About YOW!

How Did YOW! Begin?

Dave Thomas, an international adjunct professor at QUT in Brisbane, was responsible for bringing YOW! to Australia. YOW! first started in Denmark under the name JAOO (Java and Object Orientation).

During one of Dave’s visits to Brisbane in 2007, developers complained about the difficulty they had gaining access to top speakers in Australia. As Dave was on the program committee of JAOO, he called Denmark from the pub and after a brief discussion it was agreed that he would run a similar event in Australia. The first event was held in May 2008. Since then, over 18,000 people have attended YOW! events.

In 2010 the conference changed it's name to YOW! and broadened it's activities to other developer events. YOW! is organized by Dave Thomas and Craig Smith of BRL Pty, assisted by an energetic team of part-time staff and volunteers.

YOW! was bought by Skills Matter in December 2020. Skills Matter is owned and operated by Quad4 Group, a group of entrepreneurs with a rich history in supporting technology, skill transfer and community.

YOW! was later bought by Trifork in September 2022. Trifork has extensive experience operating and running their own GOTO conferences for software developers. Trifork also worked in collaboration with YOW! from 2008-2020.

What is the Purpose of YOW!?

The mission with YOW! is to build the next generation of IT leaders and encourage excellence and innovation amongst the Australian development community.

YOW! is Unusual (in a Good Way!)

YOW! operates independently which means that you won’t find any vendor sales pitches, technology platform bias or language preferences. Speakers and workshops are chosen based on their expertise, not on who has a product to sell or who is willing to sponsor an event.

How are YOW! Conference Speakers Selected?

An international Program Committee meets to decide on the speakers for each year’s YOW! Conferences. Up to 40 world class experts are selected each year, the “rock stars” of software development, and YOW! then brings them to Australia for 2 weeks for the YOW! Conferences and Workshops.

Who is Dave Thomas?

Dave Thomas is best known as the founder and past CEO of Object Technology International (OTI) (until it was sold to by IBM). He is now Chairman of Bedarra Research Labs (BRL) which specializes in emerging software technologies and practices and is based in Canada.

Dave has a wide spectrum of experience in the software industry as an engineer, consultant, architect, executive and investor. With a unique ability to see the future and translate research into competitive products, Dave was recognized as an IBM Distinguished Engineer for his contributions to Object Technology in 1998, and as an ACM Distinguished Engineer in 2006.

Dave has served as an adjunct professor at University of Queensland, Queensland University of Technology in Australia, and is now a NITCA fellow and adjunct professor at Carleton University in Canada.

Through Bedarra, Dave has been an investor, and virtual executive and advisor to numerous high tech start-ups in Australia, Canada, Europe and US. He was a co-founder of the OCRI (now Invest Ottawa), and active contributor to Student Venture Competition and Lead to Win supporting start ups.

More about Dave: www.davethomas.net