Brussels Girl Geek Dinner

The first edition saw about 35 attendees, the seventh one hosted about 100 of them. And since it’s typical of BGGD to keep the event free gratuit and gratis for those who subscribed, it’s getting harder and harder each time to find sponsors to pay for venue, food, drinks and goodies.
But! As the network of girl geeks grows, I get more and more help to try and find solutions.
I’ll just share the suggestions for upcoming Girl Geek Dinners. Nothing has been confirmed 100% yet, but feel free to speak your mind in the comments.

• BGGD #8 on 9 October, Ghent (Vooruit), theme “Art and technology”, with Eric Joris (performance group Crew) and Eva De Groote (Almost Cinema festival). Still looking for nice, preferably “artsy” gifts for the goodie bag.
• BGGD #9 in November or December, Hasselt, theme “Music and technology”. Suggested speakers: Maurice Engelen (Praga Khan), Arne Van Peteghem (Styrofoam), Frank Duchene (Hooverphonic), or Tomas DeMot (Strictly Confidential). Audiocubes demo by Percussa.com’s Bert Schiettecatte. DJ set by…. But we haven’t asked any of those people yet, so it’s definitely not fixed!
• BGGD #10 in Brussels, theme “Politics and technology”, preferably with one of the female members of European Parliament or European Commission. Suggested name (well, one of my heroes actually): European Commissioner for Information Society and Media, Viviane Reding.
• BGGD #11, theme “Philosophy vs Technology” – suggested name: Wired’s Kevin Kelly.
• BGGD #12, theme “Religion vs Technology”.

Just noticed that this blog has been around for over a year now.
It all started with a definition of Girl Geek (and a lot of good advice from the original girl geek dinner girl, Sarah Blow) on 9 August 2007 and over the months we’ve organised no less than 7 Brussels Girl Geek Dinners. A short overview:

• BGGD #1 on 17 Oct 2007 in Brasserie Mariadal (Zaventem, Brussels). Theme: “Geeky Chix.org” by Belgium’s number one geek girl, Veerle Pieters (Duoh).
• BGGD #2 on 14 November 2007 in in Brasserie Mariadal (Zaventem, Brussels) . Theme: “Sex + internet” by  Sandra Van den Eynde (Sensoa).
• BGGD #3 on 13 Feb in One Agency HQ (Ghent). Theme: “Robots and other smart companions” by Melanie Chamaah and her Tux Droid (Kysoh)
• BGGD #4 on 29 March in Netlash HQ (Ghent). Dubbed the Belgian Uber Geek Fest because it was co hosted with Geekdinner.be & Barcamp Ghent.
• BGGD #5 on 14 May in DuvalGuillaume HQ (Brussels). Theme: “Artifical Intelligence” by Koen Vervloesem. Special Guest Isabel Peeters (Fox in a Box): “There is only chaos.”
• BGGD #6 on 24 June in Lamot (Mechelen). Theme: “Paleofuturism” by Peter van Wijnaarde + Anno Expo exhibition.
• BGGD #7 on 20 August in Rémy tower (Wijgmaal, Leuven). Theme: “Shopping” by Evert-Jan De Kort (Insites) and Sabine Clappaert & Courtney Davis (Muse Communication).


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.


Last 11 minutes of presentation #2 at Brussel Girl Geek Diner 7/Open Coffee Club combo from Johan Ronsse on Vimeo.

Together with Vlerick Management School, InSites Consulting has set up a study in
June 2008 to see how consumers use the internet to decide what and where to buy.
The results of this large-scale Belgian consumer research project and critical
website screening have been presented by Christophe Vergult, Director Customer
Experience research, at the Vlerick conference ‘Internet & changing shopping
behaviour’.
If the special Girl Geek Dinner version of this presentation by Evert-Jan De Kort
made you hungry for more insights on this matter, feel free to contact
evert-jan@insites.eu for the whole story, available for
free on simple request.


Twitter addicts from netlash on Vimeo.

The combined Brussels Girl Geek Dinner and Open Coffee Club Brussels event tomorrow 20 August in Wijgmaal (Leuven) is full house. So we’re expecting exactly 50 geeky ladies and 50 entrepreneurial gentlemen.

If you can’t make it due to unforeseen circumstances, please remove your name from the attendees list – there are still a few reserves waiting and hoping to get in. You can also use the wiki to offer or search for a lift to Wijgmaal in case you don’t have a car.

This time there is no physical goodie bag, but our sponsor Billy is giving away 4.500 € worth of vouchers, free to spend (while using Billy of course) in any European web shop that accepts Master Card.

D oes this mean everyone gets a 45 € voucher?

Well, no.

