Brighton ALT.NET Beers: Tues 31st March 2009. 7pm.

Are you ALT.NET? Are you Brighton? Well if you’re one, the other or even neither of those but would like to know more, you are hereby cordially invited to the inaugural Brighton ALT.NET meet-up.

What: Brighton ALT.NET meet up/beers.

When: Tuesday 31st March 2009, from 7pm.

Where: The Prince Albert (Red Room) 48 Trafalgar St Brighton, BN1 4ED

So there you have it. A meet-up in a back room called the 'Red Room’ in a pub called the ‘Prince Albert’ with an original Banksy of two policemen kissing on the side. It couldn’t be more Brighton if Fatboy Slim turns up dishing out sticks of rock.

[photo source: here]

What is ALT.NET?

“We are a self-organizing, ad-hoc community of developers bound by a desire to improve ourselves, challenge assumptions, and help each other pursue excellence in the practice of software development. Our movement is new. The conversation just started. All are welcome to shape and form the dialog in blogs and lists and face-to-face gatherings both local and global.” [Source: http://altdotnet.org/]

Which boils down to you coming and talking to other developers about .NET development best practices.

Alan Dean had a good tweet on the ALT.NET dynamic:

"This is my definition of the alt.net dynamic: we all agree what is bad, we all agree what is good but we'll disagree what is best."*

Open Spaces

The session will be loosely based on the ‘Open Spaces’ philosophy:

• Whoever comes is the right people.
• Whatever happens is the only thing that could have.
• Whenever it starts is the right time.
• When it's over, it's over.

We will spend the first 30 minutes or so, arriving, saying hello and writing potential topics of discussion on post-it notes. When we’ve done that, we gather all the ideas and vote on the couple we would like to discuss together in depth.

PI is exactly 3

Everyone is encouraged to take part. In the spirit of Jeff Atwood’s Strong Opinions, Weakly Held blog post, don’t be afraid to have an opinion without wrapping it up in a big ball of disclaimers.

Don’t feel intimidated

Unsurprisingly this becomes less of an issue when even the most reticent are on the way to completing their second pint. Ayende came and sat next to me at a London ALT.NET meet and I still piped up. I doubt there has been, or will be a greater skill differential than there was on that table that evening so, really, don’t worry about it. We are all learning together.

Reply below and let us know you are coming

You certainly don’t have to - just turn up on the evening, but it would be great to give us an idea of numbers. You can let us know that you are coming by posting a reply below. You can also let us know on the UpComing page. Please note that if you want food, say so below as the kitchen usually closes by 7. They will stay a little longer if enough people tell us in advance or you will have to turn up earlier to ensure you get fed.

Hope to see you there!

*If we were a bit, what James May would describe as ‘poncey’, that would sound great in Latin on a ALT.NET coat of arms: De malo consentimus. De bono consentimus. Disputamus quid optimum sit.