From now on I think we need to present ourselves to be less beer centric

Ah crap!

Well it was the OpenStreetMap anniversary party. We may have had a few beers.

We had a fantastic gathering with lots of old faces. In openstreetmap years, we had the six year old face on video skype, which was fun (he looks about six don't you think?)

A new face was Thomas Koukoletsos. He's doing a PHD on OpenStreetMap! He's also organising a UCL Masters Student mapping party Sept 2010. This will involve 20 fresh students, some of whome have moved to London just that week, hitting the streets to do some OpenStreetMap surveying. We're trying to work out the best format for this event, but we will surely benefit from some experienced OSMers helping out. The snag is, it's during the working day. Actually two working days. There will be an explanatory lecture followed by surveying on the Wednesday, and editing on the Thursday morning. If you can get time off (or if you don't need to), we'd appreciate your help. Add your name on the wiki. That's at the end of September, but before that...

I blogged about Pakistan floods mapping over on the HOT site. THIS SATURDAY (28th) there's a Crisis Camp London event. This is something I've been along to a few times, and I've suggested it's a good thing for OSMers to go along to in the past. This time they're coming together with a focus on the Pakistan floods. There are various projects and ideas floating around, but you'll also find newbies keen to learn about OpenStreetMap mapping. Go along to help them out, join in with more technical hacking, or do your own OSM related technical hacking. Wifi and pizza included! Sadly I wont be able to make it myself (out of London for the weekend)

Next Tuesday we have our next mapping evening. I've just set this up in Holborn, at the Penderel's Oak. It's a building outlines gap, and also I think there's cycle hire points mapping to be done there. I haven't drawn a cake diagram yet. Will try to do so soon (unless anyone else fancies doing it?)

These events keep creeping up on me!

P.S. I almost forgot to mention...

The Japanese OSM Birthday Cake!

Awesome!