Wikipedia:Meetup/San Francisco 2

Despite the large number of Wikipedians in this region, there hasn't been a single publicized meetup. There was an open meeting for Wikia Campaigns last summer which was well attended, considering publicity was limited to Wikia. It's ripe time for a large meetup.

What do you suggest?

Proposed date
Saturday, July 14, 2007


 * Do we have a time in mind? Morning? Afternoon? Evening?


 * How about 15:00+? That would allow those of us who want to let it run into the evening.--Eloquence* 07:08, 12 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Time: I'm going to be bold and say 4 pm (16:00) -- phoebe/ (talk) 17:04, 13 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Location: Per latest round of emails, proposal is Saturday the 14th at 4pm, San Francisco Ferry Building (Embarcadero and Market Streets). Georgewilliamherbert 17:42, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
 * At the Ferry Building, we'll gather at the big tables by Peet's coffee: between #43 & #45 on this map. I will attempt to remember to bring a sign :) -- phoebe/ (talk) 21:35, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Survey
To speed this process along, I have put together a survey (with online results). Please fill it in, and pass it along to your fellow Northern California Wikipedians! Thanks, William Pietri 06:39, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Proposed locations
Ideas:
 * Citizen Space has volunteered to let us have a meetup there --> note, this is a long-standing offer. But they are available this Saturday. It's a very cool and friendly office. -- phoebe/ (talk) 21:37, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Somewhere on the field in Golden Gate Park? Picnic anyone?
 * Sounds like people favor public transport; close to BART == good?
 * yes :)


 * Dolores Park is close to public transport and may be easier to meet in than Golden Gate Park
 * Zeitgeist, a scruffy San Francisco beer garden, could suit
 * For what it's worth, there are dozens of places we could hang out in downtown SF near the Embarcadero/Market St. It's hard to drive there, but trivial to BART it (and easy to drive to BART and ride in...).  I've worked at a bunch of places in the area and can recommend more specific places for food, drinks, etc.  Georgewilliamherbert 00:32, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
 * The Ferry Building
 * Philz coffee -- http://www.philzcoffee.com/locations.html
 * My house.Giovanni33 01:13, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Attendance
Please indicate if you can attend and if you have a preferred date


 * phoebe (brassratgirl) / (talk), weekends are best (I live in Davis)
 * Georgewilliamherbert
 * Davidlud Have to go back to Germany in a few days :-(
 * Quarl
 * Dvortygirl Weekends are best. Please direct communications here.
 * R'son-W Weekends are good. I'll have to take BART from Berkeley.
 * I'll be in the Bay Area July 11-15; Saturday July 14 would work best for me. I won't rent a car unless absolutely necessary, so any location that is reachable via train & bus would be preferable. I'll be staying in San Mateo.--Eloquence* 05:56, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I live pretty much right across the bay from San Mateo, in Hayward. I'm mobile, so I can come to a location.  San Mateo has the "Caltrain" trains, and isn't far from where BART ends up south of the San Francisco airport.  Georgewilliamherbert 06:52, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Hey, I'm staying at the Howard Johnson near Hayward. Perhaps we can arrange a trip together as soon as we know where we're going. :-) --Eloquence* 22:39, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Query to clarify - Howard Johnsons in San Mateo, or on the east side of the bay? There's a 10 mile wide bay in between 8-)  I am always willing to carpool, though, and a zip across the bay is fine.  Georgewilliamherbert 00:15, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Oh dear! You can tell I'm not from here. ;-) HoJo in SM it is.--Eloquence* 07:08, 12 July 2007 (UTC)


