I remember well, how on a correlating (free) workshop Nik Graf and Andrey Okonetchnikov in particular were getting out of their way to teach us on how to go about that crazy webpack/react/redux development stack.
The folks from ReactVienna are also very well connected, so we had the best very special meetups this October - amazing talks featuring Sean Grove, Richard Feldman and David Nolen talking about what's new regarding Reason, Elm and ClojureScript respectively.
I've been wanting to emigrate from Austria ever since university but the current vibes here in Vienna do make me feel like wanting to stay in the EU for the first time in a long time.
Of course, contributing to that is the fact that there have been other great meetups happening regularly at Sektor5 (super welcoming co-working place) over the last couple of years: viennajs, viennarb and cljvie only to name a few that interest me.
As pointed out in the article - ReactVienna and all the other meetups are collaborative efforts and I'd like to applaud the teams - thanks for showing up, Vienna has become so much more interesting thanks to you <3
Also, a meet up does not have to be long. A couple of presentations for a total of a hour is a fine excuse to meet at the bar afterwards and talk technology. Finding speakers for events is hard, so even alternating between 'talk/presentation' nights and just bar nights can work, especially to keep a 'every month' rhythm going.
Speaking as someone who rarely drinks and doesn't like trying to listen to conversations in loud environments: organizing a short meetup as a prelude to retiring to a bar isn't necessarily going to be the most inclusive strategy.
austrias biggest meetup, works like a charm
https://blog.toughbyte.com/what-is-a-meetup-and-why-should-i...
The blog series is still ongoing, but it is based on a talk I gave earlier this year, which you can check out here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNZTLcutqKk
PS. If you're looking for a platform geared towards technical meetups, take a look at Meetabit which we're working on at Toughbyte: https://meetabit.com/ - your feedback would be really appreciated. We're currently available in only a few cities, but would be happy to add more cities if there's enough interest.
I prefer to focus on side benefits like community improvement, a point of meeting for professionals and so on.
I met the vast majority of my current friends through that group, so I feel like it's worth keeping it going.
I see a lot of other local Meetups shutting down after Meetup.com raised their prices last year, though. I'm a little surprised they're actually making more money after doing that, because I saw a loooot of groups shut down because of it.
We are starting HN meetup in Paris (France):
