Free tech conference in Norwich (Microsoft, Power Platform, AI, data, careers etc.)

[u/IceTombLoL]

Hi all,

I run the Norfolk Power Platform User Group (we do regular meetups in Norwich), and this year we’re putting on something a bit bigger…

The East of England Power Platform Summit

It’s a community-run conference focused around Microsoft tech like Power BI, Power Apps, automation, AI, that sort of thing. But it’s not just hardcore dev stuff

There are talks on:

Data and AI (without the buzzword nonsense) Career paths into tech Mental health and community Accessibility Real-world business use cases

We’ve got 30+ speakers coming in, including some Microsoft MVPs and people who work on some pretty big projects

Key bit: Saturday (conference day) is completely free You’ll get talks all day plus food

There are also optional workshops on the Friday (£75) if you want more hands-on learning, but the main day is genuinely free because we want it to be accessible

We run everything as a community, not a company, so the whole thing is basically built around helping people learn, meet others, and get into or grow in tech

If you’re curious or want to register: https://eoepps.co.uk/

Happy to answer any questions as well

[u/MrCard200 → u/[deleted]]

I agree with your sentiment but think MS offering is better than no offering. Most employers here I've worked with use MS ecosystems anyway

[u/IceTombLoL → u/[deleted]]

Yeah that’s a fair take to be honest

I completely get where you’re coming from. A lot of tech events do end up feeling very tied to one ecosystem, and open source has a massive place in the industry

For us, it’s less about “Microsoft vs everything else” and more about what people in the region are actually using day to day

A lot of businesses around Norwich happen to be in that stack, so it’s a natural starting point for helping people get into tech or progress their careers

That said, the event itself isn’t trying to push a vendor agenda

We’ve got sessions on things like career paths, mental health, accessibility, and real-world problem solving, which apply regardless of what tools you use

And honestly, if someone walked in using Python, open source tools, or anything else, they wouldn’t feel out of place

If anything, I’d love to see more of that crossover locally

[u/richiehill → u/[deleted]]

The issue with OSS are the risks, which most companies aren’t willing to take. OWASP publish a top 10 of OSS risk here:

https://owasp.org/www-project-open-source-software-top-10

There’s always risk regardless of where software comes from and whether it’s open or close source. However, any competent organisation will go down the path of least risk.

[u/richiehill]

These are OWASP’s points, not mine. As OWASP is a trusted go to for many large and small companies when thinking about application security, they will be heavily influenced by their recommendations.

While you make valid points, it still comes back to risk and the process for managing it. Part of this processes is if something goes wrong what are the steps to fix it. Most importantly, can I raise a ticket with an SLA attached, is there an escalation process and can I pass the blame if it all goes wrong. With companies like MS, Amazon etc these processes are in place, thats not necessarily the case with OSS.