South Sound .net: Mike Hall Interviews Bobby Johnson | SCNA 2011
South Sound .net: Mike Hall Interviews Bobby Johnson | SCNA 2011
Meet Bobby Johnson, the founder and organizer of the South Sound .NET User Group in Olympia, Washington. Learn about the group's focus on introducing new Microsoft technologies and encouraging members to try out the latest tools and techniques. Don't miss this opportunity to learn from industry experts and network with other .NET developers. #SouthSoundDotNet #MicrosoftTechnologies #.NETDevelopers #TechCommunity #BobbyJohnson
The Interviewer
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
The Guest
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
The Conversation
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Hi, I'm Mike. I'm standing here with Bobby Johnson from the South Sound Online Users Group. Hi, Bobby. Thanks for standing up with me right now. Yeah, no problem. We were all sitting down. But, you know, can you tell me a little bit about your user group and what you guys do? Sure.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
Actually, I'm not even sure where South Sound is. Yeah, South Sound refers to the South Puget Sound.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Okay.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
So we're about 45 miles south of Olympia, Washington.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Okay.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
And our user group meets every second Thursday of the month. Two times a month. Once a month. So every second. Every second Saturday.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Yeah.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
Sorry, it's been a long day. Yeah, no problem. Numbers where it's difficult. But okay, so every second. Every second Thursday of the month, we get together and we typically have a presenter come down and that's what I'm responsible for is I usually book the presenters.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Okay.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
And we have anywhere from 10 to 25 local . NET developers. Olympia happens to be the capital of our state. So there's a lot of state agencies that do . NET development.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Okay.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
So that's mainly what our audience consists of is state developers.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
When you say book speakers, are you reaching out to Microsoft?
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
Sometimes.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Or something?
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
Sometimes. I reach out to the local dev community. I'm pretty involved with the Seattle . NET group as well, Okay. which some of the more high-level . NET developers are kind of involved in that community.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Right.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
So I kind of cherry pick those guys. Yeah, exactly.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Okay.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
And so, like I said, I'm not too familiar with Southside. I'm not sure what kind of metropolitan area that is. But you said it's the capital of Washington, which means I need to go back to fifth grade. But so it's a pretty decent size area. Mm-hmm. And do you typically get five to-- Anywhere from 15 to 25 people. Oh, from 15 to 25 people. So it's a pretty good representation.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Do you typically get repeat attendees?
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
We have a core group of members that show up at every meeting and then kind of a rooming band of thousands that kind of show up whenever they show up.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
When you say thousands, I mean, do you mean you have a pretty large registered number base? Yeah.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
I believe our mailing list is something like 500 email addresses. Oh, wow.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
How many of those are actually live accounts that actually go to somebody? Yeah.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
I don't know. So the typical, like if you said you're booking speakers, I'm assuming that you're typically doing a presentation style.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Yeah. Okay. Do you ever do any hands-on labs or?
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
We do. I attempted to do a Randori-style TDD session where basically we had one person guiding somebody at a keyboard. And every two minutes we'd switch off and we worked our way through the string calculator. Those things are kind of rare for our user group. It's typically presentations.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Okay.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
And you said that you kind of can cherry pick from the alternate group. As being so close to an alternate group, which they have kind of a unique perspective on user groups themselves, is that affected -- well, I guess what I'm trying to say is the user group that you're in, it's more of a core member. It's more of a core Microsoft user group where it's going to be focused on more of the current Microsoft technologies.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Is that safe assumption?
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
I would say the overall feel of the user group is more pragmatic Microsoft developers. So, you know, they're probably using -- still using . NET 3. 5 or earlier.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Right.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
But the content we try to bring down is introducing the new stuff coming out.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Okay.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
So we're trying to keep them current and encourage them to try to branch out and try the new things as well. And also, since you're still working closer towards -- Yeah. This platform, not saying, "Okay, we'll turn that guy, so I'm going to go off and do something off, away from the mothership. " Sure. Do you have some help from the developer evangelists to get -- At Microsoft, yeah, they will definitely provide us software, swag like that, or even hook us up with maybe developers in working groups that we're interested in hearing presentations from sometimes. That would be pretty nice. It is really nice being so close. So close to the Microsoft campus. It's a curse, too, but being that close, we have a steady stream of really qualified speakers.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
What's the curse? What's the downside?
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
Well, the curse is we get a lot of practice speakers. So, yeah, I'll come down and speak at your user group, but what I'm really doing is I'm just reading my slides to you and -- Getting a feel for when I go off to -- Yeah, to the bigger conferences and stuff like that.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Okay.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
Well, yeah, it's -- It's a plus or minus. I always thought that user groups were a good test bed for speakers. But maybe if you're being like the guinea pig of that for Microsoft, that might be a little awkward. Do you leverage anything -- I know that Microsoft offers some, and I've taken advantage of some myself, user group support services, iNet.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Have those -- Have you been able to take advantage of those?
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
Yeah, the main leader of our user group is the regional iNet. I forget what they call it, like sponsor or something like that.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Okay.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
And we have used iNet funds before to get speakers to our location, so like pay for gas and maybe lodging at times. So we have taken advantage of that. So it has been a good thing for you.
Mike Hall
Interviewer, UGtastic
Yeah.
Bobby Johnson
South Sound .NET
Okay, good. All right. Well, thank you very much, Bobby, for talking with me about the South Sound -- Dot net user's group. South Sound dot net user's group in Washington. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.