A partner with Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney is involved in three unusual conferences scheduled in the next five weeks.
Frank Taney, who chairs the firm’s information-technology litigation practice group, volunteered its Center City headquarters as the site for the first one. That’s the initial TrendCamp Philly, which will be held from 6-9 p.m. on Feb. 26 and allows attendees to talk about what they see coming in the field or fields that interest them.
The second event will be sponsored by the American Society of Inventors, which Taney is a board member of, and held at the University City Science Center on the evening of March 24. It doesn’t yet have a name, but Taney hopes to make it a chance for organizations in the area that promote invention, such as MakePhilly, the Hacktory and Hive 76, to familiarize themselves with each other and his group, too.
The third, which also will be held at Buchanan & Ingersoll’s office on the 32nd floor of Liberty Place, is called Chatbots 3.0. It will deal with the current—and third, hence its name—wave of software programs called chatterbots, which are artificial intelligence software programs that simulate conversation with users. People can register for it at chatbots3.eventbrite.com.
TrendCamp is an “unconference,” so named because of instead of having a set agenda beforehand, people interested in making presentations can show up, say what they want to talk about and schedule a time to talk about it.
“Not everybody is extroverted enough to get up in front of the room, but they are typically tech-savvy people nonetheless and they are in the audience and they generate some good discussions and questions,” Taney said.
TrendCamp’s three organizers—Tyler Baber, Mark Magliocco and Mike Jewsbury—met at BarCamp Philly 2, an unconference held last year. When they were looking for space to hold TrendCamp, a friend put them in touch with Taney.
More than 100 people have registered, but people can still go to trendcamp.org to get on a waiting list for cancellations.
