Let’s Hear It For The Campuseros!
What do you get when you mix 1000’s Hackers, 1000’s of tents and game-changing speakers from all computing fields for 7 days in one of the world’s most bustling cities? Campus Party Mexico!
What is Campus Party ? According to Luis Sosa, the content director for the conference, it’s about creativity in Geeks.
The conference is a massive hackathon, with thousands of developers sitting together in one room surrounded by stages on Astronomy, Robotics, Hardware and Modding, Software Development, Free Culture, Social Media, Visual Arts, Music, Networking and Security as well as Games. Phew.
Each of the stages offered non-stop talks, in addition to the main stage dedicated to Keynote talks which included Ray Kurzweil, Al Gore, Neil Harbisson, John “Maddog” Hall, Tan Le, friend of SoundCloud Tim Exile and, gulp, myself. Tim Exile also closed the conference with a Live Jam – watch it here
Campus party (from now on I’ll refer to it as CPMX3) is *special* When I first walked into the space I was immediately overwhelmed by the size, the passion, the excitement about what’s possible. CPMX3 is developers, or Campuseros, from every computer culture niche in one space working on the future of Latin American and global computing.
Moreover, CPMX3 was inclusive, the first tech conference I have ever been to where there was a lineup in the ladies’ room. Most importantly, it was fun, as demonstrated by a Nyan Cat parade, or, 200 people walking with laptops, open to Nyan Cat for what was probably longer than anyone should be exposed to Nyan Cat.
There are Campus Parties all throughout Latin America, in Spain and next year the valley will get its own edition. If there’s one thing that Campus Party is not afraid of, it’s scale. Yet despite the size of the event, it’s personal, the kind of event at which you’ll meet friends, and not casual acquaintances you’ll strain to remember at the next conference. If you can go, go.
Thank-you so much to the fabulous people at Noiselab and the whole Campus Party Team for creating an unforgettable experience for myself and all the Campuseros!