

Connecting the UK Student Tech Scene - asronline
http://ammaar.me/connecting-the-uk-student-tech-scene

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willmw101
UCL has been organizing well attended Hackathons, seed funding pitch
competitions, partnerships with founders and accelerators as well as running
its own mini incubator for the past few years. Even a quick skim on google
would show a multitude of student (UCL) born startups that have succeeded:
Loom, backed by Google Ventures and acquired by Dropbox this year + Vungle,
raised $17MM series B this year. I understand that from a Kings perspective
the tech scene looks weak, but to discredit the scene as a whole when UCL has
been leading the way with significant success for the past few years, is
misleading.

~~~
tekacs
Similarly, the situation in Cambridge (and as I understand it Oxford) has been
very solid for a very long time.

There exist Computing and Technology (CUCaTS), Computing Facility (SRCF),
Technology Enterprise (CUTEC) and Enterpreneurs (CUE) societies. The latter
two have fallen somewhat out of favour and notice around the Computer Lab the
last few years, but are still running strong attracting tech entrepreneurs
from Physics and Engineering.

There's a lot of focus on moving out to established tech companies (blame the
recruitment fair and regular company events) but this outgoing year appeared
to have a high fraction of the CS year attempting to work on startups in one
form or another.

~~~
tfgg
As someone who has been at one of those institutions and is currently at the
other, I haven't noticed much in the way of hackdays at either... Maybe it's
changed at Cambridge, but I didn't see much sign of brewing collaborations at
the time (beyond the creative-commons-or-public-domain-only file sharing
network).

In Oxford I can recommend Oxford Geek Nights
([http://oxford.geeknights.net](http://oxford.geeknights.net)). It's not
student run, but sometimes has students speaking and it's always interesting.

~~~
tekacs
It's improving at Cambridge, but slowly.

~~~
benchin
I heard that a third of the graduating CompSci class applied to Entrepreneur
First this year?

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EmlynC
I am committee member of the PyData London Meetup and I'd argue that the tech
scene in London is simply more vibrant outside of the universities at the
various meetups, hacker spaces and conferences so often you are better served
going to those than a University society.

There is a certain amount of red tape organising events at Universities (my
basis for this is KCL and Imperial) unless they are either explicitly
educational and you often have to liase with security so we've had a lot less
friction by engaging tech companies to host meetings. You get the industry
links by making use of their facilities, you get students, devs and business
types and in all honesty companies in Silicon Roundabout are gagging to look
cool and host a meetup.

Saying that, I'm about to start post-doc work at KCL (been here since
Undergrad) so I'll be kicking around for the next 3 yrs so I'll be signing up.

~~~
lclarkmichalek
It's a real pity though, because there is one group I never see at PyData;
undergrads (and this is true for many other meetups). And that could be seen
as a problem; every tech scene needs its supply of mindless idealists if it
wants to produce a reliable stream of start ups.

~~~
EmlynC
Hey Laurie. To be honest, if the undergrads can knock out presentations as
good as your presentation on DOTA2 analysis then, we, at PyData London should
be actively trying to get more undergrads to come to our meetup.

An unbalanced group is, as you say, a problem. The key is to get a wide gamut;
people with ideas _and_ some idea of implementation, flat-out implementation
people (devs and designers), business people and investors. A lot of the
undergrads I know are green but they often have a lot of energy, ideas and can
be fine coders.

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refrigerator
Great post! I can completely relate to what was described in the first
paragraph - before going to university my impression was that loads of people
would be working on cool projects (not even necessarily tech-related) and that
it would be really inspiring, but unfortunately when I got there this wasn't
the case at all. I got the feeling that there was more cool tech stuff going
on at London universities, but word never really got round to us. Our
entrepreneurship society (Oxford Entrepreneurs, OE hereafter) seemed to be
really disconnected with the 'tech society' (Oxford CompSoc) and the majority
of people attending OE events were MBAs/other grad students. (The new OE
committee are working hard to change this though)

I think HackCampus is a great idea and is exactly what the UK tech scene
needs. We (OE) are about to hold our first ever hackathon this November open
to all students at all universities, and it seems many other universities are
also starting to do the same, so a way to connect UK students interested in
this kind of stuff is needed now more than ever.

Best of luck to HackCampus and KCL Tech Society!

Edit: I should add that a lot of Oxford alums have gone on to do really cool
stuff, but I think a lot can be done to interest more undergrads in
tech/entrepreneurship.

~~~
gearhart
As an Oxford grad who used to go to a lot of OE events, I agree with you
completely (and have definitely encountered the OP's disappointment!). I set
up my first company in Oxford just after I left a few years ago, and there was
almost nobody else there - 6 months later, we decided to move to London to
find a bigger tech scene.

Since, we've built a company almost exclusively out of London and Oxford
technical graduates, and we've just started an internship programme this year
(and they're awesome). If you'd like any involvement from inside the industry,
get in touch, we're really keen to build a stronger relationship! The same
goes for any technical student groups - if you're engaged enough to organise
or attend tech events then you are what the London tech scene needs.

That's toby at [http://gearhart.co.uk/](http://gearhart.co.uk/) if you want to
get in touch :)

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radicality
I went to Imperial College London, graduated last year – we've also organized
a couple of hackathons in the past years, and hosted the main Seedcamp event
in 2012. There is also the Imperial Ventures and Imperial Create Lab. I can
say that the amount of student tech scene stuff in Imperial has increased over
the 4 years I was there, during year 1 I can't really remember any events like
that, so it's good the community is picking up speed in the right direction.

But as you say, what's important is that the different universities are not
disconnected – organizing+advertising hackathons and hosting big events like
Seedcamp is a good way to connect the students across universities.

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gordonguthrie
Techmeetup [http://techmeetup.co.uk/](http://techmeetup.co.uk/) already covers
all of Scotland and has goodish contacts with UCL and Seedcamp and stuff...

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Tinned_Tuna
I agree that the UK Student tech scene is quite disconnected.

There are quite a few computer science oriented student societies. For
instance, at York (where I did my undergrad) there's HackSoc. There's an IRC
channel somewhere on freenode with computer science societies from the uk.
We're not completely disconnected, but we're slowly growing to the point that
we can start collaborating and having friendly competitions.

