The first ever DPiP pub meetup…

The first meet-up of Digital People in Peterborough took place last night, and seemed to be a resounding success judging by the comments and conversations in the pub, and responses on Twitter (hashtag #DPIP).

Personally, it was much needed. I’ve been up to my eyeballs in freelance work for a number of clients, meeting and chatting to people about some possible permanent roles in the future, and keeping OnlineRaceDriver updated as my main public-facing personal project.

So it was great when around a dozen people showed up last night, with a wide range of talents and interests – designers, developers, marketing, website owners. Everyone huddled round a table and started chatting, and I think that a good few contact details were exchanged and potentially some interesting new ideas were hatched…

It was great to find so many talented people are based in the area, whether they’re working for large companies, small companies or freelancing, and to be able to find out more about what they’re working on.

The plan is to meet up once a month, so I’ll share the details of the next event soon, and possibly introduce some chances to learn more about each other, specific projects and share some know-how…

Incidentally – if you happen to run a pub or suitable venue in Peterborough for 10 – 20 geeks to turn up for an evening (especially if you have plug sockets, wifi and somewhere reasonably quiet to chat), let me know!

And finally, huge thanks to everyone who was able to make it – my fears of sitting alone in the corner of the pub were unfounded! And really big thanks to @joffff for helping to organise and round-up interest, and @pjeedai for his help and buying some food for everyone to share…

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Into digital? In Peterborough? Fancy a pint?

Ages ago I started to realise how many people worked in the digital industries in Peterborough, and how cool it might be to get together with some of them. In addition to bigger companies like Bauer Media, or the large number of digital people commuting to that London place everyday, I keep discovering more and more freelancers, entrepreneurs and damn interesting people who call this part of East Anglia home.

So, months after originally suggesting to someone that we should arrange some meetups, I’ve finally put the minimal amount of effort into actually doing something.

So, the first ever Digital People in Peterborough (DPiP) meeting in the pub is set for Thursday October 28th in the Brewery Tap in Peterborough from 7.30pm.

Whether you’re a web developer, designer, blogger, marketer, journalist, database specialist, seo specialist, or entrepreneur you’re welcome to come and have a couple of beers and chat to other people in digital, mobile and general tech geekery.

And you don’t have to be in the city limits to join in – surrounding towns and villages are welcome – the name is more to limit which venues we choose!

If people are interested, I’ll sort out more focused events in the future, but the first one is mainly to see how many people can actually make it to the pub on a school night, put faces to usernames, and see what happens.

I’ve even set up a quick community site for anyone interested, which will have more details on this and future events – it’s at http://dpip.spruz.com/

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