On Saturday I went to my first Barcamp and was lucky enough that it was the UKGovWeb Barcamp hosted at the impressive sounding Ministry of Justice.

After whizzing round the room getting names and tags for everyone, Tim Davies gave us the rules for the day, sessions were organised and people just sort of got on with it. People showed stuff off, shared what worked and what didn’t, asked questions and answered a few too. Sessions I went to included Steph Gray’s on the trials and tribulations of DIUS consultation’s over the past year and Guy Dickinson and Simon Wheatley’s Ideas for my Council.

But like Carl Haggerty, (who I met for the first time and shared a Peroni or two with afterwards before he dashed back to Devon to start his new job)  I found the greatest benefit in meeting up with like minded government and non-government types looking to make a difference. I’m not a hard core government webster, but I didn’t feel out of place, I think because the idea of government websites sitting in splendid isolation is not a model that anyone attending felt was viable. It’s the fuzzy bits at the edge I’m interested in.  Where does consultation stop and policy co-creation and service provision begin? Is it a continuous iterative process that is being broken down as we speak, crossing over with local government, the private and Third sectors?

When it comes to consultation for example, tools like Commentariat are making this possible and the plain english Big City Plan Talk show that there is another way, even with a traditional consultation model – so long as a bit of common sense is applied. Overall as Steph points out and Neil Williams builds on, these are exciting times and not just times for talking (and there was a lot of good talking on Saturday), but doing.

Big thanks

Of course despite their apparently self-organising nature, these things don’t ‘just happen’, there is a lot of hard work behind the scenes and the likes of Dave Briggs and Jeremy Gould deserve lots of thanks for putting on a great day. Jeremy is already spending his first night in Ireland having literally left the building for the last time and although I’ve only met him in meatspace a couple of times, he’s obviously a top bloke, and I’ll add my voice to everyone else’s in wishing him good luck for the future – not that he needs it.

• UKGovBarcamp

• Twitter conversations

• Pictures on Flickr