I noticed a post on Jeremy Harrington's blog about an event up in Ann Arbor, Michigan called "ArbCamp". It's a commercialized, sponsor driven variation "loosely modeled after barcamp."

Loosely modeled so long as you mean, you know, not frigging at all.

BarCamp isn't about writing on walls or deciding agenda's on the fly. That's an unconference (or, as the blog* format might suggest, a variation of one). BarCamp is about taking shared values, those commonly found in the open source community, and applying it to the unconference setup. BarCamp's an open source, user generated, conference. If someone isn't going to buy into the values that BarCamp establishes, then they're not throwing an event loosely based on barcamp. They're throwing just another unconference.

In this particular case, the event organizers (a marketing company, go f'n figure) are suggesting that its loosely based on the barcamp model, but yet they're selling $2,000 sponsorships that come with dedicated speaking time and charging $65 for "full day admission." This is, quite blatantly, a commercial rip off of whats intended to be a free event model. They're taking advantage of the incredible amount of hard work folks from the community have put into creating the barcamp brand, repackaging it, aligning themselves with the brand by suggesting they have something in common with it, and then selling it for their own purposes.

Loosely based on barcamp? Psh. It's the conference equivalent of a gpl violation.

People are free to do what they will. If someone wants to start a conference and make some coin, then hey, whatever. It's just a shame to see someone blatantly take advantage of the barcamp brand like that. If you're considering attending this event, then recognize it for what it is and attend it as such: An overpriced rip-off of the real thing. You'll be forced to listen to whoever paid the most money as they try to pitch you crappy products and services instead of listening to people engage in quality discussion over topics that they're passionate about.

Seriously. If you're going to spend $65 on this event, you're better off doubling up and buying a plane ticket to attend a genuine barcamp.