Alex Shiels – Akismet – Au

Alex is Reverse Engineer at Automattic where he has worked since  2007 as lead at Akismet ”. Based in Melbourne, Alex will give us a bit of a showcase on WordPress itself such as general stats about global WordPress usage, the number of sites running WP, version distribution, where they’re hosted, that sort of thing.*

He will also explain briefly how we’re collecting that info, and what we’d like to do next. (*As much as he is allowed to say that is.)

If you use WordPress you probably use Akismet.

“Akismet filters out your comment and track-back spam for you, so you can focus on more important things.”

Previously we’ve asked Alex to talk about Akismet but for sensible reasons there is not much he is allowed to say although we do know “24,322,830 spams got stopped today so clearly the team is very busy.

Blog: Flight Path
Automattic’s first Australian, first Alex, and first vegetarian. Melbourne born and raised, Alex writes code and fights crime. He has two inventive young children, and roasts his own coffee.

The venue is the “Ellen Melville Hall” which is located centrally right near a beautiful square called Freyberg Square.  The hall is on the 1st floor of the building and there are entrances off High St and Freyberg Place.

The hall has space for around 150 people. We also have a smaller room alongside which can be used for genius bar type tips and help especially for new users.

There is disabled access and car-parking is available at Victoria St, Chancery and anywhere downtown although we’d recommend public transport. It is an easy (5min) walk up from the Britomart transport hub.

This area is part of the downtown High St zone, just one block up from Vulcan Lane and right near Chancery Square which is a great location for cafes.

The main event is all day Saturday after which everyone will be welcome to socialise over a drink or dinner nearby. If you would like to be a speaker this year please use the call for speakers 2012 form to let us know. All content needs to be related to WordPress users.

On Sunday we will have a more development oriented tech meet-up nearby in a smaller workspace which will be announced soon.

The venue building is a historic place and

“was built in 1962 as a monument to the pioneer women of the city and a memorial to the late Miss Ellen Melville (1882 – 1946). Miss Melville was the first woman to practice law independently in New Zealand and was Auckland City’s first and longest serving female councillor in the history of the council (33 years).”

For architecture buffs the original modernist building was designed by Tibor K Donner between 1958 and 1960. When it was first built it had a pool and fountain immediately underneath the hall itself as it was on columns called pilotis which kept the ground level open. Unfortunately for designers the downstairs space was converted to a shop some years back. However there is now a fountain on the other side of the square.

Dan Milward - photo by Kristina D.C. Hoeppner

Thanks everyone for coming along. We had a wonderful time with speakers, the panel fired up, some podcasting fun and even an impromptu ukelele song.

As promised here is a list of presentation slides from talks. The list will be updated as we we hear back from 2011 speakers and more speakers here.

Kristina D.C. Hoeppner took photos here is her Flickr stream for WordCamp 2011 follow her @anitsirk

Sam Parkin @booleanvalue – WordCampNZ 2011 photo stream

Paul Gibbs – BuddyPress on slideshare

SearchMasters SEO #wordcampnz presentation ppt is on http://tiny.cc/ez5z2

Ryan Allen from Envato announcing http://scalingwordpress.com, a resource for managing your wordpress blog http://is.gd/7V63WE

Vaughn Davis -Why and how I created Tweet this Book!

Miraz Jordan Slides for my 3 WordPress Tips are over on iWork

John Ford on WordPress Security this link is to an earlier version – updated by John on March 3rd and now updated here as well.

It is upstairs at Mac’s Brew Bar. Fourquare checkin / map

You will need your WordCampNZ id as it is a private function and we will start straight after the last sessions on Saturday.

Food will be available so make a night of it and meet other bloggers, WordPress users and generally interesting fellow attendees on the night. Add this session to your diary now.

It will be a cash bar as most sponsors don’t have a #party code in their accounting systems. And yes we will be running some workshops on Sunday..

We got to talk about WordCampNZ with Glenn so along I went. It’s all one take and no script plus Glenn live mixes website shots and streams the show on ustream.

There is a tiny video camera somewhere near the microphone but Glenn is over to the left and so the challenge is to talk directly to him and try not to think about the camera.

P.S. Jayson Bryant of  WineVaultTV and Vaughn Davis are regular guests and have both been to WordCampNZ where Jayson presented last time.

Last November Anthony – Co-Organizer, Dan from Instinct – a key presenter and myself were at WordCamp Australia (#30) which was held in Sydney. Even though that was only 6 months ago there have been another 25 wordcamp events since then with the mothership event in San Francisco just finishing now.

There are several more in the next few months and so wordcampNZ will be about number 62. WordCamp UK and WordCamp Chicago among them.

What to Expect?

Lots of inspired and community minded people who love using technology in a way that is genuinely helpful. There will be presentations on Themes (design sets), Plugins (mini -applications)  and the glue that holds it all together.

It will be an opportunity to compare notes with others working across town or elsewhere including those working with incredible subject matter and projects.

From my personal experience (Jason) I have worked with every content management system from the early days up to Vignette and very big proprietary systems.  What sets WordPress apart is the speed with which is can be utilised by project people who have a passion without needing to get too fussed about the technical side. It just works.

As a project manager I look after more than 50 websites and every now and then I have to go rescue someone who is stuck, but the underlying logic and overall flexibility means we can always find an easy fix to almost any scenario out there.

As an English & Law graduate from way back I have been looking forward to the day when the technology can be pushed in almost any direction without most of the previous tech constraints.

WordcampNZ is an opportunity to break down more technology barriers and genuinely help businesses and personal enthusiasts alike to express themselves.

See you in Wellington on August 8th & 9th.