---
title: 'php[tek] Open Spaces - User Groups and Community Building'
date: '2016-05-25 12:47:10'
layout: post
slug: phptek-open-spaces-user-groups
categories:
    - 'Conferences'
    - 'User Groups'
    - 'Community'
tags: {  }
---
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        <h2>php[tek] Open Spaces - User Groups and Community Building</h2>
        <p>
            Open Spaces sessions are very similar to unconference sessions. They are ad hoc sessions where anyone can sign up for a topic and lead a discussion.
        </p>
        <p>
            At my very first php[tek] conference in 2014 <a href="https://twitter.com/dragonbe" target="_blank">Michelangelo van Dam</a> held an Open Spaces
            session about User Groups. As I was already a User Group leader I joined and was excited to be able to speak in person with so many other individuals
            who were also running user groups as well as people interested in starting their own User Groups. Michelangelo and others also did this again in at php[tek]
            2015 and again I participated and was excited to share knowledge about User Groups.
        </p>
        <p>
            At php[tek] 2016 Michelangelo was not able to attend
            so I mentioned doing a User Group session to <a href="https://twitter.com/cspruck" target="_blank">Chris Spruck</a> from AtlantaPHP,
            <a href="https://twitter.com/sammyk" target="_blank">Sammy K.</a> from Chicago PHP, and <a href="https://twitter.com/ramsey" target="_blank">Ben Ramsey</a>
            from Nashvile PHP.
        </p>
        <p>
            Ben Ramsey had the idea of streaming the Open Spaces via google hangouts. Below is the recorded version of our session. I hope you enjoy it as I certainly
            enjoyed being able to host the session. Thanks to everyone that joined us at php[tek], Ben for being our cameraman, and others that watched live and contributed during the event.
        </p>
        <p>
            <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/HH2X5dkmmsI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
        </p>
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Add blog post about tek video
Add blog post about tek video
