it generally just knew Debs, or do you find that even more experienced folks like the idea of having career counseling Slash? I don't know. What does that look look like?

 

Right. Well, the interviews that I've done or the podcastthis podcast interviews?

 

Okay. that's

 

Um,

 

okay.

 

but yeah, you know, I mean the slight misunderstanding. I actually like that idea because a lot of people are especially newer people.

 

Yeah,

 

They just don't know what to expect or how to trap or anything like that. And so you know, if you had kind of a new programmers track or a new programmers? Hey, we're gonna. We're going to throw on these Tra sessions or an evening session at a restaurant

 

Well,

 

or something where Yeah,

 

I'm

 

you

 

thinking

 

have

 

about

 

somebody.

 

even

 

just

 

a space.

 

basically say hey,

 

Yeah, I'm thinking about a space. We set

 

Yeah,

 

off to the city, Jeremy, where we, either you know we could do it during lunch time or in between sessions. So that's that's something we can. That's something we can explore and see Because

 

That'd

 

I

 

be

 

can

 

cool.

 

say. I'm curious, certainly for New Davis, but I wouldn't be surprised if there be more experience. folks that, because oftentimes maybe you're you're not afraid to ask technical programming type stuff, but people are more reluctant often to About career counseling, so

 

Yeah.

 

sort of things.

 

yeah,

 

Yeah,

 

interesting. yeah,

 

Yeah, definitely, I love that idea for sure. but yeah, for the podcast interviews they usually just assigned us a room.

 

Yeah,

 

The micro soft ones. They had Richard Campbell from Dottnetrocks podcast, actually doing the organizing as to which experts we would have the opportunity to talk to and stuff like that, And he was pretty good about knowing which topics we wanted to cover. So But yeah, so so let's say that I decided I want to revive a Mountain West Ruby conference. Now Mike owns the rights to the name. He's not going to let me

 

Yeah,

 

use that. I already asked him right, so I'm

 

yeah,

 

going to name it something else, but let's say I come up with, you know, the best Salt Lake City Ruby conference in the world. You know, whatever I'm going to call it. I mean what do you do now? right?

 

Well,

 

Yeah, it's

 

I'll jump in real quick and then then and then I'll let Jeremy take over. I'll say Find you know that there's the first follower video that's out there, So I would say, If you're the one that wants to put on the conference, find find the first follower and that that's been my. My role here is that I feel like I'm Jeremy's first follower. Here was his idea, but he has been

 

Uh,

 

really.

 

huh,

 

He's been really gracious about bringing me in letting me handle sir, certain things, but not not like too too much. so I would say find a sort of find. a partner in crime would be the first step.

 

Yeah. Definitely would concur with that Like Mark. it would be really hard. Like putting on a conference is really stressful. It just really like it's one

 

Hm,

 

of the most stressful things I've done. Maybe I just don't do a lot of stressful things. But this is up there with house renovation for me and that was over ten years ago and I'm you know, like this, that's what I'm relating this stress to, and I kind of knew it was going to be stressful like you knew I knew it would be. But like having somebody else to say It's going to be all right. We're gonna figure this out. You're going to be okay. Yeah, that you know, like whatever the decision is, we're going to work through it. That is so helpful. I need that for sure, and I can imagine a lot of other people would do. Um, maybe if you already are a pretty good decision maker and you know, don't question your you know own decisions, or like you know, you've got a thick skin and you can kind of handle lot of either criticism or not worry What people are going to think. Maybe that's a ittle bit easier. but for me that's definitely like weighing on me. Like in in a big way, Like I work. I'm a consultant I work with Uh, you know, small, uh companies building their

 

Hm,

 

rails apse, I'm used to focusing on one client and how they

 

Right,

 

what they care about, and all I have to do is make this one person happy with a conference. You've got to make like hundreds of people happy, and you don't Where the unhappiness is going to come from. Like what are you going do? Wrong? That's going to. really, you know, like either upset people or hurt people's feelings, or really like, put people out in different ways, And it could be. it could be just their perception, but it could also be your bad decisions, you know, like, or just things that just happen randomly that yo're gonna have to deal with, so all of that is just like Yeah, All that to say, like it's stressful. It's really great to have a partner and I'm really glad for Mark. So yeah, that's definitely step a.

 

That and

 

Um,

 

then I'll follow up. Jeremy can talk more about this too, Is the you know, getting sponsors has been the next thing for us. I mean, Jeremy's really stepped up up here, and I mean, essentially

 

Hm,

 

he's sort of footing this thing out of pocket. At least he's made the commitment to to do it. now. The hope is that he won't have to. That's been the next step for us is. and I'll just say one more thing on that than Jeremy. You can talk more about it, but along with that

 

M.

 

we've brought in, we've got a pretty strong developer community here in Ashville again. as Jeremy said, It's sort of a vacation Nation, but there's a lot of remote. Debsadthere's. not a lot of big tech.

 

Yeah,

 

Although there are a lot of tech folks here, We've got

 

Right,

 

a local slack. We've got a local slack team and there probably a few hundred folks in there Now. Not all those folks are active, but anyway, we've recruited a handful of local folks that are inside that slack team and sort of broad brought them in to help out as volunteers and think things like that. So big part of what we're spending our time doing is reaching out to sponsors, whether it's over Twitter. Other Email, um,

 

Hm,

 

Debs, who are Rails and Ruby, folks who work for companies that have other Rails folks you know,

 

Hm,

 

try having those folks contact rips in their company to see if they can get sponsorship. So that's that's been a big, big part of our focus.

 

Yeah, and related

 

Right,

 

to that like a big part of that is if you're just starting a new conference, You are trying to build credibility with people if they don't know who you

 

Hm,

 

are, And you know I've been pretty relatively unknown. You're you're asking companies. Well, you're asking anybody, like the attends, the sponsors, the speakers, Every, everyone's having to trust you. Um, and so at least for me that was like, Okay, how do I? How do we represent ourselves And how do we kind of build? build trust with sponsors who are going to you know, hopefully help us With with the bills and attends, who are going to have to put down money to come. There's so many things like that, so yeah,

 

Right,

 

I think a big part of it is like doing a good job with your branding. And like that was one of the first things I was focused on. Um. I do a lot of design work. So I built the built the site, but I focused heavily on that to make sure there was a high level of quality that people could feel, and Um, because, to kind of make up for the fact that no one knows who I am. So if you know, like if conferences are all about details, then showing people right off the bat that we're detailed oriented really matters. I think

 

Hm,

 

so. that's another piece of it. But then also like you're because this is new. We're basically selling ourselves. You know,

 

Right,

 

trust Jeremy and Mark to do this well and not screw it up and we're really going to try hard. But if you don't know us and we're just like Brand on the internet, you know. it's like. What is that? So that's I mean. that's a big part of it. That's Why it's important to even talk to you right now about this. Because

 

Hm,

 

that's kind of what it is like. Please trust us. We want to put on a great thing you know. for our community. It's hard where working at it, but it will require trust. There's you know. It's not like rail scoff where you don't need to. You may not even know who the organizers are, but you know just

 

Right,

 

you know. it's been running for years right, and of

 

Hm,

 

course they're going to do a great job and I'm being somewhat facetious. Obviously, you know, organizers super Portant, and they do have a huge impact, but there's already a brand reputation that's built for long running conferences that we just don't have. So if you're starting something, you're selling yourself in a lot of ways to people. you have to market yourself.