My lovely assistants Jan Henckens and Paul Cobbaut will make sure everyone gets a name tag and a number (in order of appearance). The first attendees that arrive get a 150 € voucher (EDIT – bad typo, thx Robin), the last ones get a 10 € voucher. Door are open from 18:00, event starts at 18:30…

How the vouchers are divided:

• 2 x 125 €
• 8 x 100 €
• 10 x 75 €
• 40 x 50 €
• 20 x 25 €
• 20 x 10 €

Billy is a new gift voucher for online shopping. In fact, it’s a virtual pre-paid mastercard. More on the concept in this little video.


Untitled from Bart De Neve on Vimeo.

Still puzzled? Leave your questions in the comments.

The sixth edition of Brussels Girl Geek Dinner will be near Leuven. In short:

Wed 20 August 18:30-21:30 CET (doors open at 18:00)
Rémy Tower, Vaartdijk 3 (= corner of Vaartdijk & Remylaan – for GPS: type in  “Remylaan 2″), Wijgmaal (view map)
Speakers and topic: Sabine Clappaert & Courtney Davis (Muse) and Evert-Jan de Kort (InSites) on “Shopping”
Event partner: Open Coffee Club Brussels
Entrance, cold food and drinks: free for the 50 ladies and 50 gentlemen whose name is on the attendee list. If asked for an invite key: it’s sacoche.
Sponsor: Billy

We will be in this white tower on the 6th floor. I’ve been told the view is amazing.

For the occasion Brussels Girl Geek dinner is teaming up with Open Coffee Club Brussels. Open Coffee Club is an informal meeting in a friendly setting, where entrepreneurs and investors can get to know each other over a cup of coffee (or a beer).
Usually they meet every month or so in a bar to expand their network, create alliances, exchange ideas, discuss business ideas and make plans for total world domination.

The idea is to put 50 girl geeks and 50 entrepreneurs in one room and then see what happens. For the Girl Geeks, it’s a chance to turn their sacoche (= male guest) into an entrepreneur. And for the promising young businessmen and wealthy investors, it is of course an excellent chance to get to know some of the brightest female geeks in Belgium.

Although we already had them at “free beer PLUS food“.

There is only one condition: your name has to be on the registration page. There’s only room for 50 ladies and 50 gentlemen. Here’s the url:

http://bggd7.pbwiki.com/

We’re pround to present our 3 speakers at the upcoming Brussels Girl Geek Dinner: Evert-Jan de Kort (Insites Consulting), Courtney Davis (Muse Communication) and Sabine Clappaert (Muse Communication). We’re currently looking for a way to let them interact a bit.

BGGD#7 theme is “Shopping“, with the main focus on What Women Want (and Buy).

Muse Communication is a full-service communication agency specialized in smart marketing to women. Muse Communication believes in marketing that is visionary, shows intimate consumer insight and that leads to the creation of communication that is relevant, believable, honest and ethical. In short: communication that really connects with your female consumer.

Prior to founding Muse Communication, Sabine Clappaert was responsible for the development and implementation Pan-European PR campaigns as Account Director at Weber Shandwick Worldwide, a multi-national PR firm. Before joining WSW,Sabine held the position of Marketing Communication Manager at Barco ­ one of the world¹s largest visualization equipment manufacturers. Sabine holds diplomas in marketing and information technology obtained in Sydney, Australia.

Courtney Davis has extensive and varied work experience spanning the USA, UK and European markets. Her 7 years experience in communication and PR for the
food, health and travel sectors had her solidified her extensive media network. Public speaking, event planning and strategic planning were highlighted in her most recent position as Director of Communications for the food issues think tank Oldways. Degrees in English and gender studies.

InSites Consulting today is a full service research agency, covering all market research topics, using quantitative and qualitative methods. Based on these facts and figures, they offer custom-made research solutions and formulate marketing recommendations.
Management expanded the team and new business units were set up to complement InSites online research expertise: brand assets, innovation, technology and marketing communication. Apart from these business units, there are also knowledge centers with in-house experts specialising in the following fields: kids & youth, pharmacy, research methodology and e-government.

Evert-Jan de Kort is Kwantitatief Consultant for Insites Consulting, specializing in Interactive communications, new marketing and advertising technologies, and user experience. He delivers strategy development through research and advice. He’s known for his passion for anything digital communications and interactive media, and always eager to discover new insights on people and technology, and to detect hypes from trends.

Billy is a new gift voucher for online shopping. In fact, it’s a virtual pre-paid mastercard.
It’s the perfect gift for the geeky Significant Other in your life, who’d rather skip the whole cardboard gift box phase altogether and spend the gift money straight away in an online shop of his or her choice.
Billy is instant, unique and a perfect match for a geeky lifestyle.

What’s more: Billy is proud sponsor of Brussels Girl Geek Dinner #7 on Wed 20 August in Leuven. Thank you Billy!

So here is our question for you: if you got 50 euros for online shopping from Billy, what would you spend it on? Let us know in the comments.