LOL! That got me. But a club? That is cool. We could put posters up and it wouldn’t be limited to only forumers…:Din our dreams:D…
R We dead? (no offense intended)
Come on guys, this isn’t going to happen unless solid plans are made and stuck with. It should get easier to coordinate things after your first one or two meetings. 
I agree entireley with lotrj about this. If u look at my sig you’ll understand why I may not be Able to always come. If Harkyman is in (which I hope he is) we’ll need to do this once every two weeks(yikes summer vacation is almost over!) and if he can and he can explain to his friends why he sees them so often ( 
) we can do it every week. So Harrisburg appears to be our best place. A location in Harrisburg will be tough though. I think if this group is e we established we need to thank lotrj.
Ah – I was thinking a one-time meet up. It costs me $120 in gas to get to Harrisburg and back home, so it really couldn’t happen too often.
One time meet up? Like as in forever? Or once every 10 years? Or once every month?
Even just one meeting would be good to start. It’s much easier to plan out the future of the group in person than over teh interwebs.
MiBug’s first meeting was devoted almost entirely to planning out the future, if any, of the meetings/group. If I recall correctly, we met up in a Denny’s and we found Honeycomb (Steve) at the table with a blender that he brought so that we could spot him easily. Some of us would like to have the meetings twice a month, but we have found once a month to be a good amount of time in between meetings.
A few notes: Bring laptops if you have them, otherwise bring some of your work on a USB key like I do. Wireless internet is a big plus for the meeting location. The folks at MiBug have been very blessed with a conference room at 5_On_It’s place of work with both wireless internet and a nice big projection screen so that everybody can see videos/tutorials/demo files, etc. without having to huddle around a relatively tiny LCD screen.
I think I can safely speak for everybody in the current user group when I say that we would love to have a sister PeBug group.
Maybe we should make a Northern Group, and Southern group. Yeah Wireless net is a big thing for alot of us. But what exactly would we do? Define what we would do.
Um – don’t you mean West/East group? Having driven all over the state for, like, two decades, that sort of split makes a lot more sense to me.
Basically, the point of something like this is to put faces with screen names and say “hey.” Then everyone breaks out their laptop and shows what they’ve been working on. If someone’s been stumped by something, everyone works it out together. If someone is of clearly superior skill maybe they do a demo of something wild they’ve done. If everyone’s over 21, you go grab a beer afterward, and if not, you grab donuts and coffee, which are good too.
It’s basically what we do on BlenderArtists, just in person. Topics of discussion that come up at MiBug might easily be categorized into ‘news and discussion’, ‘off topic chat’, or any other forum category we have so far. Harkyman has the right idea, basically it’s to form more concrete relationships than is possible over the web with other Blender users. In addition, sometimes the group can do things to promote Blender, such as when we made that presentation at the Detroit Mac User Group. If the group grows to a certain point, there may be a need for organized activities and a meeting ‘topic of interest’, but thusfar the size of the group has remained small and personal enough to go without that.
To summarize: Food. Fellowship. Blender. :yes:
Food. Fellowship. Blender. Don’t you mean, Blender. Fellowship. Food? Oh and Harkyman, would if the youngest in the group is 10?
Food always comes first in my mind. Besides, my way seems to roll off of the tongue easier. 
Well, we probably can’t even do food. I know a teacher for Blender in Harrisburg, James Chronister. Went for one of his Blender classes in Harrisburg, was the youngest there. Very nice classes but due to lack of attendance there was only one day rather than the scheduled 3. He might be interested and the classrooms at the school he teaches are really nice to meet up. Sadly their computers have a Intel video card that gives off slow rendering but, hey if we’re going to bring our laptops…The computers themselves are connected to internet but no wireless access. When I went to the classes it was 2.45 the computers were running on but the computer I was using got 2.46(yeah I was the only former Blender user there, I asked for 2.46) But otherwise we’re looking for a more public place.
Yep, try meeting at a restaurant with wifi or something first. A more permanent location can be worked out later.
You know I was gonna suggest that but remember not all(especially 10 yearolds) dont have oaded wallets.
Well, hopefully some people in the group will help cover the costs of those that are not as fortunate as others.
Really? Like who? The owner could be a Blender user…
Dang, I wish I had a driver’s license… and a car; that helps too. And the precedent to the aforementioned is getting a job… blargh! To sum up my current financial situation (spending money-wise), I just spent a few months’ savings on a $167 graphics card. 
Even though I won’t be able to meet up with you guys for a while, most likely, I would suggest sharing your general locations and finding an epicenter at which to meet. The way gas prices are these days, you don’t want to have to travel too far to meet up with a few fellow geeks for a day.
Blender event in Pittsburgh coming up – check this new topic:
http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?p=1163735#post1163735
I guess I was sleeping when this discussion was hot… Well, actually, I wasn’t because my newborn daughter wasn’t letting me – so I was merely a zombie…
I’m also here in the 'burgh and think a meetup would be a swell idea. Something in central PA would give me a reason to dust of the motorcycle, or Harky and I could car-pool. But, long term, I think a Western PA/Eastern PA set-up would work best – with a once-yearly convention at a resort in the Poconos :eyebrowlift2: …or something.
If we have one in Pgh we might meet at Creative Treehouse, or perhaps a computer lab at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. A coffee shop is easier to arrange if our number is small.