 

Yeah, I would say quick too, Is you know? Yeah, it's up to us. you know, you know, Jeremy and I do make it great, but I would tell others who plan to come. You're going to help make great, too right. you're going to come and

 

Yeah,

 

yeah, you will be attending the sessions, but between sessions after sessions, and if you stay and do other things during the week end where working on trying to plan events that folks can go to, But the part the participants are going to help make things special too.

 

Absolutely, it reminds me of that story, Stone soup. I think about this that story all the time. you know.

 

Hm,

 

you know at. I'm talking about. Yeah, it's like you kind of create the container, but everyone else? Really, they are the ones that make it happen right. We're creating a space in a container and hopefully doing a good job of taking care of all the details so that when people show up all the magic can happen, all

 

Yeah,

 

the really

 

yeah,

 

good stuff can happen

 

yeah, I mean

 

and that

 

to me, it's

 

requires people.

 

Yeah,

 

yeah, to me, Jeremy, too. it's like we're creating. Hopefully we're creating the environment so the magic can happen right. We're not actually going to create

 

Yeah,

 

the magic, but we're going to facilitate that and

 

yeah,

 

hopefully we create an environment where other folks can you help make the magic app.

 

Yeah, exactly.

 

Yep.

 

I've got a bunch of other random advice if you're interested.

 

Well, one thing that I've been wondering about because

 

Yeah,

 

you know running the online conferences effectively right, you just set up your streaming talks. You put it out there. I've also done a summit where I pre recorded all of the talk and

 

M.

 

basically they were. They weren't talks. They were interview. So I interviewed a bunch of experts. It was on podcasting, not on programming, but you know, So you put that out there and you know kind of done right. So then you Pay any speakers who wanted to get paid. Um, and then you're off to the races and that, that's another thing that I'll ask you about in a minute. But you know finding a venue a lot of times the Venus want you to like book a certain number of hotel rooms if you're doing a hotel catering, blah, blah, blah, like, how do you arrange something like that Mountain West Ruby conference. Just contact. They did it in the solid library, and so they avoided a whole bunch of that stuff. But it was a rather small venue was the trade off, And so they filled it the top every time because they would sell every seat in that auditorium and they probably could have filled it two or three times over the room.

 

Well,

 

Yeah, so my

 

I'll jump in and give give Jeremy

 

go ahead,

 

hard time real quick. Jeremy wanted a super nice venue. There was going to be no public library anything like that. And and it is, though it's really a cool venue. it's generally used as a. You know, there's a lot of good independent music that that's in Ashville, so the venue is often used as a sort of music venue. But go ahead, Jeremy and tell them more more about that.

 

Yeah, I was really. I had my heart set on this theater. So there's this Masonic temple. If you go to the blue Ruby Dot com, you'll see a picture of the inside. Let's got this fantastic, really beautiful theater in this historic building, and so kind of had my heart set on that. I feel like that spaces like that do matter do make a really big difference. I don't know. Maybe it would have been better to go with like a cheaper easier one, but I felt

 

Yeah,

 

like that would be a rad one to do so, But yeah, so Venue is definitely important around venue. I would recommend M finding a venue that has everything that you need, like chairs and a V, if you can. If the venue supplies all that, that makes a lot of things easier. Um, Also, what was I going to say?

 

Food

 

I

 

was,

 

mean, that's

 

you know,

 

one of

 

I'll

 

the first

 

jump

 

things

 

in

 

that you

 

real.

 

were going to do.

 

Yeah,

 

Oh

 

I'll

 

yeah,

 

jump

 

food.

 

in real quickly.

 

thanks.

 

Food was another issue. I mean, the nice thing about this location is right downtown there, ton of eating spots. So does that, and

 

Yeah,

 

also just just to to Jeremy's point about you know having a venu where a lot of the logistics are taking care of. like you know, I'm I'm a part time instructor to local community college here, and we sort of considered that, but a lot of that would have been left up to us to try and organize the spaces and the chairs This Then were the Masonic temple. That going to be in that there? I mean, that's basically what they do that they've got a full time person there who you know does the scheduling sets all that up, And then they've got staff who does all those things for you. So the nice thing about choosing to venu like that is that we can focus on speakers and the text stuff and all those things and know that you know the logistics. As far as the space we're going to be in chairs. The a B stuff soun All all that stuff is going to be to taking

 

Hm,

 

care of force.

 

Yeah, that makes sense.

 

We also

 

It

 

decided

 

ended,

 

not to do lunch. I guess yeah, that was the food thing. That was like one of the big thing when I've looked at other conferences. That's one of the highest cost they have, and also one of the things that people either complain about or that doesn't come through the way they wanted to, So it's like highest risk his cost, and in

 

And

 

our

 

I think

 

case

 

a cheap,

 

like,

 

cheaper or free load location that we would have looked at would have been would have definitely been outside of town somewhere. so that would have meant

 

Yeah,

 

woe would have had

 

Yeah,

 

to take care of that. We would. He had to take care of that.

 

Yeah,

 

And also I mentioned the travel part too, that when you're no hing about being downtown Ashville close to hotels and lodging, so ideally

 

Yep.

 

folks who were coming in from out of town, they can fly in. They can take and a shuttle or an over from the airport into town, and then they can spend really all of Of their time there. They can walk from their hotel to the

 

Yeah,

 

venue so that that takes care of that piece of things too.

 

Yeah, we had that with Mountain Restart conference as well. they didn't provide any meals, but it was downtown Salt Lake at the library, and so there was a ton of stuff for people to go eat at A, and stuff, And then one of the other benefits is that Matt is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints,

 

Oh

 

who

 

yeah,

 

head quarters season Salt Lake.

 

that's right.

 

And so there were a couple of years where Mike essentially planned the The conference right around the churches General Co Onference,

 

M.

 

And so Matt was more than willing to come out because they helped him with the travel, and then he could come out for the religious services and then

 

Oh,

 

go

 

that's funny.

 

back

 

Yeah,

 

and so

 

that's smart.

 

right And so there they are. There are definitely reasons. but Yeah, for the food. Yeah, just having it downtown that worked out great and so people would just go do their thing and then come back.