 * William_Pietri - I'd love to come. I favor public transport and San Francisco proper. And I'll buy the first round at Zeitgeist afterward.
 * Short notice, but if I can make it, I'll try to be there. I'm in the East Bay, for about a month, and have pretty easy access to BART and freeways, as needed. Sounds like we favor meeting up in San Francisco; anybody have a particular place in mind? – Luna Santin  (talk) 00:06, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
 * If Citizen Space can't host us, I can likely scare something else up depending on number. I'm fiendishly busy right now, so if somebody could wrangle consensus on number of attendees and desired facilities and email me the results, that'd be great. Thanks, William Pietri 00:16, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Dragons flight. If I can scratch up the time.
 * If it's going to be July 14, please set the time soon! I'd prefer not morning, though. ArielGlenn 06:23, 12 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Delirium 17:42, 13 July 2007 (UTC) I think I can make it. I'm coming from Santa Cruz on public transit, so anywhere I can get to / connect to from Caltrain without too much hassle would be best for me. --Delirium 17:42, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Caltrain to the last stop (4th and King in SF), then SF MUNI T or N lines from 4th and King to either Folsom (and walk a couple of blocks up the Embarcadero along the bay) or Embarcadero station (and walk a block from slightly inland out to the bay). Georgewilliamherbert 18:08, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Aaron Swartz
 * Erik Möller
 * Brewster Kahle Brewster is not going to make it.--Eloquence* 18:41, 14 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Jimmy Wales
 * Wow, four people with their own articles are attending? We get all the famous people ;) -- phoebe/ (talk)
 * `'Míkka
 * Kat Walsh (spill your mind?)
 * Liz Henry I would love to come to the next one! I missed this completely! - Liz

Report
The meetup was grand. There were 15 people there (I think); many of the people listed above, plus Dan Spalding, Jkelly, Lunasantin, and Paul, an anon editor. We were joined by no fewer than three illustrious board members: Erik Möller, Jimmy Wales, and unexpectedly, the lovely Ms. Kat Walsh who flew out for the occasion from D.C.!

We gathered at the Ferry Building at roughly the appointed time and crammed around a big table and shared cookies from Peet's -- thanks, William. We introduced ourselves and talked about how amazing it is that there haven't been regular meetups before this, especially considering that Jimbo is in town regularly. We also talked about the upcoming Wikimania conference quite a bit, agreed that San Francisco would be a lovely and hospitable city for a future conference (though no one volunteered right away to organize -- we'll have to work on that! ;) and also talked about the upcoming Recent Changes Camp, which is likely to be coming to a Bay Area near you in early 2008.

It was decided that dinner should be had, so we trekked down to Gordon Biersch, but it was much too busy for our large party. Therefore, we went back to the ferry building and had burgers and fries at Taylor's Automatic Refresher, which was remarkably tasty and had lovely sweet potato fries.

We sat outside, which was good for watching the tourists and enjoying the sun, but towards evening it clouded over and got cold. A slightly reduced party of us marched off to Market Street in search of a bar. In the way of large groups, we stopped at the first one we came to, which happened to be this dive bar. "Hmm," said Jkelly. "It looks like an establishment for all day drinkers." I think he was probably right, but there was room for all of us, not to mention a space for a game of pool between Jkelly and Delirium.

Soon various out-of-towners had to catch their respective planes and the rest of us had to go home. There was much talk about planning the next meetup -- perhaps in late August or early September. We agreed that we could probably get a much larger crowd with more than three days notice! Planning should happen here.

Many thanks to everyone for showing up, especially on short notice! (And thanks especially to Erik and Kat for possibly giving us some kind of long-distance visitors record). It was a fun time. Now, post your pictures! -- phoebe/ (talk) 05:00, 16 July 2007 (UTC)


 * How are other editors in the San Francisco area supposed to know about events such as this one? If I knew, I'd probably have attended. I take it this is not an invite only type of event so some kind of public notice seems apropos.Giovanni33 06:13, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
 * See Geonotice&mdash;new feature/hack. Unfortunately it wasn't ready in time for this meetup, but for meetups in the future... It's really hard to let people know about geography-specific events without getting a lot of people who won't be interested and missing a lot who would, and this should help. Kat Walsh (spill your mind?) 06:55, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Good report, Phoebe! Georgewilliamherbert 20:09, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

That bar was a total dive. :-) But I had a good time and hope to make it out there for another sometime; I don't really need too much of an excuse to want to go to SF. (I think Tampa 1 beats this for out-of-town visitors, but that was around an actual board/officers meeting and so hardly counts!) Pictures coming as soon as I pick out the ones that aren't too awful. I'll ping people before I post them, but if you really don't want pictures of yourself online, let me know. Kat Walsh (spill your mind?) 06:55, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm ok with any pics of me, good or bad. Georgewilliamherbert 20:09, 16 July 2007 (UTC)