Savannah Gears up for Geekend
New location, new ticket options This year the conference will be on The Guild Hall campus, which includes several buildings around Montgomery Street and Martin Luther King Jr., Boulevard. The various buildings house a black box theater, makerspace, meeting rooms and outdoor spaces. “They’ve been great, and we think it’s such a nice fit in that they’re new and energetic and on the scene in Savannah. And to be able to host the conference there is really lovely,” McLeod said. The Creative Coast is also offering those who don’t consider themselves a “geek,” — which McLeod says isn’t a narrow or negative term — a chance to go behind the scenes with the addition of the Geek Curious ticket option. That will allow access to an intimate speakers’ dinner and a visit to Pitch Circus, where select entrepreneurs present projects and field questions and comments from guest venture capitalists. “I think there is just as much value for somebody that doesn’t consider themselves a ‘geek’ as someone who does,” McLeod said. “Here’s your chance — entrepreneurship and technology are such important parts of the economy, but you might not follow it every day or every week, and here’s your chance to really get immersed in it for two days and have a lot of take-a ways for the whole year ahead.” The return of fun Making its return for the second year, the Geekend Arcade Lab, through local educational partnerships, will teach students how to code arcade games that will be featured for attendees to try out during the weekend. McLeod said the conference isn’t aimed at younger kids, but organizers still want them to know that it’s happening. So the event, on Saturday morning, will feature a workshop on coding that’s free to the public, and guests will try out the games for themselves afterward. “Families can come through and engage with the games that other kids have coded and have the chance to attend the workshop and learn their own bit of technology, too,” she said. They’re also encouraging people to play with their food with the addition of MaKey MaKeys in the arcade lab. A MaKey MaKey is a two-sided circuit board with six inputs that connect small alligator clips from the circuit board to anything that’s conductive — a banana, Play-doh, pencil scratchings or in Geekend’s case, a sweet potato. Depending on where you touch the potato the icons on the screen will move up/down/left/right. “It’s additional fun twist… We want families to come, we want their grandmas to come… We want those to come that didn’t submit a game this year but to get excited about learning how to do this and participate in the Geekend Arcade in 2016,” McLeod said. IF YOU GO What: Geekend 2015 When: Oct. 15-17 Where: The Guild Hall, 615 Montgomery St. Info: To purchase tickets, go to www.geek-end.com Source: Savannah Morning News By Katie Martin]]>
