Last Sunday at our Metro Detroit WordPress meetup, we saw a lot of new members attend the WordPress REST API presentation, which was great. I think the attraction of a developer-focused talk brought in a lot of new people.
Before the presentation started, one of our long-time members asked who was going to WordCamp Grand Rapids this month.
One of the new members replied, What’s a WordCamp?
I can tell you about WordCamps,
I responded.
I looked around the room and asked, How many of you have never heard of WordCamps before?
More than half the people in the room raised their hands.
Here’s what I told them.
What are WordCamps?
WordCamps are locally organized casual events focusing on anything about WordPress. They’re an extension of the local WordPress meetup group, and organized by the meetup group leaders and/or active members.
How Much Do WordCamps Cost?
They’re low-cost events, typically $20 per day, and held at local schools, community centers, public libraries, or co-working spaces.
Who Attends WordCamps
Anyone who uses or is interested in using WordPress can attend WordCamps. That includes bloggers, business owners, designers, developers, writers, nonprofit staff, school employees or teachers, consultants, programmers, project managers, authors, or marketers.
People attend to share ideas, learn about WordPress, talk about opportunities, and meet other WordPress users in person.
What Kind of Event is a WordCamp?
WordCamps can be any kind of format. They can be a one-day event or three-day event, including:
- Conference-like sessions where local WordPress users share their knowledge and expertise about plugins, themes, design, using WordPress for their business
- Panels where WordPress users discuss/debate some aspect of WordPress
- Interviews or lightning talks
- Multi-hour workshops on a WordPress feature or functionality
- Unconference, where there are no planned sessions or speakers
Some WordCamps have a workshop day, where people who have never used WordPress can learn how to install it and use it.
Other WordCamps have a contributor day, where you personally can contribute to WordPress by making changes to core, writing/updating WordPress documentation, answering questions on the WordPress forums, or any number of other methods to contribute to the WordPress project.
Who Speaks at WordCamps
Since WordCamps are an extension of the local WordPress meetup group, speakers are drawn from the local community. It’s your chance to show off the local WordPress developers, businesses, designers, and users.
According to WordCamp Central (the organizers of all things WordCamp), the goal is to have 80 percent local speakers and 20 percent out-of-town speakers.
Funding
Funding for WordCamps come from the fees collected from the people who attend, local sponsors in your WordPress community, as well as multi-event sponsors organized by WordCamp Central.
How to Find Upcoming WordCamps
I finished talking about WordCamps by telling there was a WordCamp planned for Hawaii, but no date set yet. And I pointed people to WordCamp Central to find out about upcoming WordCamps.
Several members chatted about attending past WordCamps and others commented they sounded like great events to attend.
WordCamp Detroit?
A couple members asked when there would be a WordCamp Detroit, and why we didn’t have one this year.
I replied it takes a lot of volunteers committed to spending time to plan the event. Many hands, light work. We would love to have a WordCamp Detroit next year, I explained, and encouraged our members to talk to any of our meetup leaders about joining the planning team.
