Your Mileage Should Vary

Why can I not rate this 6??? Seriously, fantastic messages were conveyed through entertaining, witty and dry humour. Having seen Volker talk before I had really high expectations, and he totally smashed through them. Super awesome closing keynote!

Quirky and funny, this talk managed to get people clapping multiple times during the course of the talk. Really good.

Awesome

Great conclusion of the conference which touched both technology and people, while people seem to be the more important part of what we're doing.

Great job, Volker!

Amazing talk, wasn't expecting to be that good. The perfect "final talk" for such an amazing conf, both funny and informative.

PS: anyone else noticed the Galifrey hoodie? :)

The perfect way to wrap up my first PHPNW. Several laugh out loud moments were enjoyed.

PS: yes, I noticed the hoodie :D

I love Volker's talks. I totally agree we need to move past "my perfered tech is better than yours".

Great sentiments to nicely finish off a fantasticly informative weekend - with some good laughs.

An enjoyable talk with some very memorable quotes to take away.

Volker, you deserved a standing ovation today. Inspirational talk! Thanks!

Thank you for making me rethink some of my own thoughts on things that I may have been a bit bad about and for inspiring me to JUST DO IT rather than think about how forever. This was surely the most *inspiring* talk of the conference, with a truckload of humour on top of it.

AWESOME TALK BY AWESOME SPEAKER ZOMG! :D

Volker, I said you shouldn't be nervous about this keynote; and then you went and rocked the socks off your audience. A whole series of great messages, told with a lot of humour to make them memorable

Absolutely brilliant talk, delivered in a very interesting way - how to make a room of 400+ programmers sit up and listen... call them all wizards, and then slip in a few swear words - masterclass. Thank you

This was a funny informative talk, and a great send off for PHPNW this year. They really nailed it selecting this one for the final keynote

When I keynote myself, I worry about making it slick, or glib, or having a shiny slide deck - and you showed me the way :) This talk was full of challenges and important ideas for us all, with no unnecessary decoration. You position yourself well on the stage - I'm not sure you even needed your slide deck - and you share from the heart. Also the slightly panicky and breathless delivery that I have seen in the past was gone, without losing the smallest ounce of your enthusiasm or integrity. Great. Job.

Just fantastic. Thank you.

Truly inspiring!

I simply agree with all of the above and want to give it a 6 as well.
Yes, it was THAT good.
Sharp, witty, with some very, very valuable lessons to be learned.
Excellent delivery: your "unter" cool attitude goes well with the points you're actually making.

I think the slide deck was maybe just there to make sure everybody got their quotes correct? ;-) Never seen almost every quote on the slides from a talk getting repeated on twitter.

Think it must mean something if so many people value what you're saying.

An excellent talk delivered with authority and ease. The highlight of which was Volker swearing 5 minutes before the end, turned to the crowd and said "I've not done too badly, I think that's the first swear word", by this point I'd already counted about 8...

Even though the speaker admitted to being nervous at the start, he totally owned the room. The audience hung on his every word. Some great messages to take home - "Every time you criticise a WordPress developer, a Ruby developer gets to criticise you". I want to see the video NOW!

Thank you so much Volker - that was just great.

Volker's talks are special.

His personally seeps into the message and makes it something personal, and something we can all relate with. He's not just a guy on a stage, he's one of us. You can feel his frustration when he talks about things we all feel frustrated about, he jokes about the things we all laugh at, he delivers passion for things that evoke emotions in all of us. He delivers talks for humans, by a human.

The message was sane, relevant, powerful. I personally went away feeling I should stop worrying, do magic, level up. Take responsibility, make decisions, move forward.

Hugely inspiring keynote. Thank you Volker.

I've seen Volker speak a few times now and he always managed to convey even the driest of topics with humour and style. I was really excited to see him close out PHPNW14 and he did not let us down.

Volker delivered an awesome closing keynote with the same humour and style I expected/hoped for but used it to talk about really important points that we all need to pay attention to.

An absolutely perfect end to the conference and if I could rate this higher I would.

Thank you!

Although the voice was a bit shaky cuz of nerves, Volker's key note absolutely delivered! It was inspiring, witty, and full of awesome quotes! This is one talk that I'll happily sit through and listen to again! Really funny and very good advice! Thank you for doing this!

This was my favourite talk, perfect amount of humour for the end of conference. Many laughs throughout but more importantly many many serious points which resonated with me. Was left with a lot of food for thought.

I didn't take much away from this keynote. There were definitely bits I could relate to but there seemed to be a few tangents and stalls that had an impact on the overall presentation.

After reading the other reviews I'm guessing I've missed something key, so I'll wait until the video comes out just to check.

Regards anyway Volker, it must be scary as hell to stand up there and present to so many people!

Awesome. Just awesome.
Some great points with an excellent sense of humour! An excellent closing for a great conference!

An enjoyable talk to finish of the conference, with a good range of experience offered to benefit those at all levels.

Really enjoyed this, good inspiring way to end the conference.

I think everyone in the room will agree Volker was the perfect choice of speaker to end the weekend, some inspiring words and important messages to take away.

Sharing the benefits of an experienced dev's experience, the bits you can't learn from a book or a university. Also left me wondering how come Germans have a reputation for being humourless!

Seriously engaging, even at the end of a very busy weekend. He is clearly passionate about the industry, and it shows in each of the talks I've had the pleasure of attending.

I'd go to watch Volker discuss paint drying techniques.