pycon as seen from across the Tweet

That was an interesting experience: I (re)started using Twitter a couple of weeks ago, for no particular reason except that it seemed to be an increasingly significant backchannel of information around Python, meaning that useful information passes through it which is then assumed or referred to in other forums [*] such as the Python mailing lists or people’s blog posts.

But by fortunate coincidence that meant that I was able to watch the #pycon Twitter stream and get a more immediate flavour of the conference than I would have by following later blog posts. Obviously it was quite fun watching people try to get their questions on the screen for Guido’s keynote speech (took me a while to realise what was going on…).

Throughout the conference you get a mixture of the very immediate (”Has anyone got a Mac VGA Adapter for Room C?”), the impending (”BoF Session for Ruby Enthusiasts in the downstairs toilets”), the infinitely retweeted (”Unladen Swallow….”), the humorously overheard (”OH: OK; Yak shaved”), the running-joke (”Bring goat food to the Testing Sprint”), the contentious (”We were more diverse…”), the you-had-to-be-there (”Looks like @djangopony was left unattended”), the gratitude (”Thanks to everyone…”) and of course the plain exhausted (”Back home now after #pycon”).

I obviously didn’t follow everything in real time, not least because of the time difference: I do have other things to do with my time :) But it was enjoyable watching other people enjoy themselves and feeling at least a spectator to an Occasion in the Python year. Now all I’ve got to do is find time to catch up with slides, video presentations, and A Little Bit of Python.

[*] Note to pedants: seems to me that “forum” has become an English word by adoption which means that you can justifiably form its plural by adding an “s”. If I were talking about meeting places of the Ancient World I might argue for the more classical “fora”.