The Top Floor Flat

This evening I attended a regular London event called Open Soho – so named for the area of town (Soho) in which it occurs.  Tonight marked the 6th Open Soho and the event is self-described as

Devised by PopJam’s Alex Tew and Irish opportunist Paul Walsh, OpenSoho has helped create a community of like-minded followers through its Facebook group and Twitter page, causing a clamber for tickets each time they’re made available. With a sponsored bar and late-night dancefloor, OpenSoho is a highly acclaimed night on the tiles for those currently causing waves and shaping the future of the UK digital, media and advertising scene. These folk work hard and play harder, come join in the fun.

I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect as I entered the venue, located on the second floor of a rather posh-looking restaurant.  As has been the case for many of the meetups I attend, I went alone.  Generally speaking, attending events solo is difficult but for something so based on networking I didn’t expect to have any problem and was right to think so.  What a charming, social, friendly group of people! I’m fortunate to have a story (“I moved to London with no job, no place to live and not knowing a soul!”) that gets people interested but I think even without a tag line I would have had some incredibly interesting comversations.

I’ve had some trouble nailing down a focus for this blog, as I’m sure many of my regular readers have noticed.  London, of course, plays a prominate role but so does technology and the two subjects have not come together very often.  Open Soho has, for me, combined the best of both with Londoners truly excited about their startups and businesses all meeting together in one of the best parts of the city, while sharing their technological and internet-related thoughts and ideas.  I met part of the webteam that runs What’s On Stage, a London theatre website hoping to meet some techies instead of just more theatre critics; someone who seemed to be taking advantage of the fact that London is a fashion capital with his upcoming Facebook app focused on the modeling industry; a fellow American in London looking for ways to get people jobs and many more besides.  Plus there were a couple of familiar faces from previous meetups I’ve attended.

Tomorrow morning I’m off to Scotland for the weekend but I’m very glad I got one final push for tech, business and networking in this week before I switch to the polar opposite, rural setting.  All in all it was a great event and I very much look forward to the next one.

I should give a plug to the sponsors of this evening’s bar and Open Soho event, the endlessly cheerful and sugary sweet I Like U Coz, the site that lets you tell anyone in the world exactly why you like them.  Go check it out!