Barcamps are conferences without predened content, often referred to as ad-hoc conferences or unconferences. Therefore, the outcomes of a barcamp are largely unknown before the event. This raises the question of participants' motivations to attend and contribute. To answer this question, we conducted an exploratory empirical study at the Barcamp Graz 2012. We applied a mixed-method approach: First we used a sociodemographic questionnaire (n=99) which allowed us to characterize the 'typical barcamper'. Second, we conducted qualitative interviews (n=10) to get a deeper understanding of the participants' motivations to attend, expectations and the use of social media in that context. We identied three concepts, which could be deducted from the interviews: people, format and topics. We found that the motivation to attend and even a common identity is quite strongly based on these three factors. Furthermore, the results indicate that participants share a set of activities and methods by following the barcamp's inherent rules and make extensive use of social media.

1. Dennerlein, Gutounig, Kraker, Kaiser, Rauter & Ausserhofer
I-KNOW – 13th Conference on Knowledge Management and Knowledge
Technologies, 4 Sept 2013 – Graz, Austria
Assessing Barcamps
Incentives for Participation in
Ad-Hoc Conferences and the
Role of Social Media

2. Overview
● Introduction to Barcamps
● The Rules of Barcamps
● Research Questions
● Method
● Results Questionnaire & Interviews
● Discussion & Outlook

3. Introduction: What is a Barcamp?
○ ad hoc or un-conference without predefined content
○ open to the public
○ open, unconstrained and self organized exchange of
knowledge
Photo: Rene Kaiser

4. Introduction: What is a Barcamp?
○ Origin in the Web 2.0
community
○ Usually free of charge
○ Participants define the
session topics
themselves
○ Session planning on the
spot
○ No strict difference
between speaker and
audience
Photo: European Forum Alpbach
Photo: Rene Kaiser

5. • 1st Rule: You do talk about BarCamp.
• 2nd Rule: You do blog about BarCamp.
• 3rd Rule: If you want to present, you must write your topic and name in a
presentation slot.
• 4th Rule: Only three word intros.
• 5th Rule: As many presentations at a time as facilities allow for.
• 6th Rule: No pre-scheduled presentations, no tourists.
• 7th Rule: Presentations will go on as long as they have to or until they run into
another presentation slot.
• 8th Rule: If this is your first time at BarCamp, you HAVE to present. (Ok, you don't
really HAVE to, but try to find someone to present with, or at least ask questions
and be an interactive participant.)
Introduction: The Rules of BarCamp
Source: barcamp.org

6. Research Questions
1. What is the motivation of people to contribute to
an unconference such as the barcamp?
2. What role do social media play and how are
they used in the context of barcamps?

7. Method
● Object of study
○ Barcamp Graz 2012 and its attendees
○ Characteristics:
■ yearly changing combination of sub-camps (e.g. politCamp,
wissensCamp)
■ organized by volunteers
● Methodological approach (Cresswell & Plano Clark,
2011)
○ Mixed methods research
○ Explanatory sequential design:
quantitative → qualitative

8. Method
● Questionnaire:
○ Administration: paper based / Analysis: Descriptives
○ 8 questions:
age, gender, education, place of residence, technical affinity, number
of previous barcamp visits, expectations, recruitment for follow up
study
● Interviews:
○ Administration: semi-structured interview
○ Analysis: Qualitative content analysis (Mayring,2000)
○ Questions:
■ What motivated you to attend Barcamp Graz?
■ What were your expectations towards Barcamp Graz?
■ What role do social media play in context of the barcamp?

9. Results - Questionnaire
Sociodemographics:
• Age (n=92): 16 to 61 years with a mean age of 29 years
• Gender (n=98): 25% females
• Education (n=98): average education level was secondary
school
• Place of residence
(n=92):

10. ● Technological knowledge and skills (n=90):
○ barcampers describe themselves as rather technically affine
● Frequency of participation (n=85):
Results - Questionnaire

11. Results - Questionnaire
● Expectations of the participants concerning the
Barcamp (n=99)
● Recruitment of participants for follow up interviews: 48
promises

12. Results - Interviews
What is the people’s motivation to attend BCG?
• the barcamp people
“Learning from the youngsters in the IT-sector”
• the format and structure of the barcamp
“I´m interested in self governed organizations”
• the topics of the (sub-camps)
“I´m interested in the topics web, social media and
socio-political contents”

13. What expectations did the participants have regarding the
BCG and to which extent did they come true?
• freedom to express one´s own opinion
• giving others input on their ideas
• in-depth discussions
• enjoying the event
• ...
“That I can get to know interesting people and that there
will be in-depth discusssion and that I gain new
knowledge.”
Results - Interviews

14. Do social media play an important role in Barcamps?
Generally important role attributed to social media
“On the one hand I´m a strong fan of participation and on
the other hand it adds value for everyone.”
Results - Interviews
Before the barcamp During the barcamp After the Barcamp
promotion of event
 half of the
interviewees found out
about the event through
social media
- to spread news,
highlights, interesting
thoughts or quotes (using
Twitter, blogs or wikis)
- as a communication tool
to connect to other
participants and keep
relationships alive

15. May social media also constitute a barrier?
• possible decrease of attention during the sessions
„In my opinion, it [the use of social media during sessions]
keeps me from actively participating in the session.“
• one-dimensional way of promotion through social media
 barcamps partly seen as insider events
Results - Interviews

16. Discussion
● Aspects of Motivation:
○ People: Meeting and networking with interesting and diverse
people of the barcamp community
○ Topic: The common topic of the (sub-)camp implies shared
interest between participants and determines the emerging and
to be discussed themes therein
○ Format: Little restricted structure and open format of
knowledge exchange of the barcamp
→ format / community is enabled by shared activities:
■ Rules
■ Use of social media

17. Outlook
● Are barcamps a kind of Community of Practice (CoP;
Lave & Wenger, 1991)?
○ motivational aspects of barcamps are similar to the
characteristics of CoP
○ explore how the theoretical framework of CoP is fruitful to
explain mechanisms of barcamps
● Investigation of similarities and differences to other
concepts of knowledge exchange
○ scientific conferences
○ open source movements
○ open space theory

18. References
● Creswell, J.W. & Plano Clark, V. L. (2011). Designing and
Conducting Mixed Methods Research. Sage Publications, Inc.
● J. Lave and E. Wenger. Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral
participation, volume 95 of Learning in doing. Cambridge University
Press, 1991.
● P. Mayring. Qualitative Inhaltsanalyse. Forum Qualitative
Sozialforschung Forum Qualitative Social Research, 1(2), 2000.
Web:
● www.barcamp-graz.at
● www.barcamp.at
● www.barcamp.org

19. This work was conducted by members of the
Wissensmanagement Forum
http://wm-forum.org/
Read the full paper under
http://know-center.tugraz.at/download_extern/papers/sigproc-sp.pdf