 

Yeah, yeah, that that takes care of a huge aspect. You know, all the different food requirements that people have, and just yeah, Potential for complaint or just issues around food. Yeah, just being able to eliminate a lot of that. we'll still have like drinks and snacks. but it won't be the same way. you know. Won't be the same

 

Yeah,

 

scale and won't be as as stressful Hopefully around that part. Another thing that I'd recommend. or at least it was a surprise to me. When we first launched the site. We didn't have a c. f. P. open. I thought we were going to have to kind of just go around and beg speakers to come,

 

Hm,

 

And we are we Asking a few speakers that we want to personally invite, but almost immediately people are saying, Where's the C F P? Do you have a C f P? Open? and I was like, Oh, I guess we have to have a c f P. Like, and then, sure enough, we're getting a lot of great like C f P. Like talk proposals. It's been fantastic. Been

 

Right.

 

really happy about it. We've got another. Let's see we close in a week. and but we've already got. We've gotten plenty of really great proposals, so I'm very happy about that and that's One thing I would have done right from the get go instead of waiting, and I just didn't. I didn't know that that would be one of the easier parts. Um, it's not.

 

What did

 

It's

 

you

 

not

 

use?

 

Google forms.

 

Yeah,

 

I mean, yeah,

 

I've done that.

 

yeah,

 

I, so I was trying to put

 

eh,

 

on an online Ruby conference and an online Java Script conference, And the issue I ran into, I tried to use the Ruby Central C, F, P, F.

 

Yeah,

 

and it just started acting up on Herocoup for no reason, So

 

Oh, dang

 

you

 

Yes,

 

know, Like the simple thing, I've done Google forms in the past works fine

 

Yeah.

 

right

 

Yeah,

 

because it puts it into a spread sheet. So then

 

yeah,

 

you just add your, you know, Let every You vote on it, who is going to vote

 

M.

 

on it,

 

M.

 

and then you pick your tax,

 

yeah,

 

Yep,

 

or if you're the one picking all the talk, then you just tell people they're accepted.

 

Right, yeah, I know, I think it's going to be a mix. Um, there's a certain

 

M.

 

aspect. I don't know. Speaker selection is such a tricky thing. There's so many aspects

 

Hm,

 

that you want to get right with it.

 

Right,

 

I want our volunteers to be a part of the process. Um, but at the end of the day will end up being I think, Mark and I, just you know, our decision about who who those you know final slots go to, and we're trying to get a hit of wide range Of interests of diversity and backgrounds, even of experience with speaking like it matters to get some some speakers that everyone knows because people like

 

Right,

 

Oh, some, and so speaking, I'll go. but

 

Right,

 

it's

 

Yeah,

 

also important to have speakers that are are new to know newer to speaking. I want to. We want to elevate voices and new voices, and like, so trying to get that right, especially if it's a single track that actually feels. Really. I thought that was going to be.

 

Yeah,

 

I thought that would be it would. I thought we, just we're going to be. You know, begging to get ten slots filled. Now I'm thinking, Oh man, how do we like balance this really well and get you know, Get this variety in the in the ways that are going to be most beneficial To attend these to the speakers themselves into the Ruby community. Um, so it's a good. It's a good problem, but it's still a hard problem. and uh, yeah, it's challenging. That's one of the definitely challenging part of it.

 

Yeah, yeah, Absolutely one thing that I've run into as well is Some of the speakers that we reached out to for the conference. You know before before the C, f, P kind of fell apart on us. was, Um, some of them wanted to be paid and

 

Yeah,

 

so trying to figure that out, and okay, you know, where's this money going to come from? You know, is gonna come out of ticket sales, or we're going to have sponsors and just going to have to eat it. And so that was another

 

Yeah,

 

thing. I do. You run into that

 

Yeah,

 

a lot or

 

Yeah, so I

 

Kay,

 

asked a round a bunch about that, M. and so to be clear, we've got ten speaking stouts, but no, um, uh, oh, my gosh. I just blanked on it. Um,

 

He notes?

 

no key notes. Thank you. I just blank on

 

Hm,

 

the word. We're not going to do any key notes. Keynotes Are they usually okay? So at least

 

Yeah,

 

from what I've learned in the Ruby

 

Yeah,

 

community

 

key

 

C.

 

notes

 

notes,

 

are usually the one you paid for

 

Yeah, and

 

yeah,

 

so they range from the people I've talked

 

M.

 

to. They range from two thousand up to five thousand. What I've heard. I've heard numbers in that range, and right now like I've got a base line budget that I have to hit to be viable and I just could not commit to that kind of you know that kind of money.

 

M.

 

So I already

 

Hm,

 

knew I wanted to do some kind of honorarium for speakers.

 

Right,

 

M. And so I looked at like what Ruby Coff is doing And and they do. I went to Ruby Coffmenni. They did a five hundred dollar onorarium

 

Hm,

 

and that seemed I talked to some other people said. Yeah, that's sort of typical, so I'm committing to that. I want to make that doesn't even cover. I know doesn't cover traveling

 

No,

 

accommodations for a speaker. So that sucks and I hate that, but I want to at least make some effort. There need some base line of commitment to say we really appreciate you. You're doing great. Thank you so much, but I couldn't go to the next level of. also, you know, uh, doing key notes at that level of expectation And I don't want to like. I don't want to ask someone to do something like that for free.

 

M.

 

You know like that's. That's just what the expectation is. So I felt like the best thing to do this time around, at least was to kind of just leave it out. Maybe maybe if we, you know, maybe if it's different next time, maybe we could add that, but that was a way to some of our expenses. At least.

 

Yeah,

 

Hm,

 

Yep, absolutely. it's interesting not doing the keynotes Um on the remote conferences. I mean, we kind of did

 

Yeah,

 

it, but I would usually just kick it off with my best known speakers and round the day out with another well known speaker,

 

Yeah,

 

and without

 

Yeah,

 

necessarily calling it a keynote, and

 

Yeah,

 

typically their talks didn't follow, because the key notes also tend to follow

 

yeah,

 

a certain four, met and cadence. and

 

Yeah,

 

since their

 

Eh,

 

talks were more just the hey, this is a technical talk about a thing. I'm

 

eh,

 

doing that that worked out great.

 

I am looking. Think we'll be looking for some talks that might be bigger picture. like more Ruby, community related, or things

 

Hm,

 

like that that could start

 

Hm.

 

an end to kind of frame. Hopefully,

 

Oh

 

you know some framing talks that kind of set the stage for what we want and kind of close things out in in a good way. But

 

Yeah,

 

even if we have a lack of that, there's an opportunity for Mark and I to. Hopefully it's a small conference. Hopefully we get a chance to kind of set the stage as well for what we hope The two days to be, you know, and what we hope this this space will be for people. So

 

Yeah.

