If was ever any doubt in my mind (which there hasn't) about whether social media is able to build community back in the meat space world, it would have been dispelled today at the JHB Drupal Users Group first DrupalCamp. I've been around the block as far as communities go, and the comparison between the DrupalCamp of today, using social media platforms to get to the right people, vs. that of the Gauteng Linux Users Group (GLUG) 10 years back, has astounding return on investment.

Our very first camp drew a crowd of about 90 people coming in from mixed backgrounds, and skill levels, from expert brand consultants, who were just playing with Drupal for the first time, to die hard non-core-hacking PHP and Drupal pros, centered around a single cause: Enabling anybody to build better, stronger, more flexible dynamic website, whether behind the firewall, a simple brochureware site, or a massively complex data rich enterprise site.

Justin Spratt (@justinspratt) and IS Labs not only supplied the venue for the event, but also provided some crowd pleasing information in the form of what ISLabs does as far as entreprenerual support within the country, and the give back that IS puts together for us.

Charles Tanton (@foxtrotcharlie) presented an a great outline to the conceptual stuff behind Drupal, a fairly difficult mountain to climb, and did an exceptional job of it, being clear on how the Drupal framework works and what that looks like at the end of the day. Thanks to George Ziady from Springfisher for taking the beginners into a far more practical conversation of the framework, articulating and showing clearly a step by step guide on how to use the theoretical knowledge that Charles imparted, in a paint by numbers approach to setting up a Drupal based website.

After lolling around IS' braai area, munching on boerie rolls (with many to the vegetarians, there will be a salad option at the next one) and sipping beers (or in my case far too many Vitamin Waters), the jolly digital pranksters re-congregated inside to go a little deeper down the rabbit hole. One of Telamenta's developers Greg McKeen showcased the intranet project Open Atrium and the Drupal module Features,a module package management system that was met with, well, "OOh's and Aaah's" from some of even the more seasoned Drupalers, before Willem van Straaten, founder of eConsultant closed the day with his own personal rendition of the Lion King (I have reason to believe that a video of this may be available soon).

A special thank to the sponsors of this incredible first attempt to make the South African chapters of Drupal International as proud, if not prouder than our other contingents: Telamenta, ISLabs, Cerebra, Brandsh, eConsultant, and Springfisherand personal thanks to Charles Tanton for spearheading the Jozi Drupal Users Group and all other volunteers for making this event special to all that attended.

I do have pictures from the event, and I will be putting them up shortly. You guys did yourselves and our community proud.

Although still in it's infancy the buzzword Enterprise 2.0 brings with it a number of expectations; better communication channels, easier access to information and of course self organised managing of teams.

It has also brought with it many things that Enterprise 1.0 did not expect, and as such are still learning to deal with. The Enterprise 2.0 culture is that of finding the appropriate and trusted individuals within the system and is completely re-routing standard organizational hierarchies in order for the individuals within the larger system to achieve their personal outputs. Communication is quicker, more efficient and effective and as such managers are being taken to task, conversations about the good and the bad are happening both internally and externally to the organization and businesses, ill equipped to deal with these mirrors, are flustering to the often cold, always honest, feedback.

The massive upside of this infrastucture is that it opens a base from which companies can harness passionate, vocal and trusted individuals, in order to address their concerns, and shape the communities around those people and create champions for their message. There are some political theorists who are looking at management theory abstracting into political science, for many this is a natural, logical and rational approach. As an extension of that is looking where the trending topics that we are seeing take place within organizations evolving into the larger communities. So what might happen if governments learn from the behaviours of companies?

We could see services shaped around collaboration and community, where individuals are as accountable for their country as they are their companies and themselves.
Could it be possible to have a government as an emergence of collaboration, rather than a government that governs?

The past 6 months have flown by, and until the beginning of last week, I had thought nothing had happened in this year, I was wrong, in this year I became a different person, and through the last week I've been reeling to get my personality back.

Somehow in the last 6 months I became delusional, I saw my dream of Telamenta flying nicely, the work I was doing for Cycan was high level, complex and intricate, and my name seems to be ploughing through what I considered influential social circles. I was hanging out with "The cool crowd" of entrepreneurs in the South African scene, and somehow I decided that I was cool by proxy. Acceptance has always been a bit of an issue for me, standing off to the outside is my default mode of behaviour, separating myself somewhat from the inner circle of black leather jackets, and suddenly being accepted into this was seductive, intoxicating, addictive, and I lost myself. I deluded myself into thinking that the entrepreneurial rockstar lifestyle was sustainable, hell I deluded myself into thinking it was something I wanted.

Here I sit, on a Sunday morning, about to go off to a family lunch for my aunt's birthday, trying to find the person I was before the parties, before the cool, trying to remember what it was that the T-Bird's originally saw in me, before I came one myself. It was the fact that I was real, for a long time integrity was all that I had, I was down to earth, prepared to do the work, prepared to put in the extra hours (all day, all night, all weekend) and prepared to help, listen and support.

I've been reading Joseph Jaworski's "Synchronicity: the inner path of leadership" noticing patterns, and pulling out the deeper importance. Life is about relationships, deep and meaningful ones, it's about stories and people, relatedness, not things or fulfilling childish needs for the acceptance of the world.

I have moved from my worldview that the entrepreneur is a rockstar, where the pay off is superficial adoration from the thousands that have no idea who you are. Entrepreneurialism is about serving, creating something better, doing something better, or developing your community for your community, not for yourself but for the liberation, freedom and betterment of those around you, selflessly.

I don't pretend for a second that my new view is going to be easy, or that the behaviours are simple ones to change, but the pay off is bigger and the game itself is more fulfilling.

Panta rhei - Everything flows