The long arc of Ignite Philly bends toward social good

Is Ignite Philly — the twice-a-year, Philly-centric lightning talk series — now a better fit for our socially conscious sister site Generocity?

The lineup of Ignite Philly 21 seemed to show an evolution in that direction, with a lineup of talks that departed from the early days of technologists hyping up their blogs or podcasts (or passion for pneumatic tubes).

Instead, from the stage at Johnny Brenda’s on Thursday, activists and nonprofit leaders spoke passionately about their work in areas like social justice, equity and representation.

There was also a map of Philly’s best breakfast sandwiches by Neil Bardhan.

“Once a staple of seasonal social coverage for our sister site Technical.ly, Ignite is a social good event,” writes Technically Media CEO Christopher Wink on Technical.ly’s sister site. “Hence, it’s a Generocity story now. Though that civic element was always there, a clear transition has happened — according to polling collected by the event organizers, half of the attendees were there for the first time.”

Still, we’ll keep an eye out for Ignite Philly 22.