 

I think

 

I mean

 

that can you know

 

something

 

kind of fill that.

 

aspiration always is sort of like. I like the idea of having an aspirational talk, you know as a either starting or a book in to a conference, so we'll see in back. We've already got some. We're looking at some of the talks. The submissions that we've got some that that might, That might work for that. so I think even in the absence of a key key note will store, will still be able to sort of have

 

Right,

 

that you now have those starting in the ending, talk, sort of sort of fit Fit within that context,

 

Yeah,

 

Yeah, so I mean, we've kind of talked a bit about like venue and and honorariums and things like that, So um, at the end of the day I'm a little curious what does your budget look like Or how how would I figure out what my budget should look like?

 

I,

 

Maybe as a better question, right,

 

I'm going to pull up my budget because I can't remember where my numbers are.

 

He has a hundred thousand dollars that he's going to commit to it now.

 

M.

 

Oh man, I wish

 

No,

 

I had rich friends

 

No,

 

like Mark

 

he does

 

does.

 

not now, man,

 

No, definitely not okay. So I right now my base, so I have a base line budget that doesn't cover things like video production, swag,

 

Right.

 

um, banners and decoration. things like that. but my base line is and this also doesn't, so I need to figure out I'm still working on event insurance. That's a thing I need to tackle here shortly. I don't know what that's gonna even look like. I'm kind of scared to find out, but venu, um, lanyards drink, snacks, speaker, honorarium Speaker, dinner and logo and branding work. I'm looking at around sixteen, seventeen thousand, Um. for that, Um,

 

And we should check.

 

and

 

You

 

then

 

know

 

my stretch goals.

 

well, I was gonna say we should check with the venue about the insurance thing. Jeremy in thought about that, but lots of times and

 

No,

 

you may

 

they

 

have

 

did recommend

 

already

 

it. Yes, they recommended they had a U. a place to get insurance.

 

Okay, So we

 

However,

 

we do need.

 

so one of the tricks is, we're also doing these Saturday activities and

 

M.

 

we're saying Hey, Come you know, come hike with us. you know, to a to

 

There

 

a waterfall,

 

could be a lot

 

or

 

that there

 

come

 

could be a

 

to

 

lot. liability

 

the built more house with us that. Yes, so I've got to figure those parts out. I don't know what what to do about that yet. I would hope I wish that that. didn't They worry about that, but I've got to figure that out and make sure that we're we're

 

Sign

 

going to be

 

a waver.

 

okay on that. I think that

 

Yep,

 

helps. That definitely helps.

 

No, yeah,

 

I don't know that it will

 

yeah,

 

be enough. But

 

yeah,

 

yeah, so that's that's kind of what I'm looking at. and then like video production is going to be seven to eight grand. You know,

 

Hm,

 

we keep adding other things, so I really would like to do video production, but as yet we don't have the ticket sales or the sponsors to cover that, So I need

 

Right,

 

to hit our base line, and if we get the sponsors that we need, or have the ticket sale that we need, well, we'll be able to do that. That will be my next thing. So it's more like almost like stretch goals we've got like the space

 

Right,

 

level. And as long as we can do, you know X above that, I'll do the next level. but you know I'm committing to the base level even at a, you know a potential loss, and hopefully not, I don't. I don't think it will be that way. We're still like three months out and I feel like we've had good feed back from people online from From, you know, speakers from attending, and that sort of thing. So, um, but that part is still is scary.

 

And like that, you know

 

I bet.

 

having the budget in place and having those stretch goals has been like. I've used that sort of as a marketing tool for some of the sponsors that I'm talking with some of the larger,

 

Hm.

 

some of the larger companies that the support Ruby and Rails. I've used friends. that the video part, You know, I've made that specific plea that hey we we. We don't have video recording in place at the time, but you know if you will, if you will be a ruby sponsor for us than we can. You know we can negotiate. either have your you Go on some of the video or you know, so I've sort of used that as a pitch to try and try and get you know high higher level sponsorship.

 

Yeah,

 

Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. Um, I've also

 

Yeah,

 

talked to people that have run conferences that have had, so, for example, you said Swag Right is one of the things that you didn't have in there and I've I've had people say you know, I let the sponsor sponsor the swag or the sponsor sponsor the lanyards or whateve?

 

Yeah, I'm okay with some of that, but there's also certain things that I feel a little bit, maybe all about like. I want it to be done in a certain way or like,

 

Hm,

 

So I want to make sure, like if we do shirts, I have a certain way. I want to do shirts,

 

Because

 

and

 

I see,

 

Right?

 

I'd rather not

 

I had a wild

 

delegate that

 

wake

 

to somebody

 

idea.

 

else.

 

Yeah, see, I had a wild wack idea about church, Chuck and Jeremy was like, No, shut that down right quick.

 

I don't.

 

Yeah,

 

Ah, I don't mean to be that way, but

 

No,

 

there

 

no,

 

are some things

 

I'm just

 

that I want to

 

giving you

 

like.

 

a hard

 

I feel

 

time.

 

a little bit in all about.

 

Yea,

 

Yep.

 

Yeah,

 

So yeah, I mean, those are kind of the things that that. I'm just like I don't. I don't know how to do. Um, but the other thing is is, I'm also aware that there are a lot of other aspects to this that I I don't know about. So so yeah, so what are some of your other tips tricks? Random thoughts that you know, somebody might be going. Hey, you know, I want to organize this conference and they're gonna. They're going to run into this wall if you don't warn them off.

 

Yeah, if it's your first time, Uh, don't uh, don't commit yourself to a block rate for a hotel, Um They with? If you want to do, if you want a hotel block rate, you're going to be committing yourself probably to eighty percent capacity. So If you, if people don't come and fill, that, you will be paying the rest of that bill. So if you're on a budget, just don't do it. Just tell people hear the good hotels to go to Give them a couple of options and let them pick. It's not people. don't. People would rather have like one hotel that one hotel at everybody is gonna be at. But and they would like you know, hopefully like a discount. but it's just that's really difficult to pull off if you're on a on a shoe string budget. Um, I think it really helps to use Twitter for promotion. Um,

 

Uh huh,

 

that has been really big. and if you're not using Twitter already than you probably want to be using it. Well, Head of starting a conference so that you have a network to tap into and I'm not, I'm not. I don't have a huge network, but it's better than it was even a year ago, and I think that's really helped also

 

Hm,

 

if you're going to conferences. A lot of a lot of the people that I met and made friends with at conferences have been very supportive and very uh, just been very encouraging and helpful in promoting this conference. So go to conferences. make lots of friend, And tell your friends what you're playing to do. And I've just found that so many people are supportive of that. That has been one of the biggest encourage. Encouraging aspects of it is just how many people are? Um, Just like backing you up on that kind of stuff

 

Hm,

 

and wanted to see. See things like that go well and that that's meant a lot. and so do that ahead of time, So that you're you're ready and have have those people you know to to lean on and to Ask for help from the market. Yeah, the marketing of promotion is a huge is a huge thing, and again it goes back to people are having to trust you and so don't hide behind a brand when it's just you, be the be the person that's making those connections to speakers and to sponsors and everybody else.

