So I mentioned a post or two ago how joining this developers group was kind of out of character for me. And I wanted to dig into that a little bit more.

However, rather than just rehash my unease with formalized groups gathered around a specific interest, I thought I’d write up a list of rules for myself. (And just myself; I’m certainly not trying to dictate protocol here. I like having personal rules.)

Some of these things I don’t really have trouble with anyway, but there are some bad habits I’m afraid of slipping into here.

• Get to know everybody. Talk to everyone regularly. Speaking from experience, it’s easy to just find a few people I can connect with, declare myself done with this whole icebreaking thing, and shy away from other members of the group. In many ways, it’s most important to interact with people I can’t connect with at first.
• Get involved. Not that I’ve really sensed it in this particular group, but I don’t want to go in with the mindset that there’s this big organizer/participant dichotomy. I’d like to share whatever knowledge I have in workshops and help organize things where I can (not that I have much experience doing that right now).
• …but remember there’s a world outside the group. I’ve been obsessing over figuring out how to contribute to the group, but I have to remember that my whole goal of getting something out there while keeping my sanity, marriage and other friendships at a higher priority is still as important to me as ever. Whatever time I spend on preparing workshop materials or helping with/participating in events should come out of my pet project time budget, not anywhere else.
• Remember that other people have lives, too. I want to encourage others when there’s something they’re excited about working on, but I don’t want to pressure anybody to work more on their stuff or attend more meetings. I want to express my excitement about my own experiences to people outside the group, but not come off like I’m recruiting or evangelizing anything.
• Don’t let things like game jams become an end unto themselves. Sure, the game jam was great fun, but I can’t lose track of my long-term projects, or let frequent busy weekends interfere with my weekdays at work-work. I also don’t want to slip into the habit of producing things at game jams that have any kind of by-developers-for-developers feel. (Which my first game jam entry sort of had; next time I do a jam, I actually think it would be an interesting challenge to decide on a hypothetical target audience while figuring out my approach to the theme.)