A question I had going in to Drumbeat, and one that I still have, is why Barcelona? I was hoping that once I attended drumbeat the reason would become more apparent; Perhaps it was a bastion of thinking of Freedom, learning and the web? Maybe the local school system is/was doing something super future thinking? Maybe Mozilla Europe has a big, giant installment? Perhaps Barcelona is home to the biggest hacker movement in Europe?

As far as I can tell, all the answer to the above questions are no, no, not really, and no.  It is to the point where when people ask me “how was Barcelona?” I honestly do not have an answer. The festival was kind of a Mozillaland (with a heavy North American Flavor) that was implanted on top of Barcelona. It was very disorienting both for me and for local people I came in to contact with.

That being said, it was nice to meet  people from the other side of the pond who had a much easier time travelling to Barcelona than they would have had travelling to North America. I am thankful for the voices I was able to hear that I wouldn’t have otherwise. Maybe that was the point?

Independent of Mozilla

Barcelona is a beautiful city. Unfortunately I did not have much time to explore. I did happen upon a random youth Rally to celebrate the Pope’s arrival in the city, an arrival that happened to coincide with the ending of the festival. I think the experience of the Rally was the only time I really felt like I was “in” Barcelona.  I captured some of the rally in the video above.