Having Fun at SteemFest (Day 1)

Saludos de Lisboa! The first day of SteemFest was amazing! Not because of the talks - the few I saw were actually rather disappointing. But I met many interesting people and had lots of fun.

With Detlev from Aachen, wo runs the Beer Saturday Challenge.

SteemFest's organiser Roeland kicked off the conference with his funny opening speech and explained why this time every part of SteemFest happens in a different venue: his idea is that just by visiting the conference you already see many interesting sites of Lisbon. 

The first day of the conference took place at Centro Cultural de Belém, which is located at the banks of River Tejo. We had a stunning view of the bridge Ponte 25 de Abril, which looks very similar to San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge. Another famous landmark of Lisboa is at the other side of the river close to the bridge, the monument to Cristo Redentor. So we had the funny feeling of being in San Francisco and Rio de Janeiro at the same time.

Steemit's co-founder Ned Scott gave the key note speech, which was quite weak. He claimed that Steem (which currenly has 0.0002 times as many users as Facebook) will be "huge", without disclosing any concrete plans or making any new announcments. I prefer British understatement and the principle to "underpromise and overdeliver".

The following talks I saw where quite boring and tech-oriented, with a similar combination of self-praise and hot air. So I decided to stayed for the rest of the day talking to people, which was much more interesting. Here are some impressions:

There are not many tech conferences where you can see people do some acro-yoga.

These Yoga professionals from California blog about Yoga on Steemit. They will also teach some classes on the week-end.

The Steemit community is quite diverse.

The percentage of female attendees is significantly higher than on normal tech conferences.

The friendly ladies from check-in.

One of the few talks I saw was a presentation of a Steem based ticketing service called PassageX.

The conference day ended with an early dinner at the conference venue, overlooking Rio Tejo. The lady in the front is @ramengirl from Korea, dressed up in a traditional Korean outfit.

The brain behind SteemFest, @RoelandP relaxes after a hard day of work with his wife and kid.

The best part of the day was a private tour through some of Lisbon's great bars in the Principe Real area, guided by Daniel Eiba, a German marketing professional who lives in the Portuguese capital. I met him because we are advisors to the same ICO. Daniel showed us some really awesome insider places. No names and pictures here, so they don't get overrun.

The first day of the conference was a great experience for me, and as usual it was not because of the official talks, but because of the many informal meetings and conversations you can have at such an event. 

So I am looking forward to day two of Steemfest, which will take place at a different venue.

 More posts about SteemFest 2:

• Arriving in Lisbon
• The First Night
• Impressions of Day 2
• Impressions of Days 3 & 4