Maybe its just that I’m relatively new to it, but it appears that the Melbourne web development/startup scene seems to have a lot to offer, and from others are saying, might be picking up speed with regular events such as Thehive.org.au, Melbourne Jelly and Pitchclub, The events are great for connecting entrepreneurs and developers and bringing new people onto the scene to inspire each other’s ideas and efforts. This weekend saw Melbourne’s first Startup Camp. 3 startups in 48hrs from 3 teams. Not even a glint in the eye of the team members as they arrived on Friday evening, the ideas manifested into fully fledged working products by lunchtime Sunday with business plans and pitches ready to launch.
Our team managed to get a bitofpluck.com up and running by the deadline. Creating colorful, engaging connections between strangers with similar interests based on location data. The frenzy of rapid development over the weekend makes for some frenzied learning.
Story cards
The 1. I am (user)….2. I want to (action)….3. So that (outcome) story cards really helped us frame the fundamental value proposition of the site, from both the business and the development side. It helped us keep the feature set as simple as possible so that the developers had a realistic target to meet and had everyone moving in the same direction. We were talking pretty big at the start and this really helped us pull our heads in.
Ideas abound
I can’t believe I ever thought there were not enough new ideas. The process of getting together with people in that environment just seems to bring the creativity out.
There are some great people in Melbourne
Genuine, intelligent people just seem to be congregating and this is just one example. Not just people who want to start a business, but people who seem to believe that a business has more to offer than just a revenue stream.
Its not the last we’re going to see of this kind of get together. Thanks to Maxim Shklyar from Kisla Interactive for letting us use his fantastic studio, and Bart Jellema of Tjoos.com for bringing his Startup Camp expertise from Sydney, and Michael Specht from inspecht.com.au for food sponsorship and organisation.
