So on my first visit to the London office of Google last Thursday, I’m mostly remembering the food experience as much as the people who were there.
That experience was when I joined in with nearly 100 others to celebrate the third anniversary of the London Girl Geek Dinners.
Indeed, reviewing the few photos I took on Thursday, the focus is very much on Google food. Take a look through this Flickr slideshow and you’ll see.
The event took place in Google’s employee cafeteria on the fifth floor of the London Googleplex, a rather nondescript office building in Buckingham Palace Road close to Victoria station.
I wouldn’t call the event nondescript, though, as it sparkled with great conversation along with some formal presentations during the course of well over three hours.
Yet I’m hard pressed to remember the detail of those presentations – Sandrine Plasseraud has a good account – as I’m still thinking about the dinner.
So I’d say that the stories you hear about Google and restaurants for employees are probably true.
I did enjoy this London Girl Geek Dinner event. I’ve been invited to a few before but this was the first one I’ve been to.
What are the London Girl Geek Dinners? you may wonder.
They are the brainchild of Sarah Blow, pictured at last Thursday’s dinner, who attended a geek dinner in London in June 2005 at which Robert Scoble was guest of honour (I was at that one, too: a small world), and noted that her gender was in a distinct minority as well as outnumbered by marketing folk.
Incidentally, the words ‘girl geek’ don’t necessarily mean technology, as Sarah notes.
But rather than me trying to explain what Girl Geek Dinners is all about, listen to Sarah as she describes the background to what today is a network of Girl Geek Dinners in 24 cities in eleven countries.
Judging by last Thursday’s event in London, it’s a terrific community. And it’s not only women – men are welcome if you meet the conditions :)
And with plans for the future:
London Girl Geek Dinners aims to change the world! No really! Honestly… we really do… we want to make technology accessible and interesting to all age groups and all people… no matter what age, gender etc. We have grand plans for conferences, vlogs and who knows what else… so watch this space!
I’m watching.
More commentary about last Thursday’s third anniversary dinner:
9 responses to “Dining with girl geeks at Google”
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It must have been a very interesting night. Your photo are very good, the one with google toilet is hilarious :)
The photo is indeed hilarious… I am sure there weren’t any reminded in the ladies!
Shame we didn’t get to meet – I got there slightly late and missed the networking / iuntroductions part of the evening.
See you at the next event?
[…] event was a celebration of the last three years and Google laid on great food – see Neville Hobson’s slide show – and gorgeous branded cupcakes which are already rightly getting fan posts via Annie […]
My intention wasn’t to highlight the dinner photos with what I call ‘the loo shot,’ it’s just how Flickr organizes the slidehow!
I liked your post, Laurence, and a pity we didn’t get to meet. There were a lot of people there. A really enjoyable evening and I do hope to make it to another one, so see you then.
Shame indeed – I go to lots of events so I am sure we’ll get to meet at some point!
Hey, thanks for the link ! Looks like I missed out on the food by arriving late. Nevermind, I had my cup cake ;-)
[…] event was a celebration of the last three years and Google laid on great food – see Neville Hobson’s slide show – and gorgeous branded cupcakes which are already rightly getting fan posts via Annie […]
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