Back in May I was lucky enough to stay in the city for two nights for a workshop with the Apple University Consortium (Mac OS development) as part of my Honours research and found the experience to be quite enlightening to how life in the city may really be like in reality.
Luckily I again had the chance to stay in the city, this time for a conference, again allowing me to experience the city life once more =D
This conference was similar to the workshop back in May, focusing heavily on the new developments for iPhone/iPad's (it was an Apple sponsored event), which links directly with my Honours research as well as what is fast becoming a rather enticing interest of mine. I would also like to mention that this all happened 3 weeks ago, thus showing how ridiculously busy I am these days for it to take me this long ha ha.
The conference itself was amazing, we heard some amazing talks from industry professionals and iOS developers from a huge range of backgrounds covering all sorts of topics from in-depth talks about memory management using Cocoa, to some absolutely incredible (and well presented) presentations on user interface designs, game control theory and small business/freelance testimonies.
One of my favourite talks was from a guy called Andre Pang who currently works for Pixar. He told us his amazing story of where he originally started to how he ended up working for Pixar, as well as some great stories about his experiences at Pixar and the things he had learned along the way (keeping in mind this guy is only around 26 years old, he has gone a long way at such a young age). Andre gave some irreplaceable pieces of advice, my favourite quote from him that I actually try to live by ever since was:
"Be interested, not interesting"
Basically what that means is, everybody loves to talk about themselves. Which when you think about it is so true. Heck, me writing these posts every week proves that I like talking about myself, much like every other blogger out there. Which don't get me wrong, it isn't a bad thing by any means (within moderation of course). Andre's point was, in life you should try to have a very open, enthusiastic and outgoing view in life, to be interested in things (sports, music, hobbies), so when you meet someone and they are talking about something, if you are interested in what they are talking about, that person obviously gets to talk more about it, and it is a win win for both sides.
Anyways that was a rather bad tangent but I hope you get the point. I thought it was wise words at least =)
All in all it was a great couple of days. I met this super awesome guy from Perth (he is 23, Australian, but has taught himself fluent Japanese, how cool is that!), made an awesome contact at another University who has offered to help with my Honours research, and our table at the quiz night somehow managed to actually win the quiz ha ha (won a $25 iTunes gift card, sweet!). To top it off, I went to the conference with my super awesome Honours supervisor Sophie, who I always love spending time with so it was awesome to hang out for two whole days =)
I have another conference planned for early December, it goes for 3 days but this time will be in Sydney for an entire week! Then, next year? Who knows, but there are some big plans on the horizon let me say that much.
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