I really enjoyed watching Phillip Torrone's talk on the MAKE manifestations in The Do-It-Yourself Mindset. The audience seemed very interested, even though some example projects may not have been directly applicable to a European audience (i.e. there weren't too many PSP users in the crowd).

He received much applause when mentioning the "Maker Manifesto" (at least, I think that's what it's called) that will be part of Vol 04. This audience seems to resonate strongly with the ideals of freedom behind these fun projects in addition to the projects themselves.

Oh, makers are starting to show up for tonight's Maker Faire. I'm looking forward to it.

Hello from The Netherlands. Registration opened today at the Krasnapolsky for tutorial attendees. From the looks of it thus far, this is going to be a quieter, more intimate event than our Northwestern U.S. conferences.

Many of today's attendees appear to be still recovering from jet-lag (I think), although approximately 12% of registrants are from The Netherlands so they wouldn't have that problem. Neither would the approximately 30% who hail from neighboring European nations. Although smaller in size, it looks to be a great opportunity to bring ideas and people together for many who might not ever attend U.S. OSCON.

For example, earlier today I met a faculty member from the University of Amsterdam School of Information Science. He brought along 15 students to whom he is teaching a variety of open source topics. Even better, he explains that this morning's Ruby on Rails tutorial was required for them to attend, as it's relevant to their current coursework. After that, the students are free to pick and choose their EuroOSCON path. These kinds of effects are great.

I'm in the registration dugout currently. Hopefully, I can attend some sessions when time permits.