Rebooting Nashville PHP

I recently moved to Nashville, and as part of that transition, I’ve taken the helm as the new organizer for the Nashville PHP user group. I posted what follows to the Nashville PHP mailing list, but I thought it would be a good blog post. Enjoy!

Six years ago, I founded the Atlanta PHP user group (along with a few others), and I’ve been organizing it since then. It’s been a lot of hard work to grow and develop the PHP community in the Atlanta area, but it’s also been rewarding to meet so many great people and to see them take interest in and become invested in the continued success of their PHP user group. I’m proud to have been a part of building that community to the point where it can sustain itself without my involvement.

Now, I’m in Nashville. A few months ago, I moved here to pursue a job with a local web start-up. I never had any intention of running the local PHP user group, but Will Fitch, the former Nashville PHP organizer, contacted me to see if I would be interested in taking over the reins. He had moved out of the area and was no longer able to devote the time necessary to keep the group growing. I humbly accepted the torch, and that’s why I’m now the Nashville PHP organizer.

There have been several incarnations of PHP user groups in the Nashville area over the past ten years, all with varied success. It is my hope to build on those successes and to grow a sustained community of members who are personally invested in seeing a vibrant and active PHP community in the Middle Tennessee area.

That’s a lofty goal that will require a lot of hard work, so I’ll need your help. Nevertheless, I’m up for the challenge, and I hope you’ll join me in growing this community.

First of all, a few matters of business:

  • Nashville PHP will hold regular monthly meetings on the second Tuesday of every month at 7pm at the same location each month. I am currently solidifying this location, and I’ll let you know when details are finalized.
  • June 8 at 7pm will be our first meeting. Location and topic TBA.
  • Nashville PHP will continue to use Meetup.com as our central place for membership and meeting announcements and RSVPs.
  • I’m dropping the discussion forums on Meetup.com in favor of a Google Group for discussions and job postings. Please join the Nashville PHP Google Group.
  • Follow @NashvillePHP on Twitter for community status updates. Also, if you have a Twitter account and you want to be listed on the nashvillephp-devs list, let me know. I’ll add you.
  • Join me on Freenode IRC in the #nashvillephp channel. If you’re new to IRC, read this basic IRC tutorial to get started.
  • Employers and recruiters are welcome to post job opportunities to our discussion list. Before posting, please read the rules.

Welcome to the new Nashville PHP! I hope you’ll join me in making this community a success.