Last night was the 53rd Oxford Geek Night, and the second OGN post-pandemic. Unfortunately I missed the first one due to back troubles (stupid fragile bags of mostly water) so I was really excited to get back to The Jericho Tavern and hang out with the Oxfordshire geek contingent.If you’ve never attended OGN then the format consists of four 15 minute talks, and a couple of 5 minute lightning talks, with a quiz at the end.Caroline Cake was first up with a peek behind the curtain of a new health startup spun out of Oxford University’s Oxford Science Enterprises. It was great to have a team from the university in attendence, they’ve been sorely missing from OGN over the years, and I hope this signals a desire to be more involved in the local community.

David North performing a live demo

David North took us on a tour of Nordigen and their open banking API, even being brave enough to perform a live demo! As a long term user of YNAB, it was fascinating to get a glimpse into how the open banking ecosystem works.

Dan Clarke gave us a rundown of the current state of .Net. It’s not a framework I’ve ever used, but it’s always good to hear about other tech.The final talk was from Christi Scarborough of the Open Rights Group. who took us through the perils of the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill, and the Online Safety Bill, both currently wending their way through the UK Parliament. Given my new job, these are both pieces of legislation that I have been keeping my eye on, and it was good to have a quick chat with Christi after, and extend thanks from the teams at the Internet Society for all the work ORG are doing.

Dan Q

The first of the lightning talks was by the always entertaining Dan Q with a talk on “Yesterday’s Internet Today“. Seeing him talk about protocols like finger and gopher reminded me of my days hanging out in the open access rooms at Coventry University and teaching myself Unix when I should have been attending lectures.And finally came a heartfelt talk on recognising the signs of potential burn-out from Kate Drewett. A timely remind to us all that hustle culture is just a bad thing.

Quiz time

It was so good to see so many familiar faces, and plenty of new ones. OGN was always a highlight of the Oxford geek calendar (I spoke at OGN #1 dontcha know), and I’m really happy that it’s back.