November 18, 2011 – Musings of The Edmonton Tourist

Today I learned a valuable lesson about sharing. No I didn’t watch Sesame Street, and No, Fred Rogers didn’t teach it to me either. I was at WordCamp Edmonton 2011. The last place on earth I thought I would experience this type of networking and sharing of ideas.

WordCamp 2011 or affectionately known as #wcyeg is a conference set up to support and teach web developers and content users to create amazing pages using WordPress. While I was listening to the information, my head was swimming with ideas for my mom’s site, my friend’s project he has going on for next year, work and of course my own blog! The potential is limited to what I can hold in my brain or research. I have great research skills…so I would say the potential is unlimited. I am very excited for tomorrow’s sessions! But the camp itself is not what this blog is about.

I was at LEAST 15-20 years older then every single person in that room. My knowledge is not vast in terms of programming and code, but it isn’t lost on me either. I felt like Amy Farrah Fowler in a room full of Leonards. For those of you not in the know…that is a Big Bang Theory reference. I felt smart enough to follow what they were talking about yet out of my element enough that this was entirely new information. HOLY CRAP I learned some cool stuff!! you want to know why? Those fella’s are into information sharing BIG TIME.

I find that comforting. It has been my experience that people of my generation are quite cut throat and not all that forthcoming when it comes to sharing what you know. People are willing to teach or sell information but not all that keen on sharing information. This may be unique to this type of people. Meaning programmers and tech devs (my new jargon! Technology Developers). However, I don’t think this is the case, I think people of this generation are big on sharing information.

These people grew up with the internet ALWAYS being there. It isn’t “new” technology as some of my co-workers look at it. It is as simple to these people as understanding how a microwave works is to people of my generation. This group share code, music, movies, books, and other information needed by just asking. Someone always says…Oh I have that, or you can find that here. That amazed me. That is a huge boost for humanity.

You may be thinking, well ET, if these young whippersnappers who need a shave share everything, how are they ever going to make it in this cut throat world? Good Point people! I’ll tell you how.

This group or generation will share a ton of information and create something that YOU need. They will sell it to you. They understand that Facebook is a new fangle tool that you don’t “get”. In fact, they developed the code and workings for you to use it and eventually “get”. They share it for FREE. So where does the money part come in? In Advertising and YOU thinking you could use something like that for your business. Well, they aren’t giving it to you, they just shared something quite significant for free, caught your eye, and now you are hooked. Best self promotion ever! Now they are doing it with WordPress. It’s not just for blogs anymore. Sharing amongst their peers to help each other out, then encouraging and cheering for each other along the way. It was a beautiful lesson in teamwork. Quite

frankly, it is a lesson we all can learn..

Team Work + Sharing = Hope