BarCampSaigon: Proposal for RMIT Vietnam as host and venue
This page introduces BarCamp to the RMIT Vietnam community, in particular the Computer Science & Information Technology department. We believe RMIT Vietnam would be an ideal venue to host the very first BarCamp "unconference" in Vietnam, benefiting the tech community in Saigon, current and future IT students and staff at RMIT, and IT employers in Vietnam.
BarCamp is an international network of user-generated conferences — open, participatory workshop-events, whose content is provided by participants — often focusing on early-stage web applications, and related open source technologies, social protocols, and open data formats.
The first BarCamp was held in Palo Alto, California, USA, from August 19-21, 2005, with 200 attendees. Since then, BarCamps have been held in over 350 cities around the world, in North America, South America, Africa, Europe, Australasia and Asia. The second-year anniversary in Palo Alto was attended by over 800 people.
More information can be found at the Wikipedia entry for BarCamp.
What happens at a BarCamp?
The procedural framework consists of sessions proposed and scheduled each day by attendees, mostly on-site, typically using white boards or paper taped to the wall.
While loosely structured, there are friendly rules at BarCamp. All attendees are encouraged to present or facilitate a session. Everyone is also asked to share information and experiences of the event, both live and after the fact, via public web channels including (but not limited to) blogging, photo sharing, social bookmarking, wiki-ing, and IRC.
How much does it cost?
Venues typically provide basic services. Free network access, usually WiFi, is crucial. BarCamps rely on securing sponsorship, ranging from the venue and network access to beverages and food.
Attendance is typically monetarily free and generally restricted only by space constraints. Participants are asked, though, to sign up in advance.
How will this benefit the tech community in Saigon?
How will this benefit current RMIT students & staff?
How will this benefit prospective RMIT students?
How will this benefit RMIT?
How will this benefit IT employers?
Will the sessions be conducted in English or Vietnamese?
This is up to those who propose or facilitate a session. We expect there to be sessions in English, in Vietnamese, and both.
