Paradise Circus

Just a quick post on returning home from the second free Social Media Surgery that we held for Birmingham’s voluntary organisations at the BVSC in Digbeth. As with the first event, tonight’s event was very popular and we hope everyone went home with some practical ideas and the confidence to try them out. We look forward to online activity from organisations including City Centre Neighbourhood Forum, Perry Barr Multifaith Network, the Get Walking Keep Walking project and Digbeth Trust to name but a few.

I’m sure more details will emerge over the next few days about what was achieved (please link to any further info in the comments), but for now, I’d like to say thanks to the following ’surgeons’ for giving up their free time to offer advice to some worthy local voluntary organisations:

• Robert Annable
• Pete Ashton
• Nick Booth
• Jon Bounds
• Joanna Geary
• Nicky Getgood
• Stef Lewandowski
• John Mostyn
• Henry Mostyn
• Phil Oakley
• Stuart Parker
• Antonio Roberts
• Chris Unitt
• Ben Whitehouse
• Gavin Wray

The date is set: Wednesday, November 26th, 2008 5.30pm to 7.00pm at the same venue as the one we ran on Blog Action day in October. To sign up for a free place and find a map to the location please visit this link. In this post we also have an explanation of what is going on, some information for people thinking of coming along to get some advice and a few words for the very fine folk who are offering their expertise for free.

I thought last month was a one off? Yes. So did I. But it worked really well. (more…)

No agenda, no fixed time (turn up and leave when you like on “Monday Evening”, just a social — unless you know/want different.

The venue is a nice pub by the canal (sort of behind the ICC), friendly and alternative-ish by memory. According to Danny Smith: “flap is nice been refurbed (coat of paint), dead on a monday and if its nice we can sit outside, plenty of room out there”

If there’s something you’d like to talk about raise it here so we can all have a think

The Flapper

Upcoming.org Event

FB Event

View Larger Map

When we came up with the bright idea of having a picnic in Moseley Private Park for the next meeting during the 3-day heatwave of early May, we didn’t foresee being in the middle of a wetwave, so hastily made a backup plan of the Prince of Wales.

As well as myself, the following people also turned up at various points during the evening (in approx order of appearance):

Nick Booth, Jon Bounds, Clare Edwards, Simon Gray, Andy Mabbett, Mark Steadman, Kevin Rapley, Danny Smith, Matt ?, Stuart ?, Ana Milgram, Nikki Pugh, Chris Unitt and friend, Stef Lewandowski, Emma Jones, Antonio Gould and friend, two random Polish ladies and Caroline Charlton. (Feel free to fill in the gaps peeps)

The venue was quite good because it has a back room which was a good size for the group with room to grow a little. Drinks selection and prices were good. They serve food and also have a kind of delicatessen out back which is quite incongruous, but good nevertheless. The management are friendly. The day we went, a Wednesday, happened to be quiz night, which we took part in and was quite fun, we even got a curry chucked in with the £1 entry fee. No public wifi. There’s a bit of free parking on the road in the evenings.

As well as the usual general meeting interesting people and socialising, the following ideas came out of the meeting:

This website, Paradise Circus.

Jon reckoned that technology is just about ready for a live phone-in show on the web. Mark, Danny and Kevin agreed and they’re hoping to get together soon. It will no doubt be very rude!

Stuart chatted to people about wanting to break down divides around the use of social media by adults.

We learnt a Polish song about drinking too much beer that went something like “Storya! Storya!”

Please add anything I’ve missed in the comments. I’ve created a new Wordpress Page to put venue reviews as this could be a really useful resource. Any Pages (as opposed to individual Posts) could act as a wiki, ask if you want a login.