 

And and

 

M.

 

doing,

 

and I don't know

 

dude,

 

if I said this already, but

 

I was going to say just doing doing what we're doing. Now we did the We did the Ruby on Rails Podpodcast a couple of weeks ago, But getting the word out

 

Hm,

 

that that sort of free promotional stuff that you can do the you know it's time, but it doesn't cost anything to do.

 

Yeah,

 

Right,

 

now we really appreciate that. That's That's a huge thing like being able to talk about what we're doing in the community. Twitter is a great place, but obviously like bein ble to come on, Ruby Rogues is like a fantastic way to be able to tell other people about what we're doing, So yeah, absolutely

 

And then I'd say having a team too. We've got like we again. We've uh, you know, Jeremy reached out to focus on Twitter. There was a bunch of response there, and then again, our local, you know group to we. We've got a handful of folks, so we've got a little weekly. We've just sort. we've got a standing. We've got a standing weekly, meeting it in place on Fridays, where, even if there's not something specific we're gonna talk about, we'll just take thirty minutes and check in there. get up to date on any Any sponsors that folks might be contacting if there's any issues. That again, it's a good spot for. If Jeremy is trying to make some heavy decisions about things, it's just a good sounding board for him to be able to say. Hey, I was contacted by this person about that. What do you guys think

 

Hm,

 

about it? So feels more like a team rather than just maybe you know either Jeremy by himself or even just myself and

 

Yeah.

 

Jeremy. Having you know three, four or five folks, there feels

 

Hm,

 

more like we've got a team in place.

 

Yep,

 

I would also say like I don't know how other conference organizers do this, but you got a budget regular time every week to work on this. I've been tracking my time so far in February, and I'm coming in around eight to ten hours a week on average for the conference, and maybe that will taper down. I don't know if it will, but that's where I'm at right now and it was probably higher when I was working on building the site and getting those things set up, so

 

Right,

 

um, it takes a good amount of time. Thankfully, I do like fractional retainer contracts. One of one of the retainers I had just wound down. I wasn't planning to fill all my capacity and just you. I was planning to budget like ten hours a week from here till June to work on this, and thankfully I can do that. I don't know how you do it if you have a full time job and like a family and stuff like that.

 

Right,

 

Thankfully, I can like. I have this during my work day, you know, budgeted through, you know, through June, And can kind of do that. but yeah, make sure that you've got enough time to commit to it or figure out a way to you. Now split that with other people and that sort of thing. But there's so many little decisions like there's so many. Like just surprising things that keep coming. You know like you think it's like Okay, we've got this one thing set. But then there's just like a million decisions behind that like you set the venue. But then there's a million decisions about which tables to use for this. You know, the sponsor area and You know, like going through all the details around their wife and their Av set up, and like just so many things right. So it's just surprising and having enough margin in there so that you, when those things hit you, you've got capacity for it. I think it's really important. Um, and for me like I am a big picture person and to do details, which I do, for you know, like build web, Ap. So like you've got to be detailed, ranted in that sense, but I'm big picture in Ted. Do detail as well. I have to keep going back over the details over and over and over again,

 

Hm,

 

and that's the way I've got to do it, which is why it's really helpful to have a weekly stand up Mark was talking about. We basically sit down for thirty minutes and say what's happened this week. What are we working on And that's being able to go through those details over and over again. helps me make sure I'm not losing anything, because you know I've already been surprised by a couple of things was like, Oh, I didn't think about that, so that's just going to happen. So the more you go over it, the btteryou're. going to be catching all those little details And then you need the capacity to like to be able to respond to those. The other

 

Oh

 

thing, That's that's really difficult for me. thinking about just a work mentality. Most of my day as a developer is spent in deep work. You know, I don't have a lot of meetings. I don't have a lot of emails. or unless I get on slack. if I can stay off. I don't. I'm not involved a lot of conversation so I can get

 

Yeah,

 

a lot of deep. You know, work done on projects. But this aspect has been like so many little things right, So many. Like, Uh, connect with this person over Twitter. D. M. email this person back. Oh, I need to respond to this someone just like me. you know, like all these different things, and it's all these little conversations that you're trying to move just inches further right you can't ever. There's

 

Hm,

 

all these open loops and you can't close them all.

 

Hm,

 

They just keep going back ground. You're just like moving the ball forward a little bit for each one of them. So you're changing context all the time and that is really challenging. like. I find that to be really draining. Ex. Sting. Um, so I'm not getting as much deep work as I normally get. And

 

Hm,

 

but it has to be done. It's just it's a very different kind of work than I'm used to doing. Um, so just now, that's what you're getting into. I guess

 

Hm.

 

Yep, Cool.

 

Yeah,

 

So

 

Oh,

 

what are you working on now? Like what's what's next?

 

Oh, current stuff. What are we looking at? One of the big things is sponsorships continue to work on That That that opens the doors for many other things. You know.

 

Right?

 

like I've got. I've got somebody who I want to do our video stuff. But we, we need the sponsors ahead of that there.

 

Right.

 

So there are things like that that have to be done. Our c. F P closes next Wednesday. We need to work the next couple of days to figure out how the how to include our volunteers in a way that makes sense. That is, Gives them an opportunity to have feed back into and into our review process and then plan that so that we can make our final choices and then go out, you know, to our speakers and say okay, Are you still good? Will this work for you? And then you know I have all of that done and then start announcing, So we're planning to announce speakers starting March fifteenth, So we've got two two weeks in there to know. Make our selections speak, you know, talk to the speakers. make sure they're on board and then start announcing them. And

 

Yep,

 

that's also when our early bird registration closes, March fifteenth, So there's quite a bit to do between now and then and then. I imagine that is also going to be another kind of big push in terms of our ability to start doing more marketing and stuff like that, Because it's hard to. It's harder to have things to say until we know who our speakers are and what their topics are. But as soon as you have that, you have a lot more to say on social media or in email, news letters, and that sort of thing, so We'll be able to. We'll have more content available to start marketing that, either to the people that are attending or people that might attend. Um, So we've got that will be a big push. then,

 

Good deal. Um, I guess

 

Oh

 

the other thing that I've run into is sometimes I with the remote conferences. I've actually had to postpone a couple of them because

 

Hm.

 

I set the time line too short to launch them.

 

Hm.

 

So

 

Yeah.

