Understood. I was just writing from an organizer / advocate standpoint. And I know where you’re coming from too.

To me, networking events in general are about return on investment. That is, we’re investing our time. If we don’t establish meaningful relationships during that time, then what’s the point? I can have a drink anywhere.

Matt Genoveses last blog post..Electronics Design & Manufacturing Symposium & Vendor Show – Attendee Survey

This is not an attack on Door64. I know your intentions are very good. I just feel very pressed for personal time and am now not really seeing much benefit from them. This was more or less a post about my personal position rather than a judgment of happy hours.

It’s hard to do this when biking, and frankly I think people just coming off a day’s work are not apt to meet somewhere else other than a relaxed atmosphere to socialize. Hell, getting engineers to socialize can be a feat in itself sometimes (which is why I keep events free: low barrier to entry). Weekends are for families, so that leaves weeknights. With a goal of provoking meaningful conversation to create professional relationships, that does limit what else can be done simultaneously.

I will say that like yours and others, my time is valuable since I have many projects I work on. So I’m not bouncing between happy hours throughout each week. On average I hit one every few weeks (if that). And I’m careful to choose where I go. Chatting for the sake of chatting isn’t my cup of tea. This is the reason I keep door64 events focused on high-tech: people (like me) should find value in the networking, and not just chuck the business cards afterwards.

While not trying to pat myself on the back or self-promote, I think this experiment has worked, at least for door64. That said, I do want to hold other types of events that stretch beyond pure networking into continuing education. We’ll see how that pans out.

Matt Genoveses last blog post..Electronics Design & Manufacturing Symposium & Vendor Show – Attendee Survey

Do we HAVE to network at a bar? Can we network in any other context? Other than these events, I hardly ever go to happy hour.

I do not dismiss the network aspects of it. I just feel there are other ways of doing this. I would suggest attending an Austin Social Media Club or Refresh Austin meeting so you can see what I am talking about. People drink a little, they certainly pass around business cards, but there is a goal to learn new skills.

Would you show up if Michael Arrington AND Obama showed up?

I’ve personally been to tons of events where there was and was not drinking and, frankly, you get out of them what you put into them…drunk or not.

I don’t agree that there are too many of these events. Let them happen and the useful ones will stick around while the ones only claiming to be progressive will disappear as people realize they are crap.

The only part I hate about the number of events is that I can’t make it to all of them, so I can never be sure I am making it to the best ones.

Robert “Adomatica” Gilbreaths last blog post..Who’s Watching Who #53

And at the risk on going on too much of a tangent… Part of the effect of those events is that it “selects for” a certain kind of people which, in turn, makes for a relative insularity of the crowd in question. Among things which could change for many of these things to go really mainstream (social media, “Web 2.0,” social marketing…), it might be a good idea to expand from the “geek niche” into broad society. At the risk of sounding stereotypical, there are “demographics” which are nearly absent from these spheres and one reason is that events are mostly welcoming for a certain type of people. I have a very clear picture in mind but I’m afraid it might be misconstrued. A specific GaryVee party in Austin during SXSWi was the ideal case for this.

Alexandre Enkerlis last blog post..Apologies and Social Media: A Follow-Up on PRI’s WTP

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The stream of ideas recalled an old (and two-edged) saying:

“Marketing is as old as the crossroad.”

~ Alex from Our Evolution

Alexander M Zoltais last blog post..Global Unity