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Go to BSides Tampa, because 80% of success is showing up

The 13th edition of BSides Tampa is happening tomorrow, Saturday May 16. It’s not too late to get tickets ($45 for general admission, $30 for students and military), and you can save 20% by using Tampa Devs’ discount code, TampaDevs20_BSIDESTAMPA_2026.

There are plenty of reasons to attend BSides Tampa, a cybersecurity conference that brings in 2,000+ attendees, including…

Great keynotes and presentations across seven tracks: keynotes, red team, blue team, cloud security, GRC and privacy, appsec, and AI and emerging

The exhibitor hall, where they don’t scan your badge, which means that you won’t get spammed as a result and they won’t sell your info

Interactive villages: malware, social engineering, IOT, network, lockpicking

A chance to meet the technology and cybersecurity professionals in the area, including these two…

But the most compelling reason I can think of to go is…

Let me repeat that:

80 percent of success is just showing up.

Let me illustrate with a story. Last May, techie-about-town Ammar Yusuf said he could hook me up with a free ticket to VueConf, which was taking place right here in Tampa.

I’d just come back from an expensive two-week trip, and I was still operating as an independent consultant. The spring and summer of 2025 were pretty slow; the well of clients was running dry.

I was strongly tempted to turn down the free ticket so I could devote more time and energy to finding my next job or client. Some might argue that it would be the smart thing to do.

But I decided to take the free ticket and go to VueConf instead, because I remembered all those times when showing up led to great things. Again, I remind you:

At VueConf, I met one of the organizers, Pratik Patel. When he came here in February, I decided to say hi and attend the Java User Group meetup where he gave a talk about AI architecture, pictured below:

I ended up chatting with Pratik, who then offered both me and Anitra free tickets to the Dev/Nexus conference in Atlanta that would take place a couple of weeks later. It was short notice, and Atlanta’s a 7+ hour drive from Tampa. But we remembered the rule:

So we went, learned a lot, and had a great time:

And while we were at Dev/Nexus, I ran into Pratik, who was walking the exhibitor floor with Venkat Subramaniam, who knows me because I show up to his talks whenever he comes to town.

Here’s the “Bollywood Buddy Movie Poster” photo taken at the meetup where I met Venkat:

When I ran into Pratik and Venkat at Dev/Nexus, Pratik suggested to Venkat that I speak at the Arc of AI conference that would take place the following month. Venkat thought that would be a good idea, and asked me to submit a couple of talk proposals. So I did, even though I was knee-deep in contract work and a job search, because…

My submissions got accepted, and the result was my talk about writing documentation and example code for consumption by AI agents:

…and I met a lot of people:

And here’s the kicker: not only did I get to meet new people and attend (and speak) at conferences, but all this helped me land my current job at NetFoundry. The fact that I’d managed to land a speaker gig at Arc of AI was a key point in my job interviews. And I wouldn’t have the key point for that interview if…

I didn’t speak at Arc of AI, which wouldn’t have happened if

I didn’t apply to speak at Arc of AI, which wouldn’t have happened if

I didn’t go to Dev/Nexus, which wouldn’t have happened if

I didn’t go to Pratik’s talk at the Tampa Java User Group meetup, which wouldn’t have happened if

I didn’t go to VueConf with the free ticket Ammar gave me.

The lesson here is simple:

So if you don’t have prior commitments and you can afford to do so and you’re in a tech/tech-adjacent/cybersecurity/cybersecurity-adjacent field — and especially if you’re looking for work — consider going to BSides Tampa tomorrow, because you know what showing up can do for you!

Once again, ticket prices are:

$45 for general admission

$30 for students and military

…and you can save 20% by using Tampa Devs’ discount code, TampaDevs20_BSIDESTAMPA_2026.

# contentMap.en
Go to BSides Tampa, because 80% of success is showing up

The 13th edition of BSides Tampa is happening tomorrow, Saturday May 16. It’s not too late to get tickets ($45 for general admission, $30 for students and military), and you can save 20% by using Tampa Devs’ discount code, TampaDevs20_BSIDESTAMPA_2026.

There are plenty of reasons to attend BSides Tampa, a cybersecurity conference that brings in 2,000+ attendees, including…

Great keynotes and presentations across seven tracks: keynotes, red team, blue team, cloud security, GRC and privacy, appsec, and AI and emerging

The exhibitor hall, where they don’t scan your badge, which means that you won’t get spammed as a result and they won’t sell your info

Interactive villages: malware, social engineering, IOT, network, lockpicking

A chance to meet the technology and cybersecurity professionals in the area, including these two…

But the most compelling reason I can think of to go is…

Let me repeat that:

80 percent of success is just showing up.

Let me illustrate with a story. Last May, techie-about-town Ammar Yusuf said he could hook me up with a free ticket to VueConf, which was taking place right here in Tampa.

I’d just come back from an expensive two-week trip, and I was still operating as an independent consultant. The spring and summer of 2025 were pretty slow; the well of clients was running dry.

I was strongly tempted to turn down the free ticket so I could devote more time and energy to finding my next job or client. Some might argue that it would be the smart thing to do.

But I decided to take the free ticket and go to VueConf instead, because I remembered all those times when showing up led to great things. Again, I remind you:

At VueConf, I met one of the organizers, Pratik Patel. When he came here in February, I decided to say hi and attend the Java User Group meetup where he gave a talk about AI architecture, pictured below:

I ended up chatting with Pratik, who then offered both me and Anitra free tickets to the Dev/Nexus conference in Atlanta that would take place a couple of weeks later. It was short notice, and Atlanta’s a 7+ hour drive from Tampa. But we remembered the rule:

So we went, learned a lot, and had a great time:

And while we were at Dev/Nexus, I ran into Pratik, who was walking the exhibitor floor with Venkat Subramaniam, who knows me because I show up to his talks whenever he comes to town.

Here’s the “Bollywood Buddy Movie Poster” photo taken at the meetup where I met Venkat:

When I ran into Pratik and Venkat at Dev/Nexus, Pratik suggested to Venkat that I speak at the Arc of AI conference that would take place the following month. Venkat thought that would be a good idea, and asked me to submit a couple of talk proposals. So I did, even though I was knee-deep in contract work and a job search, because…

My submissions got accepted, and the result was my talk about writing documentation and example code for consumption by AI agents:

…and I met a lot of people:

And here’s the kicker: not only did I get to meet new people and attend (and speak) at conferences, but all this helped me land my current job at NetFoundry. The fact that I’d managed to land a speaker gig at Arc of AI was a key point in my job interviews. And I wouldn’t have the key point for that interview if…

I didn’t speak at Arc of AI, which wouldn’t have happened if

I didn’t apply to speak at Arc of AI, which wouldn’t have happened if

I didn’t go to Dev/Nexus, which wouldn’t have happened if

I didn’t go to Pratik’s talk at the Tampa Java User Group meetup, which wouldn’t have happened if

I didn’t go to VueConf with the free ticket Ammar gave me.

The lesson here is simple:

So if you don’t have prior commitments and you can afford to do so and you’re in a tech/tech-adjacent/cybersecurity/cybersecurity-adjacent field — and especially if you’re looking for work — consider going to BSides Tampa tomorrow, because you know what showing up can do for you!

Once again, ticket prices are:

$45 for general admission

$30 for students and military

…and you can save 20% by using Tampa Devs’ discount code, TampaDevs20_BSIDESTAMPA_2026.