 

and in the past I just put it up and it would all kind of come together, But it looks like it seems like it's more work now to make it run. so I'm wondering on your, and like how

 

Oh,

 

being where you are now, how far out would you schedue The conference like if you're looking at doing a conference and you're like I want to run it as soon as possible.

 

M.

 

Would you wait six months, three months, eight months, ten months?

 

I would say minimum six months,

 

Okay,

 

I don't, I mean, and this is still my first time. Maybe

 

Yeah,

 

it's easier than you like, if you're a first time, or maybe if you've

 

Yeah,

 

done this before and you have everything

 

yeah,

 

kind of set. But the first time you're like, Oh, how am I going to do this? How am I going to do that? How are we going do this like it's all these brand new challenges you got to solve for the first time right. There's a bunch of stuff

 

My

 

that. if we did it again, especially if we use the same venue, it would just be it would

 

Hm,

 

fall into place right

 

Hm.

 

so. But if it's your first time, boy, you've got to Into decisions ahead of you. You probably need

 

Yeah,

 

six months

 

And I

 

and

 

mean, really.

 

you need

 

really

 

people.

 

almost

 

you need

 

eight.

 

to build awareness.

 

Yeah, you know, really almost eight months.

 

Yeah,

 

Because I guess

 

that would probably

 

we

 

be

 

started

 

better.

 

talking. I mean, we started talking back. And when was that of October, November, something like

 

It

 

that,

 

was like, Yeah, October, November,

 

and then

 

something like

 

January

 

that. Ah,

 

is when we really. I think we, we got together and chatted, you know, right after the first year and we sort of decided to sort, said. Okay, Yeah, we're goin to definitely do it. I said okay, Yeah, I'm definitely going to support you. So that was the sixth month mark, but Really it was you know we were. We

 

Yeah,

 

were sort of making some plans and having conversations about bait prior to that,

 

That might be

 

Yep,

 

different if it was a one day event Or you know, if you didn't have other aspects like that like you know, But if it's if it's two days there's hotel. There's travel people on site. You know, lots of speakers. If you need sponsorship, all those things just add a lot of extra time.

 

Yeah, I'm also wondering like, is there? is there somebody you're getting advice from to start and run a conference or

 

Yeah, maybe I didn't say this already, but yes, uh, talked to other conference organizers. I have talked to a bunch of people. talked to Andy Croll, Jason Carns, Jim is rof, Emily Samp, just talked to Tod Lewis, who does all things open and rally, talked to him this week. Every time I talk to somebody knew, I get something like something new out of

 

Right?

 

it. So every person has this different perspective and they remember. You know, they remember different keys or bring up something that was different, and every time I've learned something valuable that I really need to know, so I think that's huge. I've been so thankful to all the organizers who've been willing to give me like thirty minutes to an hour of their time like that's been so helpful. It's also so there's the knowledge side of. There's also the sort of the emotional support side of it, which is like you're doing great. You're going, You know you're you're. this is, we've did it. You're gonna. you're going to be okay. You know that, kind of just like the support around like it's going to be all right. You're doing a brave thing. This is. this is hard. You're going to get through it. That. really? That really helps. I really. I personally need that. that's very reassuring. especially when you know, Get focused on one one specific problem that I'm like. How are we go Figure this out? Like this is so stressful. No other people have figured it out and that their support if really matters. so I definitely recommend reaching out to people if you know them, especially, but I found even people that I didn't really know very well were really were willing to talk to me and that was that's been. Yeah, just such an encouraging thing.

 

Hm, makes sense. Um, Man, we've already been talking for an hour,

 

Uh, uh,

 

So if people want to come to Blue Ridge Ruby conference or if they want to volunteer or speak, or you know

 

Oh

 

how do they? how do they connect with you guys?

 

Yeah, Blueridge Ruby dot com, Let's sit. We've got a good

 

Yeah,

 

amount of information. Not speakers listed yet.

 

yeah,

 

That will be three more weeks. but

 

Yeah,

 

the venue, the town kind of the basic about the conference. Where to where to get a hotel? Travel all that kind of stuff Is there? We've got early bird ticket sales right now for two forty nine. That's until March fifteenth. You can also there, submit to our c. F. P. That's until Next week next Wednesday. Don't know when when this episode will drop, But we're closing March first, and then we'll announce speakers March fifteenth, And if you are, if you're interestin sponsoring, there's a sponsorship page with all our packages. Definitely want to connect with with you. If you are interested in that. What else

 

We

 

am

 

also

 

I thinking

 

have

 

of? We also

 

scholarships.

 

have. Oh yeah, yeah, we. we have ten first come for serve, Uh, scholarship tickets that we're making available to people you know, eduyouknweducational or people based on need. We'd love to see more, especially early rubies coming to the conference, So there's a place to apply for that And then we're also on Twitter and Ruby Social with the Blue Ridge Ruby handle.

 

Yeah, cool. all right. Well, let's go ahead and go into our next segments. One segment we added. Since you guys have been on Um, is the self promo segment Um, and it's just hey, this is what I'm working on. The people should know about and we've kind of done that for the conference. But um, you guys are welcome to talk about anything else you guys are working on. I'm actually just going to jump in and go first. M. So two things that I've been working on and I'll keep it real short. One of them Is as I'm getting ready to actually launch my M. M, v P course. The most valuable programmer course, Um, and effectively, it's going to be a master class on how to get the most out of your career. And when I talk about getingthe most out of your career, Effectively when I talk to people who I think of it this level, they're getting paid really well to work on really interesting projects and they're in high demand and are recognized experts, Right And so that's what I'm going to teach you to do. I'm going to teach you how to get to that point. you know, and sure, I mean that you're going to have to do some work

 

M.

 

to get that right. But I can show you a lot of the short cuts. You have to go figure it out on your own. Um, I'm probably

 

Oh

 

going to sell it as I, because I'm I'm starting working on the course, but I'll probably do pre sales,

 

Yeah,

 

and based on whatever percentage I have done, you'll get it for that percentage of the full price, which is going to be. It's going to be high. Ticket, Of course, right, like a full on Bo camp, so keep an eye out for that. I'll probably tweet about it once I have the sign up page up, but that's one thing I'm working on and the other thing I'm working on is I've actually

 

Yeah,

 

put together a page for um episode

 

Oh,

 

recommendations

 

yeah,

 

so you can come in and you can recommend a person

 

Yeah,

 

or a topic, or you know whatever right. You can ask a question you want us

 

yeah,

 

to answer on the show And then

 

Yeah,

 

you can also come if you don't have an idea, But you want to see what people are suggesting

 

Ye.

 

you come, and you can uploate them. And so, uh, yeah, that's that's just

 

This

 

something

 

was.

