I’m getting excited by the minute! I haven’t been in London since 99, I still have some great memories from The City, but I’m more than eager to actually settle my feet there again!

This time, the trip isn’t entirely on vacation as was the first time, my schedule is a bit overwhelming actually! I’m attending this weekend’s second London BarCamp and during the course of next week, I’ll be at FOWA. Somehow between all that I’m planning to actually meet-up some friends and have a drink in one of the many great London Bars. AH! and of course, my wife Patrícia is also expecting me to join her in some some sightseeing too, So let’s see how all turns out!!

If anyone’s interested, I’m in London from this saturday, up until next saturday night (I’m actually leaving on sunday 25th early morning).

I’m kind of curious how the London BarCamp is going to be. I have only participated in one Barcamp so far, the Portuguese one in Coimbra last year, but judging from all the affluence expected on this one, it’s going to … let’s say it this way… different! This year Barcamp is sponsored by BT,BBC Backstage, O’Reilly and Torchbox, and takes place in FOWA - Future of Web Apps starts next tuesday, and it’s schedule looks really promising! And from all the speakers, I’m especially interested, on the following ones:

• Mike Arrington from TechCrunch on “The Future of Start-Ups and Web Companies”;
• Bradley Horowitz from Yahoo! talking about “Social Interaction - What the Future Holds”;
• Tara Hunt from Citizen Agency on “Building Online Communities”;
• Werner Vogels from Amazon and “Why and How Its Easier Than Ever Before To Build A Web Business and Compete With Anyone”;
• Matthew Ogle & Anil Bawa Cavia from Last.fm on their “Lessons from the Building of the World’s Largest Social Music Platform”;
• Kevin Rose from Digg presenting “The Future of Crowd Generated Media”;
• Khoi Vinh from NYTimes.com presenting “Managing User Interface Design”;
• Simon Willison and “The Future of OpenID”;
• Tariq Krim from Netvibes about the “Netvibes relaunch, code-named ‘Coriander’”;
• Richard Moross & Stefan Magdalinski from the fantastic MOO cards talking about “How we Turn Virtual Stuff on the Web into Beautiful Things in the Real World”;

At the end of FOWA’s second day, there’s still time, for the Geek Dinner with Tara Hunt and Chris Messina, where I’m hoping I can not only meet them in person, but also, invite them to come to Lisbon some time soon!

And finally, I’m not entirely sure if I did managed to register since it has limited seats, but I might just be able to attend Google’s University Sessions on Thursday, and have a first hand insight on how to use Google Gadgets, Google Maps and, of course, Google Search.

I’ll try to post as often as I’m allowed with news/updates from both the trip and the events, but since I won’t have permanent net connection during the time in London, I’m not entirely sure if I’m able to post anything along those days.

See you in London!