What Will iPhoneDevCamp Accomplish?

Beginning this weekend, from Friday evening until Sunday, 200 to 300 developers, designers and entrepreneurs will all assemble together in San Francisco. What for, you ask? Well, one week after the release of the Apple iPhone, there can only be one thing that will draw a crowd of this size… the iPhone itself. The iPhoneDevCamp, also known as the iPhone Developers Camp, is taking place to allow anyone to discuss and develop new programs and improve the web experience for the brand new Apple iPhone. Attendees will include web designers, developers, testers, and iPhone owners.

"It's going to be the largest gathering of iPhone owners - we'll probably have at least 150 iPhones in the same room," event organizer Raven Zachary told PC World magazine in a recent article. This event is in no way sponsored by Apple, so this will be a remarkable feat to accomplish considering the fact that the entire event was not even planned until less than a month ago, after the WWDC conference.

Since then, the event plans have been rolled out in detail and everything is ready for takeoff. Apple has even released a Web development guide for the iPhone that provides hints about the iPhone's capabilities, and information on how to integrate your app with the iPhone and its existing software.

I am sure that the development guide will be very useful, but it was not expected to be available before the event. This makes me wonder if Apple decided to quickly release it once word of iPhoneDevCamp spread. I am sure they would not want a bunch of developers creating apps that aren't seamlessly integrated. This is Apple we are speaking of after all. What do you think?

The iPhoneDevCamp has 4 main goals on the agenda that should be accomplished by Sunday afternoon, which include:

• Creating new web applications for iPhone.
• Optimizing existing web applications for iPhone.
• Migrating Dashboard Widgets to web-based widgets for iPhone.
• Testing and optimize web sites for iPhone.

The entire weekend is packed with sessions aimed to help progress and it will culminate on Sunday with a Hack-A-Thon demo session that will result in prizes and rewards.

My main concern about this event is whether 3 days is enough to create "quality" applications. Good products take time, so is this developer camp rushing things for the iPhone? Is it just extending the iPhone hype after its official release? Also, will there be enough collaboration and "brainpower" present to create truly useful apps that will be popular for a wide range of people? What are your opinions?

Currently, 150 Apple iPhone devices are expected to be at the event, which is open to everyone. Let's hope that some positive comes out of this event and not just a crew of iPhone owners wanting to meet others who have made the big purchase.

Be sure to get all the details on iPhoneDevCamp's homepage. You can also keep up-to-date by adding iPhoneDevCamp as a friend on Twitter.

If you plan on attending, please let me know what you will be up to. What are your ideas? What will change about the world of iPhone in three short days?

Editor's note: And do not forget that you can enter the Profy iPhone contest to get one of 5 iPhones we are giving away this summer.

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