 

that we're Um, I've had a lot of people ask me for that and so I'm putting that together And then I'm also launching the contapult your coding career. So I said too, and I gave you three. Um, and that that's a podcast

 

Yeah,

 

on the kinds

 

yeah,

 

of things I'm goin be teaching in that V P course, but

 

Oh

 

effectively we're just going to answer questions that people have

 

Yeah,

 

Start out with questions I've been getting in my coaching calls right, and I'll just be a little bit hand wavy about who it is right, because I don't want to violate in his privacy.

 

Yeah,

 

But a lot of the questions are questions

 

yeah,

 

that I get from a variety of people,

 

Yeah,

 

And then I'll have a recommendation board for that as well, and you can come in and you can ask

 

Yes.

 

the question you want me to answer in the show. Um, and then occasionally I think I'll have some guests on that can talk about Publishing a book with a traditional publisher. Or maybe I'll have you guys on to talk about organizing a conference or stuff like that.

 

Yeah,

 

That's

 

Yeah,

 

what I'm working

 

me, be cool.

 

on. Either of you have things you're working on. You want people

 

yeah,

 

to know

 

Yeah, I've got something. So if you are into Rails and Indy business, my friend Jus Brown and I just started the India Rails podcast. Were

 

M.

 

this is my first time dipping my toes into a podcast. We just interviewed Joe Mazalotti Rails Debs last week. It was really great talking with him. It feels like we've gotten a lot of just a lot of great feed back from from the community so far, so if you're into like independent Business plus rails, this is kind of like. That's our scene. That's what we're going for. So we're on all the major podcasting platforms as well as India Rails Dot com.

 

Cool.

 

I have a pet project that I started a couple of months ago, Have not done a ton of work, but I'm excited about the idea and if anyone would love to partner with me on that, I would be happy to have you work with me on it. It is the idea for it is, I'm a registered independent and I was thinking like, how do I know whether someone a politician is independent or not right? There's all these right leaning sites and

 

M,

 

left leaning

 

Hm.

 

sites. You can tell how concerned with someone else how liberal they are, but there's really no way to tell Like if someone's independent or not, And so that that was the sort of impetus for the idea. Pro pro Publica has a congressional a P. I, and you can pull all kinds of robust data from that, Every single bill that goes to the House and the Senate floor, All the discussion how people voted on it, and then there's all kinds of little, neat, little tit bits of data and things like like that there. So my, the idea is and I've toyed around with all kinds of names for a website. Are they Independent? Are you independent? So that's still so. If you feel if you work with me on this, you can help name the website

 

M

 

that. That's one

 

nice,

 

perk, but I've started. I've got the. I've sort of got the guts of a Rails app in place. I've started pulling data down. I've got sort of contest that go in and pull data into it. Ideally, I would have a design or somebody with a design sense. That's not one of my strong points, So certainly, if you are a front end person who knows some rails that that would be great to work with, so you can. Yeah, just reach out to me at Mark Lock Layer on Twitter.

 

That's cool. I'm fairly politically involved. I just don't talk about it on these shows because we're talking about programming.

 

Usually Yes, it's usually good. good not to, And so and I'm not, you know

 

Yeah,

 

to me this is pure

 

No,

 

teck. but yeah,

 

yeah, but I think it's interesting you know, just from Yeah. from the point of view of Yeah, how independent are they Because I see the you know, the right leaning. You know people who evaluate folks, Basically saying these people are way extreme over here, and I see the left leaning folks do the same thing to people on the right. And so, and usually they don't have anything to back it up right. It's just like Oh you. And so it'd be interesting to. Yeah, here's the voting record. Here's the algorithm we're using Right And so then I can look at it and then go. Oh, I see what. I see what you're pulling in. I can see how you come to that conclusion. That's interesting right? so yeah, all right. let's go ahead and do picks. Now I always do a board game Pick first, so I'm going to pick a board game. This one is a little bit more complicated. I feel like the last handful that I've I have been. You know, fairly casual games that most

 

M.

 

people would play. This one is a pretty intense game. It's called Ark, Nova, Um, and effectively, what you wind up doing is your buying animals and stuff in your zoo, And I think last I played it last night with my friends and it took us like three hours to play it. So it's not for the faint of heart. Um, but it was super fun. It's It's just kind of involved. It takes a while to play it. Um. and yeah, so you're what you wind up doing as you wind up. Um, you kind of manage your turn and take different actions, and you put animals in the zoo. The animals have. Um, there are three tracks. there's the M. there's the prestige or the what is it reputation track? There's the conservation track, and there's the appeal track. And so you know, as you put the animals in the zoo, almost couple of them give you a peal, Some of them give you money that you used to, You

 

M.

 

know,

 

Oh,

 

I

 

M.

 

space in your zoo,

 

M.

 

build space in your zoo for more animals. And anyway, I'm not going to go into play. but, but it's pretty fun and yeah, this is the second time through that I've played it the third time that I've started it and I really enjoyed it. So it is

 

Yeah,

 

three point seven, two weight Out of five on board game geek, and is telling people to is kind of where you get into the semi complicated

 

Oh

 

game that a casual gamer would still play. And so

 

Okay,

 

when you get into games like this, it's the serious board gamers that want to have like thinking strategy. You know, intense game. Um, I also have to say that it's so tempting for me.

 

A

 

I just write like a mobile app or something that keeps track of like all the tracks and everything else, so

 

Yeah,

 

that effectively,

 

yeah,

 

you know I can play on my phone and I can say okay, Um, you know, up

 

Yeah,

 

the M. I played this card and it would add, subtract, and tell me what else I need to do in order to make sure that I know what's going on, and you know, I can also tell it what I've done on my board, so that at the end of the, you know because the, There were a few times where we played something and then somebody would go. Oh, I missed this and this, and you know we'd always let him go back and do it, But yeah,

 

M.

 

it's

 

M.

 

just because there were some complicated pieces to it, so I'm going

 

Oh

 

to pick that another pick that I have is. I'm still doing seventy five hard.

 

Yeah,

 

Um about weeks ago, Had terrible stuff happened to in mine and so, and it's just wiped me out, so I had to start it over, But I'm two weeks in now and last week doing the work outs and everything. I actually lost four pounds and my body fat percentage went down by a percentage point, so I'm

 

M.

 

Dan,

 

pretty thrilled about that, so go check out seventy five hard. It's actually a self disciplined

 

h.

 

program. It's not a weight loss program,

 

Hm,

 

but it's one of the side effects because you have to work out as part of your deal, So

 

Yeah,

 

I'm going to pick that has an app, The Apse life saver Because I would forget stuff. The first time I

 

yeah,

 

did it before Was the app and

 

Oh

 

I completed it, but I had to remember everything every day and this time

 

Yeah,

 

makes it real simple to just do. Um, so yeah, so I'm enjoying that and there was a new episode

 

Yeah,

 

It

 

of

 

was

 

Nineteen Twenty three and I'm enjoying that

 

M.

