Community, no not the TV Show.

Guest post by Lee Daniels.
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I thought long and hard for a few days of what to write for my first blog post, after all there’s so much going on right now with Marvel, Star Wars and every Mark Millar comic being turned into a movie, it makes choosing a subject a lot easier with such a huge pool to pick from.

But I wanted to write something that means a lot to me and that most likely means a lot to you to.

The geek community.

I’ve always been happy to class myself as a geek but I never really felt I’d found my place in the geek world, but 8 months ago that all changed. Eight months ago I helped Alaskan Folk singer-songwriter Marian Call with her European tour. This led me to CERN, which was the first time I’d flown abroad on my own and I was meeting up with people I’d only ever spoken to on Twitter. <Leaving my Comfort Zone: Achievement Unlocked>

Had to add a pic of CERN because of the sheer awesome of science!

It was that weekend at CERN that really opened my eyes; I was in a foreign land, in a building that was filled with some of the smartest people on the planet and I was finally getting to meet Marian Call. To say I was nervous was an understatement but within seconds I felt right at home. Okay whilst we were having dinner I had to pinch myself a couple of times as I looked around the table and realised I was sitting with two musicians, an illustrator and several particle physicists.

From that weekend I took away some great memories and made some friends for life, two of whom I’m working with on a very cool project that you’ll all hear about soon enough, but it was being around so many people who have a passion and a love for something so much that they literally shout it from the roof tops (no really, our tour guide shouted from the roof tops).

But that’s what being a geek/nerd is all about, passion. Whether it’s for music, comics, video games, cars, cooking, it doesn’t matter, be proud of it and be proud of who you are. The geek community is vast and full of wonder and a great thing to be a part of and most importantly it lets you be you and if you need help, it’s there waiting for you to ask.

No doubt you’ve all seen that 2 weeks ago Glee stole Jonathan Coultons cover of Baby Got Back, and as expected Fox are being complete douchebags over it but JoCo’s not, the guy who just got his work stolen isn’t being a douche, instead he re-released his version of the song and all proceeds are going to selected charities that help communities with funding their own music and arts programmes.

There are other examples with Matt “Oatmeal” Inman raising over $200,000 for charity after he got sued by a company who stole his work, the recently started John Scalzi Gamma Rabbit Fund Drive and even Anonymous helped a young girl who was being bullied into committing suicide over Twitter.

I’m going to borrow a quote from Marian Call here ‘look what you did, you are mighty when you come together’ and that’s exactly what I love about the geek community, we don’t riot, we don’t strike, instead we focus our energy and do something constructive, something that actually benefits other people and not ourselves.

I’d love to know your stories, how has the geek community helped you? Whether to gain new confidence, discover new things or meet new people, let me know in the comments section below.

Tags: Awesomeness Squared!, CERN, Geekery, Guest Post, Lee, Marian Call, Musicians, Nerd Adventures, Nerd Love, Nerd Win, Nerdtastic Ramblings, Personal, Science