October 13, 2005
C.L.A.S.P.
C.L.A.S.P. was a peripatetic City of London institution, active from the late 80s through to the mid 90s. Although nominally meeting in the Wellington Pub just off the Strand, next to the Lyceum, sub-branches were known to meet at El Vino, or Wynkyn de Worde, or Danielle's. C.L.A.S.P. was the brainchild of Hugh Stewart and membership was open to those working in IT in the City, with new members acquired through friend-of-a-friend-style osmosis. The idea was to provide a forum for discussion of financial information systems. As Hugh himself was sales director for BACmac at the time, the possibility of some business coming his way had not escaped him, but I think primarily Hugh is just one of those people who gets enormous pleasure from building social/business networks. An average C.L.A.S.P. evening would be chat about programming languages, LANs, databases, operating systems, financial instruments, trading systems and other nerdish things, mixed in with a liberal helping of off-colour jokes, and fine wines or ales. C.L.A.S.P. could be seen as a forerunner of First Tuesday and other similar networks (without the possibility of attracting investment, and generally without the entrepreneurs). Oh, and the initials? Computer Literate After Seven Pints.
Posted by daen at 11:22 PM