On the need for an informal meetup of a certain type of digital media professional in the North West.

I have noticed the imbalance; the injustice

The designers have the estimable Northern Digitals, the propeller-heads have the marvellously enjoyable Geekup and the Merely Curious have the invaluable SMC_MCR. Both are beloved and increasingly institutional events - its arguable in fact that they wield more influence than they know.

But, as wonderful as they are, I always feel like they’re not for me.

And its probably because they’re not.

Geekup trends towards the hard-tech end of the game; I’ll never be cool enough to go to a Northern Digitals meeting because, at the end of the day, I don’t care about  bevelling, kerning or whether you want to be known as a developer not a designer because you can put an on_Event on a fucking button.

[And, while I’m ranting, how typical of an event organised by designers that they’ve got a typo in the logo. (“Lets get together” indeed. Let’s also have a meeting about the correct use of the apostrophe showing omission while we’re about it.)]

Meanwhile, while I continue to attend and enjoy the monthly SMC_MCR meetings, I have to ask myself whether I’m ever going to want to monetize my blogging. (And that, I think, comes across in my posts.)

So I’ve identified a need for a night that achieves something else.

Now hold that thought.

About 4 years ago when I was working at Lightmaker Manchester, me and the boys in what we laughingly referred to as Senior Management, used to go out for the occasional beer after work. We noticed that the nights were holding to an unwritten agenda that went something like this:

1) 1 pint of civil conversation; everyone making a concerted effort not to talk about work.

2) 1 further pint of civil conversation; everyone realising that, hey, we may as well talk about work because, hey, we work together, right? Ha ha ha.

3) 1 pint of increasingly diplomatic attempts to talk around the real issue that everyone’s come to the pub to avoid having to deal with through working late.

4) The tipping point. Fuelled by *just* enough beer to heighten the emotions, loosen the tongue and give one the magical eloquence of alcohol, there would follow anywhere between 3 and 5 more pints of unbridled, no-holds-barred complaining, bitching, pissing and moaning that would usually reach a heady climax some hours later with someone frantically scrawling a work-flow onto a beermat and mumbling earnestly “You see, I’ll show you what’s fucking wrong with this fucking company…”

Now, nothing was ever done. All this piss and vinegar did not lead to the writing of letters of resignation, bold new business plans or insightful revisions of company policy. But that’s not what the night was for; the night was intended only to begin the healing.

We started to refer to it as the 3 Pint Bitch. In fact, we still do.

Now remember that thought I asked you to hold a few hundred words ago?

Venting is merely important. Venting with like-minded individuals is where the magic happens.

And so I propose the need for an evening for a certain type of Manchester-based digital professional to come forth and throw off the oppresive shackles of good-natured social events.

Which type? I’ve tried to nail that down in the past, but it basically boils to whether you can agree with any or all of the following statements:

• You can accurately guess how much a client has got to spend by the way they format their RFI documents
• William Goldman’s adage “Add a third for the shit” is basically your approach to costing new work.
• Milan Kundera’s adage “Everything will be forgotten and nothing will be redressed” is basically your approach to project management.
• There is a time and place for new and bold approaches to application development and this isn’t fucking it, right sunshine?
• You, like me, have a deep and wonderful thirst.

The idea is still forming, and many details remain to be worked out, but the germ of an idea is here. I will write more on this soon.