Hello World! Ok...lame I know. But we are geeks and what is the easiest way to get a response out of a programmer? Talk to them about hello world. Who hasn't heard that one?
Anyway - welcome.
Why Virtual?
We created this group because we saw a need for something easier than the standard dot net user group. The thought of geting into our cars and spending time on the road to go to something that might be useful no longer appealed to us! We have all been to dot net user groups that took time to get too...and in the end flat out sucked. They either lacked interesting content, boring speakers, were a marketing event for a local headhunter firm, or were poorly planned. Bottom line - they were a waste of our time. Of course we have also all been to good meetings that were well worth the trip. But this is in no way the norm. Time for an alternative method.
We figured that a virtual dot net user group would be much easier on a group of people that generally don't have a lot of extra time on their hands. Also there is an added benefit to being virtual - if it turns out that the group is covering something that you don't need to know about, has boring speakers, thrusts headhunters in your face, or is poorly planned - if the meeting just sucks - you can turn us off! Also - what other meeting can you attend in your underwear with a beer in your hand?
How are we virtual?
Good question. We are currently using two primary technologies to facilitate our virtual environment: GoToMeeting and TeamSpeak. Both of these are free to you - our users.
GoToMeeting
GoToMeeting is a slick program (www.gotomeeting.com). Among many other features - it allows one person to see another person's computer. Or in our case it allows many people to see one person's computer. This allows the speaker at our meetings to provide a visual environment for slides, real time coding demonstrations, etc. In addition to that we can pass control from one user to another. This allows the presenter to act as if they were standing over you personally and help you on your computer (in case there are configuration issues). And of course this program provides us with chatting capabilities and many other "classroom" type features. So far this has worked out very well for us!
Do you know of a better platform for this task?
TeamSpeak
TeamSpeak is also a wonderful app (www.goteamspeak.com). This program allows us to speak with one another as a group. It also has chat capabilities and other features. But for the most part VOIP is its primary feature for us.
Do you know of a better platform for this task?