 

as well. And then there was something else I was going to pick and I, it's into a couple of books on Audible and so Let me just shout out about those real quick. The first one's called. Everything is figured out able by Marie Folio And it's It's awesome. Um, and it really made me think about just how many times I just give myself an excuse and a pass to not finish something or do something instead of pushing through and finding

 

Yah.

 

a way to make it happen.

 

Yeah,

 

The other one is the power of one more,

 

yeah,

 

and that was by Ed Malet, and his Is more of the Do one more lap. Do one more push up. Do one more, you know, stick

 

Oh,

 

it out for one more day when things are hard and you know there

 

Ah,

 

are the different chapters go into like you know, one more style leadership, one more style, you know, exercise, one more style. And so he gives you examples of how it plays out in your life, and it really really inspired me. And so I'm enjoying that as well, and

 

Yeah,

 

I pick up the book because he was talking about some of these. I As on a call and this is my last pick. I've picked like six things. I'm sorry, but

 

M.

 

this last

 

Okay,

 

one is he. So he and Andrew Frazella, who did the M f C E project podcast And now it's the relafpodcast the re launching M f c e O. But anyway he, he

 

Yeah,

 

has

 

Yes,

 

a podcast. Andrew Frazella is also the guy who put together seventy five hard. The

 

Yeah,

 

two guys together have put together is community

 

Yeah,

 

called Rat

 

So

 

Syndicate. And what it is is it's a bunch of business people that get together. Usually

 

Yeah,

 

it's just Ed and Andy like answering questions and talking about some of these ideas. And so

 

Yeah,

 

I picked up the book because

 

Yes,

 

you know he was talking about some of

 

yeah,

 

the ideas and just

 

Yes,

 

casually mentioned that he had some of it in that book. So I listened to the book and it's awesome. Tally

 

Yes,

 

planned on buying both of those books physically and notes in him. So anyway they're

 

Yeah,

 

terrific. I'll put links to all

 

That's

 

of it in

 

cool.

 

the show notes. but yeah, loving that mark. Do you have some picks? S?

 

I do have some picks I'm going to pick. I have two picks One is going to be and I think I think I bought this set based on a pick off this show many many years ago, but I thought I would just come back and come back around to a full circle. These are Logoftech twenty E head set. And what's cool about it is it's They're not. Blue Tooth is like the old school at two dot eleven. Um, you know

 

Hm,

 

wireless connection. So what's great about it Is something? The sure. you're not going to walk away, But often if I'm in staff meetings or something like that and I'm not playing a huge role and I just need to be there and listen. I can mute myself and I can walk all around the house. I can walk downstairs and go put put clothes from the wash into the driver.

 

Yeah,

 

I can even walk out to the road and go to the mail box, so I don't know. I haven't really seen how far I can go before I lose

 

Oh,

 

a connection. But if you're if you're child of the eighties and you had a wireless phone back then, it probably use that to Dot Eleven wireless standard. So that's one pick and then the other pick is. And surely someone has made this pick in the last couple of months, but I'm going to say that G. P. T. I, yesterday I had

 

Hm,

 

the experience of I was having the issue with. I had a vagrant box that had mysqlloaded on it, and I've got Phpmadman on my local box, and I was trying to connect to this my s. q, l instance on this vagrant box, from P. H, P, or from from Phpmsql I simultaneously posted on stack overflow about the issue that I was having, and then I went into a conversation with chat, g, p T, and we went back and forth about ten times or so, but I chat g p. T helped me successfully solve my issue, and by then that was probably by the time I went back and looked on stack overflow, There was still not a response there. And so I feel like that. I feel for me. that feels like a milestone moment. So I would encourage folks. You know, Surely you've heard about it, but if you're not, you're not using that g, g, P. T, or least experiment with it. Try and see, but it's It's pretty impressive.

 

Awesome, Yeah, I've played with it. Some definitely want to play with it more, because I've been doing quite a bit of writing and

 

Hm,

 

I don't know that I would use exactly what chat G

 

Okay,

 

P. T wrote, but I've

 

It's

 

I've

 

a

 

done

 

great

 

a couple

 

start.

 

of things with it and it gives

 

Yeah,

 

me a solid start. Yeah,

 

yep.

 

Yeah,

 

yep.

 

and and then I can, I can

 

I,

 

go from there and I can say Okay, you know, this is more how I, you know I want my voice to come across, or how I would say it Loud and then typically I'm adding it and this is the story I would tell right

 

Yeah,

 

that chat. G, P. T can't pull out of my head.

 

And and

 

I'm

 

So

 

what's

 

working

 

also

 

loving

 

on an

 

that

 

integration.

 

fun? I was gonna say. What's also fun. Chuck, When you do that, do it and then go back and add and do it in the voice of a pirate. And so that that sort of closes the loop on it.

 

Uh,

 

There we

 

uh,

 

go. pirate emails.

 

Nice.

 

Yeah,

 

Yeah, how about you, Jeremy. What are your picks?

 

I got two picks. The first is a blog posts by Clive Thompson. It's called how I use r, s. s to re wild my attention, and I really love this idea of re wilding your attention instead of having it sort of tied down to a feed. Um, Using r s. S that way, it's kind of a throwback in some ways, but in other ways it's like a way to kind of get yourself weened off. maybe a little bit of All media and halgorithmic feeds, and so share the link for that And then also came across this site. It's a site with articles and a book that goes with its called Good services. The site is good Dot services, And you know I do consulting and development for people and I'm thinking about services a lot. and what kind of services I offer and how to package those well, and this site has in the book, I'm excited to get this book and read it, but already reading some of the articles has a really good insight into how to how to think about the service that you're offering. not just simply the task that you're doing, but how it's presented to Um, to your clients, to the people that would buy it, and how to design how to properly design an entire service, and thinking about it being a design challenge is kind of interesting. M. You have a lot of choices that you can make. You can kind of pick some defaults, but there are a lot of choices to make too. Either you know, make for better for worse for your clients. That experience for them so good good services looks really interesting. I'm already learning some good stuff from that excited to pick up the book

 

Nice? All right, So last question, if people want to connect with you online where they find you

 

Jeremy, God

 

For me. Yes, sorry, it's Jeremy Smith, Co, on Twitter and on Ruby Social, and my little one person Dev studio is called Hybrid, H, Y, B, r, D dot C, O.

 

And I am.

 

A new mark.

 

I'm Mark Locklear, l, c, c, l, a r on most plat platforms, including Twitter, and my website is Lockleer, Dot me,

 

All right, Um, well, I'm gonna go ahead and wrap us up. Thanks for coming. This was awesome.

 

Yeah,

 

Thank

 

that's

 

you, jock.

 

great. great, thank you,

 

Yeah.

 

Chuck. Ah, I appreciate it.

 

All right. Well, folks hang in there until next time Max out.