I used to think all cool web startups happened in and around the Bay Area, the nexus of innovation, brains, and capital – right? There has been a great change underway with global spread of Barcamp since August ’05 and Facebook Developer Garages (calendar) that have been going on since May ’07 (time of Facebook platform launch), there has been a surge in creativity happening in places far beyond the Valley. In fact 8 out 10 most recent Facebook developer garages are happening outside the States.
Juan Franco of Mentez of Miami has smartly tapped several hots trends. Mentez has created an environment for bringing together developers together around the viral platforms, Facebook and OpenSocial. They are reaching out to developers in developing countries like Turkey, Mexico, Columbia, Brazil, and South Africa.
While we have at times raised sponsorships to offer prizes at iPhoneDevCamp and DevHouse events I’ve been part of organizing, they are paying cold cash and providing consulting services and infrastructure through a deal announced yesterday with Joyent. I don’t think they’ve quite reached the OLPC-destination villages in Africa, Asia and Latin America but maybe that’s the next stop.
Their approach builds on things that have worked elsewhere like SuperHappyDevHouse in Silicon Valley and its dirivitives, CocoaDevHouse, MashPits, and in another vein, Startup Weekend.
Developers interested in the next round of Mentez competitions have until the 24th of February to signup. Check it out if you’re a developer and if you’re a blogger in those countries, help spread the word.
I’d be happy to field your questions about scaling your business or social applications on Joyent Accelerators. If you’re a Facebook developer, check out our free Accelerator offering in partnership with DELL and Facebook.
[Disclosure: I'm a platform evangelist at Joyent. ]
Last month Melbourne had its first Facebook Dev Garage