Oh I do like to be beside the BSides.

[Wayne]

BSides Cymru was yesterday and I was there. Not only was I there, I was one of the speakers. No long journey this time, just a drive down to the train station in town where I'd treated myself to a 1st class ticket. Then a short taxi journey to the venue. I could have walked it, but it was raining and my laptop bag is really heavy when loaded up with everything I need. All in all it takes me about an hour to get there, so not too bad.

As I walk in I'm immediately spotted by one of the staff who greets me, takes me through the signing in process, shows me where I'm going to be speaking and checks I have everything I need. My talk has some videos, so I confirm they have HDMI audio capabilities there. First time I gave this talk, the venue didn't and we had to improvise. No big deal, but as there's only a short gap between talks I want to make sure we can get everything set up as quickly as possible. The staff are going to be running around like headless chickens as it is, I don't want to be the one who gives them any undue headaches. As it happens, I got to hear about a few of the problems they had and I'm glad I wasn't one of them.

My talk is at about 11am in the main room, so I watch the ones before me. We have about 10 minutes before my talk, so while they set my laptop up for me, I go grab a smoke to help calm my nerves. The talk itself went well. No real issues and seemed to have been well received. After it I got chatting with some people and managed to learn something new about AI voices.

At this point it all gets a bit blurred as it always does when you do these events. I attend other talks, miss some I was hoping to see but got distracted by chatting to people (no big deal as they bring them out on YouTube as well later on, plus it's more important to make sure anyone who has questions or comments gets my full attention), get recognised a few times which I still find weird, and generally enjoy the rest of the day. I make sure to buy some new stickers to put on my laptop, chat with sponsors and generally make out like a bandit with the merch. Sticker sales go to charity, so I made sure to donate well and provide them with some of our own to add to the collection.

This was my 3rd BSides Cymru event, the second one I'd spoken at, the 3rd time I'd given a variation of the same talk at one (for those unaware, BSides events are held all over the world and there's quite a few in the UK) and my 5th time attending a BSides in general. Cymru will always be my "go to" location as they were the first to give me the chance to talk, but I'm definitely looking to attend a lot more of them around the country.

Absolute kudos to the team at BSides. I genuinely couldn't have felt more welcomed there. Also thank you to those who attended my talk, chatted with me after and asked me questions. If we see each other at another one, come say hi. Remember, we have stickers now!