GeoMonday is a new event series at Office Club in Pappelallee. We sat down with founder and organizer Jan Nowak to learn some about its background:

Hi Jan, let’s get to know you in brief: Who are you and what do you do for a living?
Hi, I'm Jan Nowak, Founder of GeoMonday and Co-Founder of WhereCamp Berlin. Since 2012 I have been very active in the Geo community, starting with my work as PM for the Web Maps API of Nokia (today HERE). Even though I'm not with HERE anymore, Maps and Geo-Technology are still one of my favorite tech topics.

How did you become a geogeek? What is it that excites you?
When I started in IT, I was instantly hooked by the idea of turning digital data into something you can see. I really like the myriads of ways we can nowadays render (interactive) information on a map canvas. Obviously 3D mapping and Augmented Reality are also great visualization methods to get a better understanding of location data.

When did you decide „There should be an event for the Berlin geo community to come together and share some know-how“?
In the beginning of 2013[nbsp] the other founders of WhereCamp Berlin and I met and discussed how to ramp a similar event, which occurs on a more regular basis. This was the incubation time of GeoMonday. Due to the great support and the lightweight organization it took less than 3 months from the initial idea to first event.

What kind of people are you trying to bring together at GeoMondays and what can they expect there?
The GeoMonday community spans from Students via (Geo-) Tech / IT Professionals to Product Managers and decision makers We are proud of such a heterogeneous fellowship, as it guarantees for a rich feedback and plenty of topics for the networking session.

In the first gathering in April you focused on the special needs and demands of handicapped people. How can geo technologies be of use to improve their everyday life?
In our first gathering in 2015 we had some very great presenters which explained how their work could improve the life of people with an handicap. It was clear to see, that with the rise of connected sensors and the power of nowadays smartphones those people have a digital assistant next to them which comprises real world data into meaningful navigation support.

The upcoming GeoMonday on June 15th will revolve around „Geo Services for Smarter Cities“. How can cities and urban life in general benefit from geo technologies? Could you give some examples?
We are still in the process of collecting talks for our next session, so I can't give a final statement here. However we see some trending topics, which we will very likely cover. For example sharing of cars [&] bikes together with Multi-Modal Routing allows for a complete new and independent way to get from A to B in an urban environment.

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Come around next Geomonday on June 15th at Office Club Berlin Prenzlauer Berg.