OSCON, its no Comic-Con

OSCON is no Comic-Con, which is happening concurrently to OSCON in San Diego, but I knew this going in.  Still, its pretty fun so far, full of interesting people wearing "genius by birth, slacker by choice," Firefox and even quite a few Ubuntu tee-shirts instead of Chewbacca costumes.  Monday and Tuesday are the slow days--the expo floor is closed and most people who registered for "sessions only" like me only come Wednesday-Friday.  Comic-Con is part of the reason I decided to study F/OSS convention; I am very curious if F/OSS conventions hold something of the "the-whole-world-could-be-transformed" feeling that emerges at Comic-Con when people dressed up as anime characters are suddenly normal in the downtown Ralphs grocery store or when 500 people who love something dearly converge from around the world in a single room.  As my good friend who is putting me up in Portland is wise to point out, its those ephermal moments, how they form, where the form and the sorts of possible worlds they imagine (for better or worse) that drives both of us to do this academic thing and to study geography (why geography is something I still don't quite understand).

In the doldrums of Tuesday morning at OSCON it became clear to me how many peole have to keep working while they are OSCON, even and especially if it is their employer that sponsors their attendance.  It was a quiet morning, and people found nooks and crannies near power outlets to type away with their heads down while others attended tutorial sessions.  But its not that working opposes OSCON to Comic-Con (lots of people, not including the thousands of Convention Center employees, work at both events).  OSCON is no Comic-Con because I don't have the same excitement for Gnome or Python or even Ubuntu that I do for Star Trek or Veronica Mars or the Watchmen.  OSCON is no Comic-Con for me--but it might be for some folk.  There were moments of excitement, people recognizing one another across the hall, spontaneous groups forming in the hallways to discuss Openmoko phones or good gossip about CEOs, fools and good pranks--moments of something shared that reminded me of Comic-Con at moments.

But I am here feeling like a bit of an interloper, although at the same time I recognize that it is very hard to be an interloper when people are so open and generous with their time and ideas.  I've got great interviews almost lined up (had one today with a Canonical employee) with very busy people who are still willing to step back and talk about their experiences.  Interviews are exhausting for me, so fortunately Portland supplies great coffee and even better cheap bear at fine pubs with super cheap happy hours.  I'm starting to like the beer, coffee and very bike-friendly-ness of Portland a good bit, but thats another story.  And it involves old rail road ties falling out of a pick truck in front of me on my first day of Portland biking.