Where in the world is DC210?

[dr.strangelust]

My closest hacker friend and I decided to drive the 70 miles into San Antonio to attend the DC210 meeting that happens every third Wednesday at the Thai Corner Restaurant. The website at www.dc210.org was still valid with a link to a nice looking flyer that I read and saved with all the details, so- off we went.

The location is nice, and I remembered meeting here last winter with the San Antonio Hackers Association (SAHA, I think…) and there was a semi-private room, plenty of space and seats, a projector, good Thai food, and everything else a loose organization of hackers might want, except for us two, there were not any other hackers.

After an obligatory re-check of the website and flyer, we asked the manager about the meeting. He let us know that it had been a long time since DC210 had met there, maybe almost a year ago. He offered to let us know about the other group that met there (SAHA), we thanked him, and finished our meal and discussed DEFCON relevant stories and ideas at our group of two meeting.

So all you DEFCON enthusiasts out there in the 210 lands, please consider carefully why this close to DEFCON-19 we all are not having any get-togethers?

HEY! Wakeup out there and please help get the discussion going- with no personal attacks. If you have a personal problem with how something was done, volunteer to do it correctly. Participate and make something great:

a. How do we re-fibrillate the group?
b. What are the hang-ups that need to be addressed?
c. Who wants to and can help, volunteer, participate?
d. If nothing else, we can find somewhere to meet and drink;
...the flying saucer perhaps....


-Doc & Belle

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Re: Where in the world is DC210?

Timing of this post isn't surprising, right before Defcon there is new interest, and right after Defcon no one shows up at the meetings.

Turnouts at the meetings have always been very low, only when something big was being held did people show up. We announced plans to open a Hackerspace and we had a dozen+ people turn out, we did a Win7 launch party and got 25+ people. The average meeting though only pulls 2-4 people.

Many times I show up at the restaurant, order food, sit at a table and wait.
If no one shows or only 2 or 3 people we just use a regular table and do not bother to have them open the party room. So Im not surprised they said they hadnt seen us in a while. Many times I've eaten dinner alone, sometimes sitting with stuff ready to present a talk.

San Antonio has alot of groups, and because of that the numbers that turn out suffer.
DEFCON, SAHA, 10BitWorks Hackerspace, SATLUG, 2600, The Community College Computer Group (Not sure what their name is), San Antonio Digital Fabricators.
XCSSA (Exotic Computer Club)

Thats just a few that I can name off the top of my head.

People stay busy all month with other projects and groups and just don't show up. Because the Defcon group is not really working on anything as a group project. The Defcon Group here is basically a collection of people who belong to other groups that work on projects.

I would like to see the groups present some talks on their projects.

When I have an event planned, or a lecture that I think will pull in a few people I send an email out to the mailing list, which has over 70 people right now. I announce that a meeting is being held, and what will be presented. If were lucky, 5 or more show up.

I will be doing a dry run on the "Arduino 101" stuff at the next meeting. This will be some of the stuff I plan to have at the booth for Defcon. I want to see what questions people have, what I need to add to my materials, and any ideas that people have.

Hopefully people will turnout. It all depends if they are interested in Arduino or not. People arent attending the meetings to attend the group meeting. People are only attending when a topic that is beneficial to them is being presented.

I'm truly sorry you came all the way down here and we missed meeting up.
Please PM me your email address if you'd like to be added to the mailing list, then you can better gauge a meeting you might want to come back down to San Antonio to attend.

Ohh and I used to send out an invite once a month to have a beer night at the Flying Saucer, and it people still didn't show. If beer and scantily dressed women don't attract hackers, then I don't know what else to try.

I miss the days of a group that did things as a group, everyone is either self focused, or wants to keep their group separated from other groups. I once tried to merge the a few groups meetings and got a negative response. So Im always open for suggestions.