Yesterday, we ended the first year of Portland Lunch 2.0 at the place it all began in February 2008, AboutUs.
I didn’t get a very official count at either event, but I think we went from about 50 at the first Lunch 2.0 to well over a 100 yesterday. I saw a lot of familiar faces, along with new ones.
Aside from opening up their sweet renovated warehouse office space to us, AboutUs provided chotchkies (cell phone charms featuring the universal edit button and AboutUs buttons), grub and cupcakes as big as a fist. They had a projector broadcasting a stream of their pageviews, which attracted a lot of attention; Lunch 2.0 still is a pretty geeky crowd after all.
Case in point, someone suggested that we watch the list to see if there were repeat IPs, but this quickly made me dizzy and disoriented.
Another nice touch was the arrangement of cinema displays (color me jealous) along the western wall of the office that read “HAPPY BIRTHDAY LUNCH 2.0”.
We skipped the talkie-talkie this time. Everyone was happily chatting around the office, which is kinda the point. No need to interrupt everyone to listen to me mumble, and AboutUs had all their people mingling and answering questions about what they do.
Big thanks to the whole AboutUs crew for hosting, especially to Steven for organizing.
Likewise, thanks to Aaron Hockley who provided excellent photos of the event. All photos in the post are by Aaron and used under Creative Commons. Incidentally, check out Aaron’s Lunch 2.0 – Portland set on Flickr; it provides a great history of the event. Aaron has been to nearly all the Lunch 2.0s, and he usually has his camera to document the festivities. His photos also pop up on Flickr widget on lunch20.com, the home of the original Bay Area chapter because of how awesome they are. OK, it’s also because they’re tagged “lunch2.0”.
Anyway, let’s peer into the future of Portland Lunch 2.0’s second year.
Upcoming Portland Lunch 2.0s
Save these Dates
These haven’t been officially announced yet, but they are happening. Stay tuned for details.
- April 8 hosted by MioWorks at a location TBD
- May 20 hosted by WebVisions at the Oregon Convention Center
Big thanks to all the hosts who have hosted or plan to host Lunch 2.0. Drop a comment (or tweet @jkuramot) if you want information about hosting one. It’s easy.
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[…] number. The Portland chapter of Lunch 2.0 kicked off at AboutUs back on February 27, 2008, and we returned on February 11, 2009 to celebrate our first […]
[…] number. The Portland chapter of Lunch 2.0 kicked off at AboutUs back on February 27, 2008, and we returned on February 11, 2009 to celebrate our first […]
[…] was ceremoniously passed from Thomas to David. I’ll back up; at the Portland Lunch 2.0 birthday at AboutUs in February, someone (not sure if it was Mark, Steven or Nico) put out a guest book that […]
[…] was ceremoniously passed from Thomas to David. I’ll back up; at the Portland Lunch 2.0 birthday at AboutUs in February, someone (not sure if it was Mark, Steven or Nico) put out a guest book that […]
[…] was a really good event, and we’re on a roll because I heard the same thing after AboutUs last month. Large open spaces seem to be very conducive to fluid […]
[…] was a really good event, and we’re on a roll because I heard the same thing after AboutUs last month. Large open spaces seem to be very conducive to fluid […]
Hi Bill.
Thanks for sharing this with us. We wish you could join us too. Maybe the next time you visit Portland, there will just happen to be a Lunch 2.0 happening.
It could happen.
Lunch 2.0 really shows well for Portland and the tech scene. As an AboutUs “Dad”, my family and I are thrilled to see things in which our son is involved. (He is an AboutUs techie). It was hard to lose him to Portland, but this helps us see it is so much better for our son professionally.
Thanks for Lunch 2.0. Wish I could join you!
[…] a local technology company to discuss, share and just get to know each other. Silicon Florist has a great recap of this week’s event, and there’s a variety of photos drifting around Flickr of this and past Lunch 2.0 events. […]
Thanks to everyone who came to Lunch 2.0 yesterday! Another person who deserves a shout out is Nyco for helping arrange the food. According to the guest book and the number of plates taken, we had about 145 people present.