About once a month, a group of app developers who live nearby meet for coffee. We’ve met at the Appbackr offices, the YogiPlay offices, and various shops around town. We call this entourage “Coffee With Apps”. Through these meetings, we learn about much more than apps. It’s also led to marketing and press opportunities that would have otherwise been unknown.
If you are an app developer, an app consumer, an educator, or someone who would like to have a voice in “new media” for kids, I recommend getting involved with your local MeetUps. Here are some pointers, and then I will share some pics.
1. To link up with other app users or developers, go to MeetUp.com, type in “apps” or “iOS” and your city/state, and a list of MeetUps closest to you will come up. If there aren’t any listed, MeetUp.com makes it easy to start your own. In the Bay Area, we’ve been attending the Silicon Valley Apps for Kids MeetUp at Creativity Inc., which is a wonderful and growing group.
2. If you have an “app idea” and want to start networking and building that idea, try Startup Weekend (events are national and international). Startup Weekend is a global non-profit run by volunteers which aims to spark new ideas and powerful networking. Ahmed of GoGoMongo is one of the organizers for bayarea.startupweekend.org, and he is doing an incredible job of keeping the startup energy alive in our area. *NOTE: An education-themed weekend is planned for February.
3. If you are already in the MWA forum, go to the “new member introduction” board, and do a search on your city. It’s possible that others live nearby, but you may have missed their introduction given the volume of daily posts in our forum.
Who else is out there, meeting up? How did you get connected? What would you recommend?
Lorraine Akemann | Editor | Moms With Apps
