Essentially, my experience at FOWA was doing participant observation of the developer side of the tech industry. A large part of the speakers and materials covered was over my head since I have a limited knowledge but I learned a lot. I did walk away learning like I knew a bit more about their processes but more importantly I feel like I gained insight into their world. The majority of the talks focused on the development process and excluded user-centered research, or mentions of users in general. To be fair, the audience was likely interested in the former more than the later. I commented to someone that FOWA felt very developer-centric and lacked a focus on users. Their response was something to the effect of “users aren’t part of the process.” To be sure, they *should* be.

BarCampMiami was useful in that the presenters only focused on the basics of what they were discussing, i.e. OpenID, OAuth, etc. I actually learned about the subjects they presented rather than gained insight into the tech industry.

Last week I attended SXSW Interactive in Austin, TX and BarCampAustin. My experience at BarCampAustin was similar to that of Miami and I learned a lot (and had fun, BarCampAustin rocked!). SXSW was a different experience from FOWA for me though. In addition to gaining insight into and about the development process of web apps, software, etc. I became inspired by listening to the developers talk about their research.

This process of listening to people talk about their experiences to gain insights in/for research is nothing new if you’re familiar with anthropology. In listening to the developers, etc. discuss their research I discovered/thought of many ways that anthropological research could help their processes and goals. This is good knowledge to have when you’re looking for internships (me or if you want to do consulting work.

All and all, I really enjoyed FOWA, SXSWi, and both BarCamps. Given that most practicing/applied anthropologists will have a professional counterpart (for tech design research it’s designers/developers, for medical anthropology maybe it’s doctors, for educational anthropologists it’s teachers, etc.) and I believe that attending your counterparts’ conferences, etc. will be very valuable for you to be able to communicate with that communicate.

Today, Tim and I registered for the Future of Web Apps (FOWA) in Miami, Florida. Part of our discussion to go was simply because it’s so close to home for us (home is Tampa, FL) and the affordable cost of the trip (early registration is only $150 for non-students, $50 for students). But, I’m looking forward to FOWA because it’s not anthropology – it’ll help me to expand my horizons a bit. Plus, it’s neat that Tim (total geek) and me (totally awesome) can go to the same events and enjoy them (we went to BarCamp Orlando and had a lot of fun). BarCamp Miami is during FOWA, so we’ll be there too

Two weeks after FOWA, Tim and I will be headed to Austin, TX for SXSW. We’ll be there for the Interactive part, so again, it’s cool we can go together (we’ll get totally different things from the sessions) and I’ll be expanding my horizons. Really excited about SXSW.

Two weeks after SXSW, I’ll be in Memphis, TN for the Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA) Meeting. I always have a good time at the SfAA Meetings, and I’ll be doing the SfAA Podcasts again in Memphis (much news about that project – I’ll post about it soon!).

Late February – early April is going to be super busy! EPIC is in Denmark next year… I hope to be there – but who knows! I’m currently taking a break from working on our paper for the American Anthropological Assoc. conference (AAA) this year in DC – that takes place at the end of November.

I’m really not looking forward to being busy or being away from home that much – BUT, like I said, I’ll take advantage of the student discounts and University funding while it lasts