Event Recap: WordCamp Jax

BoldLife, WordCamps

April 12, 2018 by Harry Jackson

We just finished attending another one of our favorite events, WordCamp Jax! This WordCamp was held this past weekend, on April 7th and 8th, at Keiser University. This was our second year attending Jacksonville’s only WordCamp, and it was well worth the return trip. We arrived in sunny Florida on Friday, so we had some time to settle in and attend the speaker and sponsor dinner that evening. This year’s dinner was hosted at a charming brewery, Intuition Ale Works. This local craft brewery served amazing food, which was surpassed only by the company. This was a great way to kick off the weekend and get to know our fellow speakers and attendees. After dinner, a few of us decided to take a tour of Sweet Pete’s Candy Shop. Needless to say, everyone had a ton of fun. Saturday was the first day of the WordCamp. The sessions were very timely and beneficial to a wide variety of WordPress users, covering topics ranging from development, to business practices, to web design. Our very own Mike Demo gave his talk “Two Sides of the Same Coin”, which is all about Open Source. Mike’s deep knowledge and enthusiasm on Open Source always draws in a crowd, and today was no exception. After a full day of sessions and networking with everyone, we were invited to an unofficial after-party hosted by our friends at Pressable and WAPU.US at the Mellow Mushroom. They serve some of the best pizza around, and have plenty of vegan options too. We made a lot of new friends, and were able to connect with some old ones too. All in all, it was a great after-party to connect with other people at WordCamp! Sunday was the last day of the event, and even though it was a half day, it was packed with great sessions. We heard about how to better utilize Google Analytics for your website, identifying guest authors for your blog, overcoming the fear of sales, and much more. The keynote talk and ending session was given by Nathan Ingram, entitled “The Challenge of Change: How to Thrive in the New World of WordPress”; It was an excellent presentation that helped prepare everyone for the developments and changes coming to the WordPress platform. He also spoke at length about Gutenberg, which is the new editor coming to WordPress – of which we are also a sponsor! It was great to see Nathan again, as we had just interviewed Nathan on BoldLife just a few weeks prior and got his insights into the future of WordPress, among other topics. The official WordCamp Jax after-party was a lunch held at Wicked Barley, which is a local craft brewery that serves some delicious food. Afterward, we wanted to host our own event and get to know a few people a bit better. We became a sponsor of WAPU this past January, so we partnered up with our new friends and hosted an unofficial event at the local Top Golf. That night, we spent time with some of the WCJAX team and voluneteers, who are responsible for making this event such a success. WordCamp Jax most certainly did not disappoint this year. Everything ran smoothly, was very well organized, and full of insightful sessions plus great people. We can’t wait to attend next year!