Alpha geeks shows off their gadgets in real life meeting

Vishnu K. Mahmud, Contributor, Jakarta

Finally, people from a variety of web mailing lists decided to have a gathering of sorts after spending years communicating with each other over the Internet. Having a virtual community meet IRL (in real life) is nothing new but what was interesting was the theme: geek gadgets.

Gadgets 2 Gather (G2G) was organized by the new Digicom magazine and sponsored by a variety of high-tech companies such as Compaq, Nokia and Siemens.

Although the venue was open to the public, the gathering was supported and promoted by many different Internet mailing lists such as id-Palm (Indonesian Palm Personal Digital Assistant Users Group), id-PocketPC (Microsoft PocketPC Users Group), id-GPS (Indonesia Global Positioning Satellite aficionados) and gadtorade (a mailing list for trading PDAs, computer accessories, electronic gadgets and anything else geeky!).

The room was filled with alpha geeks showing off their toys. Like alpha gorillas, these geeks are the dominant species of their kind. Before you even consider pointing and laughing at them, these guys are most likely the ones who control your company networks with God-like access. They can also trouble- shoot any computer errors, fix any kind of electronic hardware, create McGyver-like patches for real life problems and have boatloads of money. Bill Gates of Microsoft and Scott McNealy of Sun Microsystems are the supreme alpha geeks on earth.

M. Sacha J.v. Diest, one of the event's organizers and Indonesia's supreme gadget man, stated that while the gathering was meant as a forum for "gadgeteers" to meet so they could share experience and knowledge in a nonvirtual environment, the sponsors recognized that this particular segment of society in Indonesia was rather small. Such a community needed to be nurtured in order to expand. Instead of servicing a market, you help build it. The "geek market" has never been targeted by businesses on a large scale.

Even though Indonesian alpha geeks are rare, they are most likely to try any new gadget, hardware or software just for the sake of testing it.

As early adapters or pioneers, they can quickly find out what works, what does not and what feature should be added. With their knowledge and influence, these geeks are the ones "normal" people go to for recommendations on computers, cellphones and other electronic paraphernalia.

While the gathering had the regular tables featuring sponsors selling products at special event prices, there were other booths manned by people from the community mailing lists for people to ask questions about their Personal Digitant Assistants (PDAs), see product demonstrations as well as share knowledge with other users or potential owners. Have a problem with your Palm? An id- Palm geek can help you out. Your PocketPC feels a bit sluggish? A friendly hand can de-bug it for you.

Everyone brought out their latest toys. One showed a digital camera-cum-laptop computer that was the size of a small book, while another showed his Nokia Communicator cellphone with internet access. Others took the opportunity to swap gadgets by posting them on the "for sale" bulletin board, to be immediately bombarded with questions. A true geek's paradise!

In addition to the vendor tables and community booths, there were various presentations given by each gadget evangelist. One showed his love of electronic books that were freely available on the Internet, while another showed various useful applications using a GPS receiver. One salesman even demonstrated the new upcoming Nokia cellphone (with hidden keypad) and invited many curious people to crowd and photograph their next new toy.

Probably the most popular was the PocketPC presentations. One user demonstrated how to give a business presentation with the Microsoft-backed PDA and an LCD projector. Even more appealing, one PocketPC-er showed all the games (with cool colors and stereo sound) that you could play. After seeing that, one Palm owner sadly looked at his grey-scaled, monochrome screened Palm Vx and considered switching.

Palm and PocketPC rivalry aside, the G2G meet has shown that there is a viable, albeit small, geek community in Indonesia. These events not only display how to efficiently utilize any consumer electronics that are now on the market but are also a venue for people to meet, see the possibilities of these gadgets and implement them in their business.

It is now a well-known fact that some hospitals in the U.S. use PDAs to keep track of their patients and businesses now use GPS for construction and mapping purposes. What other invention out there could your company use?

You too can join the mailing lists and see what the excitement is about. Like everything else, to be an alpha geek requires tireless dedication, experimentation and studying. All it takes at first is a little interest. We can make a geek out of you yet!

To join these groups, simply go to Yahoo!Groups (groups.yahoo.com) and search for "id-palm", "id-pocketpc", "id- GPS" or "gadtorade". Click on the group of your choice and follow the instructions on the screen on how to join.