Reading Roars!

On Thursday night, parties were staged simultaneously around the world in “175+ cities“, including London (of course), Jerusalem, D.C, Mumbai, Ankara and… Reading.  

Ok, Reading isn’t a city (really, it isn’t), but the point is our town, the digital pearl of the Thames Valley, lay host for the first time to the geeky, global and highly-publicised Twitter extravaganza named the Twestival – an exciting development that will, I’m sure, lead to further “tweetups”.

Superbly organised, the Reading Twestival took place at the Spanish-style La Tasca.  Newcomers were warmly greeted by @simonster and partner @DonnaWhitehead at the downstairs bar entrance, where they received a sticker bearing their Twitter username, e.g. @mattbrady, and an opportunity to buy raffle tickets.  

The top raffle prize was brilliantly conceived (and it is brilliant): a Tana Water T6 water dispenser.  Brilliant, because unfiltered tap water in Reading doesn’t taste so great, but more importantly, the Twestival was held in aid of charity:water.  Marvellous.  Unfortunately, I didn’t win anything.

I was nervously expecting in-depth conversations about obscure programming languages and (shivers down spine) Mac vs PC debates.  Instead, topics were more mainstream.   Yes, there were hardcore geeks, but there were also sponsor people (I recognised at least one MS face) and salesy types (ok, fair enough, we were all selling something – it wasn’t just about the giving).  In other words, the Reading Twestival crowd was a mixed bunch.

The first person I approached, standing in a group located conveniently next to the bar (Cruzcampo on tap), spotted my dazzling, bright yellow Barcelona top and said something about the friendly international between England and Spain the night before.  That was the perfect ice-breaker (confirming that football is indeed the ultimate ice-breaker).  That, and the fact that my name sticker was no longer on my Nike jacket (I later found it stuck to an empty pint glass).  

As the drink flowed, live tweets from global Twestival events were projected on to a screen.  Which leads me to my only gripe: I was unable to connect to the wireless network and therefore unable to tweet myself.  Others in the first group I was with had similar difficulties (there was an amusing moment when we all produced an iPhone/iPod Touch at once).

It’s a very minor gripe, however, as I was delighted to meet and communicate in person with “tweeple” (Twitter + people) such as @jangles, @musingsofamanc, @timmorgan, @tjrobinson, @x5315, @lukesmith, an enthusiastic @craigyd (Craig and I can be seen in this post-pint photo) and a more philosophical  @davidjohnpowell (that’s David talking to me in this photo) (pics snapped by @BenjaminEllis, a tremendously nice chap).

And finally, back to the giving.  Reading Twestival raised a super £1007.04 for charity:water and the alcohol gave some of us – dreaded Twitter derivative alert – a “twangover” on Friday morning.

Other summaries of the Reading Twestival can be read on the following blogs:

• NevilleHobson.com
• David’s Blog
• Kraeig’s Blog

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 14th, 2009 at 10:08 pm and is filed under Culture, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.