Me at WordCamp Europe 2015 – Seville

Two weeks ago I attended WordCamp Europe 2015 and it was truly an amazing experience. This was my second WordCamp (I was in Sofia last year).

Seville

Seville was hot! Trust me, I’m from Naples, Italy, and I know what does it mean when it gets hot in Summer. But Seville…as the taxi driver said: “No June, no July, no August, no September..you should come any other month!”

But it’s truly a wonderful city: one morning I got up early just to get lost walking through the streets.

The WordCamp

There is just one word: amazing. The organization was just perfect: two tracks well-balanced, talks ranging all the spectrum, the food was tasty.

But the real value in this kind of (non)conferences is in the people. Don’t go to these events and stay on your own. Talk to the people, try to understand what they do, listen to their experiences and I guarantee that you will return home changed. Among developers and the organizers (thanks, all of you!) I talked, for example, to a retired Australian man who was passing by Seville and used WordPress to help charity associations with their websites!

The Community or “Go Italy, Go!”

This WordCamp was important for another reason. Before this event, the Italian WordPress scene wasn’t in a good shape. But there were a lot of Italians in Seville. So we gathered, talked, and asked for suggestions. Then we planned and:

• we have now a rebooted Rosetta Site¹, with a brand new showcase and lots of improvements coming by;

• the blog is also rocking, with many news about WordPress being translated in Italian;

• new WordPress meetups are popping around Italy: we have Barletta, Bologna, Lucera, Milano, Napoli, Roma, Romagna, Torino and Brescia;

• and finally, a Slack channel has been created, where everyone can contribute to the Italian WordPress scene.

A new hope

This was my experience at WordCamp Europe 2015. Lots of things happened in a short amount of time, but I’m sure that this year will bring more and more. Stay tuned!