Aris
Founder & Lead Organizer of CityJS
In this episode of Señors @ Scale, host Neciu Dan sits down with Aris — founder and lead organizer of CityJS — to talk about building developer communities, organizing meetups, and scaling conferences into global events.
Main Takeaways from my conversation with Aris:
🏀 Programming came late.
Aris started coding only at university, bringing a competitive, sports-like mindset from basketball into programming.
🖨 First job hack.
He figured out how to print remotely to stores across the UK — years before “remote work” was cool.
🖥 Framework wars shaped him.
From .NET to Angular, React, and Vue — he’s seen frontend evolve into today’s massive ecosystem.
🍕 Meetups > webinars.
It’s not about the talks alone. Meetups are for friendships, job leads, and building confidence in the community.
📢 Meetups as training grounds.
First-time speakers can practice at small meetups before stepping on a big conference stage.
📉 The 30% no-show rule.
No matter what you do, about a third of RSVPs won’t turn up. Plan your pizza order accordingly.
📆 Thursday is golden.
It’s the best day to host a meetup — people are downtown, ready for beers, and still get a long weekend.
💡 Conferences are real training.
They’re not “nice-to-haves.” One day of talks can reshape your career and bring back practices your team actually uses.
🌍 From local to global.
CityJS grew beyond London almost by accident — thanks to the community asking for events in their own cities.
🎤 Community is the product.
Without it, conferences are just expensive webinars. With it, they’re life-changing.
📚 Recommended Reads:
- Eleven Rings by Phil Jackson (lessons on leadership from the Bulls era)
- The Book of Basketball by Bill Simmons
🎤 Also in this episode:
- Creative sponsorship hacks (pizza, drinks, even burger vouchers)
- Why some companies still resist sending developers to conferences
- How COVID forced a pivot to virtual — and unexpectedly made CityJS global
Episode Length: 44 minutes of community building, meetup stories, and behind-the-scenes lessons from conferences at scale.
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