This weekend around 100 folks have descended upon Austin Texas for the ALT.NET conference.  There has been much written about ALT.NET, what it is, how people are misunderstanding it, why it was created, why people should be interested in it, and why it will dominate the world.  Unfortunately, it's all lies.

The truth is, ALT.NET is a scam.  I hate myself for being the one to figure it out, and now for writing this post exposing ALT.NET for what it really is.  The truth is, ALT.NET was created so that a bunch of nobodies [1] could get Scott Gu, Martin Fowler, and the others in the industry whom they have a geek-crush on to come to their conference.  All that talk about making better software, using the best tool for the job, its all bogus.  ALT.NET is all about trying to rub elbows with Martin Fowler. Sad. [2]

[1] by nobodies I mean people whom I love and respect :)
[2] Or maybe its for real and I'm just sad that I didn't go?

On Friday I went to Ruby East and got to hear a bunch of good presentations on Ruby as well as Rails.  In addition to getting the inside scoop from some Ruby experts I also spent some time with Brian talking about the Philly ALT.NET user group.  From what I know about the somewhat controversial ALT.NET movement, I think I fit the general demographic.   If you're a .NET developer in the Philly area, and identify with some of the things that fall under the ALT.NET moniker, I'd strongly suggest you subscribe to the Philly ALT.NET yahoo group.  A first meeting has not been scheduled as of yet, but it's coming shortly. 

Subscribe to the Philly ALT.NET Yahoo Group