~~~
kragniz
Do you have the name of that IRC channel?

~~~
benchin
details are [http://www.compsocs.uk/](http://www.compsocs.uk/)

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ibisum
My experience with the tech scene in the UK leads me to believe that it is the
class system which has to be broached in order for this to be broken wide
open. Too often in English society clear class division is used to keep people
out of touch with each other - I saw very clear examples of this in the
hackerspace scene, wherein I noticed with great dismay the typical 'sterotype-
casting' of individuals, whose technological prowess was not insignificant,
working against them. The idea of "dirty student techies stinking up the lab"
was far too prevalent - even in the hackerspace scene. British culture takes
too much pride in its classist attitudes, as embodied in much of its culture,
and I think this definitely works against any effort to build a broader
community.

Generally, I'd hope that the 'tech classes' rapidly dissuade themselves of any
of the so-called virtues of British classism, but this isn't something thats
necessarily on the table. Too often, bigotry and prejudice gets in the way of
technological progress; this is very much the case, in my experience, within
the UK tech sector.

~~~
simonbarker87
I can certainly say that I have seen very little of what you describe in the
UK tech scene at least certainly not up in the North East where I am - perhaps
London is different but I can't believe it is that different.

And as far as "dirty students sinking up the lab goes", this is more likely an
isolated case rather than the prevailing norm in my experience.

~~~
ibisum
I think that the UK is still considered the most classist country in Europe..
to an outsider, the confusing arrays of 'types of people' that you would
encounter during a trip to the UK, as described by its denizens, lends
credence to this view. "Don't talk to that chav, mate!", or "yes, she's an
upper-class type, went to school so-and-so", and "well, you're an engineer ..
how very working class of you .." are all statements I have encountered with
random people on the street during my brief visits to the UK, and it was quite
unnerving just how ingrained this mode of thinking is in the populace. British
TV seems to be nothing but a war of the classes.

So I'm not sure you'd understand, unless you left for a while and came back.
The British have a reputation for it - this can't be because the rest of the
world hates Britain for some reason (there are legitimate reasons), but has to
have some bearing in the truth of the circumstance. Classism is a very real
thing in the UK - _especially_ as a result of its education system, and in
spite of many attempts at reform.

EDIT: An interesting article on the subject:

[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/5165594/Britains-
clas...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/5165594/Britains-class-system-
alive-and-well-claims-research.html)

And here:

[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2303333/Great-
Britis...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2303333/Great-British-
Class-Survey-reveals-UK-7-social-classes-Are-precariat-new-affluent-worker-
elite.html)

.. and more:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_structure_of_the_United_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_structure_of_the_United_Kingdom)

.. and well, this pretty much clinches it - the UK is a classist society:

[http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-22007058](http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-22007058)

~~~
lclarkmichalek
Yeah, no idea what you're talking about. I'll acknowledge that I'm white, male
and come from a middle class background, so yeah, pretty privileged. But when
I look at who gets "stick" for their background, it's pretty universally
people who come from money. Now, that's not to say that there isn't jealousy
relating to upbringing; I am the product of a state school, so I am jealous of
grammar/scholarship kids, and generally dismissive of private/public school
kids. And schooling is significant; every September the Oxbridge recruiters
begin the arduous task of trying to get more state school applicants, and that
disparity does manifest itself later on in life.

However, it is never explicit. Someone saying "how very working class of you"
is not something that would happen. Hell, I'd consider that person uncultured
for saying that. If you really want to talk about British culture's
reputation, then the first thing you should talk about is not acknowledging
things, responding in a passive (aggressive) manner, maybe looking down your
nose, but never ever confronting anyone.

Also, I really wonder how much British culture matters in the tech scene. I'm
in London, so that probably changes my experiences, but at my start up, we
have 4 Italian employees, 1 Swiss guy, and me, the sole "British" member
(though half my family is Polish, so go figure). The tech scene in London is
incredibly diverse, and at least in my experience, British culture is pretty
far from universally prevalent.

~~~
ibisum
Well ..

    
    
        ""I am the product of a state school, so I am jealous of grammar/scholarship kids, and generally dismissive of private/public school kids.""
    

.. this is precisely an example of the factors - class-derived - which I
believe limit expansion of the student/technology scene in the UK.

~~~
lclarkmichalek
Well given that, of the people I attend university with, work with and
generally interact with in the general tech sphere, there are only 2 people to
whom I could assign a style of school, it's not too crippling of a prejudice.

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flurdy
For more a startup mostly tech career fair in London there is the popular
Silicon Milkroundabout.
[https://www.siliconmilkroundabout.com/](https://www.siliconmilkroundabout.com/)
Milkround 8 is in November.

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royroyroys
last couple of years, the 3beards have been pretty good at organising tech
events like 'art hackathons' and hackathons with companies in London.

think a tech scene doesn't need to be exclusive to students.

