TAMAM: The Arab Mobile Apps Meetup
Tech meetups in Amman seem to be taking new directions. In addition to big general meetups where lots of people attend, we are now seeing recently specialized smaller meetups where only 20–30 people participate. This makes it like a gathering, and almost all participants sit in a big circle and just chat.
I have written about such a meetup earlier which was: Amman’s Mini MBA, where we meet to discuss selective business case studies.
Now I am happy to share with you my experience at a new similar meetup: The Arab Mobile Apps Meetup or TAMAM, started by Osama Alshurafa (@oalshu) and Noora Sharrab (@noora888). Here are TAMAM Page on Facebook and TAMAM Twitter Account @TamamApps.
Simply put, we gather to talk about new mobile apps. So whoever wants to talk about an app that he/she likes or uses, comes and introduces the app for 5 minutes. Next he/she answers questions about it. Simple but very informative!
Last week, I attended the second TAMAM meetup at Wild Jordan Cafe. The first was at Cafe Gourmand in Taj Mall. Because it’s a relatively small gathering, it can be done in a corner of a big cafe! This makes it more fun and casual, so you get to meet/talk with almost every participant, and engage in all discussions, unlike big events with speakers and panels.
Although I thought I know about the latest apps, I learned about some new cool apps there! This time, participants among the group talked about: MailBox, Action Movie FX, Blux, UMANO, Couple, Avocado, and Kick The Boss 2. I loved Blux and UMANO!!! I didn’t know about them before. We also talked about how MailBox is doing all this buzz with amazing UX, and we discussed why it was acquired so quickly by DropBox.
On the other hand, you get to meet very interesting people! For example, I met Maher Zidan (@ooenomel2003) who comes from the pharmaceutical industry. He learned how to develop mobile apps on his own as a hobby, and then started to create apps for his own use to solve his own problems. He decided later to publish them on the app stores and now his apps have a good user base! One of his apps was created to make it easier to buy parking tickets in Dubai via SMS, because it was hard to remember the parking codes! Check it out on iTunes: Dubai Park.
Samsung has kindly sponsored the event by providing their latest Smart TV to be used by the presenters. It’s worth mentioning that they did not send a marketing guy to talk about it, they sent a great technical guy who was transparent in talking about the TV and its TV Apps, and the drawbacks they’re working on. He also informed us about Samsung’s program to support developers financially if they want to develop apps for Samsung Smart TV.
Can’t wait for the next TAMAM :-)
