On Thursday November 5th the first Build conference was held in Belfast’s Waterfront Studio.
The atmosphere during Build was fantastic, a really positive vibe was emanating from the audience all day. The speakers did interesting and informative presentations, we even learned how to open a banana thanks to Tim Van Damme, I can’t believe we were doing it wrong all this time.
In case anyone missed the lineup of speakers, they are all top class:
Eric Meyer
Tim Van Damme
Mark Boulton
Wilson Miner
Andy Budd
Ryan Sims
I was also very lucky during the Build conference as I won a copy of Adobe CS4 Web premium (for Mac OS X) from Giant Training, thanks to a prize draw where Eric Meyer picked my out of a box.
The Build after party was also made of the stuff of legends, many beers were had and I met so many great people who I hope to see again next time!
A great job by Andy Good/McMillan on organising Build, it has been the most informative and fun conference I have had the pleasure to attend. Already I am looking forward to the next Build!
Conference pass.
Tim Van Damme getting things started with the first presentation.
The Build conference got off to a great start last night with a screening of the documentary Objectified by Gary Hustwit in the Black Box. Free pizza and beer were served throughout the screening and the evening was rounded off in style at the Malmaison.
What It Is:
Build is a conference which has been constructed for designers and digital ninjas, it will take place on Thursday November 5th at the Waterfront Studio in Belfast.
Build has been fully organised by Andy McMillan (@goodonpaper).
Who Is Speaking:
The lineup of speakers are of the highest caliber in the business and this will be a great opportunity to learn from the best:
Eric Meyer
Tim Van Damme
Mark Boulton
Wilson Miner
Andy Budd
Ryan Sims
A full list of the topics which will be covered can be found in the speakers section of the Build site.
Surrounding Events:
Unlike most conferences Build has a full week of events which will surround the main conference. These are not your typical events and include a showing of the popular documentary Objectified, a lecture by Airside, a BarCamp unconference and of course the Build after party. Complete listings for the events and registration details can be found over at the Build schedule.
Workshops:
Build also gives you the opportunity to register for a range of workshops on Wednesday November 4th. The workshops include Accessibility 2.0 with Philip Strain from Ecliptic, HTML 5 and CSS 3 with Chris Murphy and Nik Persson (Web Standardistas) and Guerrilla Usability Testing with Andy Budd from Clearleft.
Tickets:
If you are interested in attending Build it is still not to late, so grab a ticket while you can.
Roundup:
With only a week to go before the conference gets underway, the buzz is beginning to hit the streets and I, for one can’t wait.
Hope to see you there!
Lookaly is a new service that has been developed in order to act as a gateway for people based in Belfast and Northern Ireland to share their experiences of goods and services provided by local businesses.
When you first visit Lookaly the first thing that will standout is the design, this has clearly been taken very seriously and a lot of thought placed on making the user experience as smooth as possible through a clean and well structured interface.
The businesses that are available for browsing have been placed into a range of categories which include:
Automotive
Eating, Drinking and Nightlife
Financial and Legal
Leisure and Sports
Public Services, Education and Careers
Travel and Transportation
Once you have located the business you are interested in you can simply view all the reviews, photos and contact details that are associated with it. If you own a business or have an experience you want to share I would highly recommend adding it to their directory, so far it has helped me several times on choosing where to go for lunch in Belfast.
Lookaly also provides a blog which covers topics such as local events, products and of course businesses.
Another nice feature from Lookaly comes from utilising the social networking platform Twitter, they will often tweet a summary of reviews that have been posted, so it is a good idea to follow @Lookaly if you are a Twitter user.
Overall I think Lookaly is an extremely useful service and I am looking forward to seeing it grow as more businesses are added to the directory.