I was really excited to see that Matt Mullenweng is finally moving forward with plans to host his own unconference for users of his WordPress blogging software, but bummed when I saw the date (August 5) is the same as the National Coalition for Deliberation and Dialogue's annual confeerence.  WordCamp should be a lot of fun and I hope to be able to find a couple slots in the schedule for my other conference where I can get over to WordCamp for a few sessions and will of course be able to make the party that night. 

I have been fortunate to spend some time talking with Matt recently, and despite my post raving about VOX the other day, I am and will continue to be a loyal WordPress user.  At the closing party of Gnomedex, we talked a bit about the power of unconferences to close the feedback loop between user and developer - how it was an authentic way to move product development forward in unexpected ways and how it ultimately leads to better relationships between a company and its customers.

While it makes sense for them to try a BarCamp styled Open Space given the fact that most participants will be more technical and WordPress is a platform upon which creative engineers can easily develop, I hope Matt considers some alternate designs for the event format rather than just falling in lockstep with open space advocates.  Of course, it depends on the expectations of participants and aligning that with the goals of the company, so perhaps the first step should be to do some sort of Survey Monkey questionnaire.  Then, with some insights on expectations understood through the lens of the organization's need for genuine dialogue with developers and customers, the right sort of event can be planned.

I have a few ideas I hope to share with Matt about what could be done along the lines of what we are going to be doing with Social Media Club over the next few months (which is finally in 'soft launch mode' on WordPress after staying up till 430am last night tweaking the design).  If we are able to collaborate on this event together even just a little bit, I think we can make the WordPress community very happy and help thousands of others have a first class Blog platform that meets their own needs even more eaisly than is now possible with the famous 5-minute WordPress install.  I will be writing more about this idea after I explain how we are going to be doing it with Social Media Club...

Good luck Matt, Tony et al - and congratulations on taking this important first step forward into making your global community even more real!