Laracon US 2015 Recap - main takeaways

Two-day Laracon US Conference has just finished yesterday, and now it's time to recap all of it. Especially for those who didn't make it to Louisville (like myself), there's a ton of public information about everything that has happened there. Let's dig it all up and try to build a picture.

Sources of Information

First, if you want to experience it all yourself, here are the main links I've found: And now let's try to list the main takeaways.

Laracon is not (only) about Laravel

While following live Twitter feed during the event, I noticed that a lot of topics are about general development or event project management, and not about Laravel. A little weird, but the talks were really good!
  • Matt Stauffer, speaking about "Leveraging Laravel", was touching the Lean philosophy and related topics: "Perfect is the enemy of launched. It doesn't have to be perfect, just launch it!"
  • Eryn O'Neill was talking about making mistakes and how to make it "better": "If you're not making mistakes you’re not getting better. If you're making the same mistakes you're also not getting better"
  • Jeffrey Way's topic was about simplicity: "So, if there is some secret sauce for success, I have to believe the key ingredient is simplicity."
  • Brian Webb discussed company culture and leadership: "A lot of leadership is not about teaching someone *how* to do something, but *why* to do it. People need purpose."
So, in essence Laracon is suitable for any developer or even IT team leader, specific Laravel things are only a part of the topics discussed.

Laravel Spark - SaaS out-of-the-box

Lately Taylor's keynotes at Laracon conferences work almost like Apple presentations by legendary Steve Jobs - people are awaiting of what Taylor will launch this time. And since he usually teases something on Twitter - it adds even more excitement. But the main thing is that he always delivers - whether it's Forge, Lumen, Envoyer or something else related to Laravel, it's always something cool. So this time he announced Laravel Spark - a framework on top of Laravel framework. Basically, it's a pre-built SaaS app with basic functionality for you to start coding your actual project - leaving common functionality like accounts, payments, subscriptions - to Spark. Here's an excerpt from the Spark announcement: It will be officially launched next month, with some more new features before Laracon EU. Isn't it exciting? Some people are more than ready for it:

Laravel is a family. Literally.

Want to end on a slightly unexpected note - thanks to the women who are massive supporters of the guys behind Laravel. Without them and their patience we wouldn't have such an awesome framework and community. My ultimate question is: where can I buy tickets for the Laracon 2016 already? And, any other resource or important fact about Laracon I've missed here?
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