The 3rd annual BarCamp Berlin will take place 18-19 Oktober, the weekend before Web 2.0 Expo Europe.

BarCamp is a giant unconference, a conference that self-organizes sessions and content on-site. There are no pre-scheduled talks but in the truest sense of crowdsourcing, sessions are proposed and voted on amongst the peers in attendance.

Typically Expo holds an “official unconference” at every show, but for Web 2.0 Expo Europe we collaborated with BarCamp Berlin to BE our official unconference.

And today I got word that there were 20 spots available for international guests. What does that mean? Here are examples:

Germans living in the UK - OK

Americans living in Germany - Not OK

There will be 700 plus people attending this weekend event and I’ll personally be volunteering at registration on Saturday morning to do some bleary-eyed meet and greeting. If you’re planning to come into town for Web 2.0 Expo Europe - this might be a great way to mingle and geek out beforehand.

Oh, and they are throwing a welcome party Friday night for registrants… maybe a good incentive?

Setting up an event is A LOT of work - un or real conference. BarCamp organizers around the world create this event for their community, in exchange for goodwill. It’s an honorable job. Tobias Kaufmann, one of the ten BarCamp Berlin3 organizers, and I were debating if we should hold a session on conference organizing - similarities, differences, challenges… we’ll work on the concept a bit more. Or maybe we can do a session on Community Management?

You’ll have to attend to see what we settle on. Hopefully we’ll see you there