zlacker

Also having just returned from PyCon, I have a slightly different take than Chelsea. Contrary to the "ugh... networking." take, ~30% of what I took away from PyCon was exactly the networking. Or at least that's much of what I consider the "hallway track". Hallway track also consists of reconnecting with old friends and tech/social things after the conference.

On the way back, my 13 yo son asked "How do you talk to people" and I said that there's not much you can do about it other than just do it. It IS a skill you can practice by doing. But you just need to acknowledge the anxiety, take a breath, and let it go and just say something. "Oh, I see you have for First Pycon ribbon, welcome to pycon. What do you do?" "Oh, you have a speaker ribbon, what is your talk on?"

Probably another 30% is excitement and feeling revitalized at what I've seen and who I've talked to.

Maybe 20% is cross-pollination with others in the industry, I had some really good "Open Space" talks this year. These are "Birds of a Feather" session, a group of people talking peer-to-peer about a subject. Still trying to decide if the advice from a Bloomberg SRE applies at all to my tiny company. :-)

So that leaves maybe 20% for the talks.

Plus, I got some pretty good dad-cred for introducing my son to the guy that was interviewed on a podcast we listened to on the way to the conf.

Now let's pour some out for the Whiskey BOF.

>>linsom+(OP)
> I have a slightly different take than Chelsea. Contrary to the "ugh... networking." take, ~30% of what I took away from PyCon was exactly the networking. Or at least that's much of what I consider the "hallway track". Hallway track also consists of reconnecting with old friends and tech/social things after the conference.

Isn't this exactly Chelsea's take, too?

>>fknora+gj
In the end, yes, but "ugh... networking" was also mentioned, IIRC, at least twice, maybe more.