Nerd Nite SF Returns

Ever since last year's sold-out Nerd Nite—when East Coast nerds descended upon our fair city bringing beer and presentations on real-life zombies, parasitic birds and ancient foodstuffs—San Francisco nerds have been hankering for another chance to get edified. Well, hanker no more. Nerd Nite SF returns! And this time, local nerds get to do all the edifying.

Nerd Nite is an informal gathering at which brainy folk get together for nerdery of all sorts—well, mostly presentations and drinking. It was conceived in a Boston bar in 2003 when Chris Balakrishnan, a doctoral fellow at Harvard, spent so much time at his local watering hole talking about his research into the parasitic finches of Cameroon that the bartenders asked him to give a presentation on it for his friends, hoping he'd just get it over with.

Now there are Nerd Nites in New York, Austin, Washington, DC, Munich and San Francisco, with more coming soon to LA, Chicago and Seattle. All the presentations are given by volunteers who are eager to share their knowledge. No advanced degrees are required, just a passion for the subject matter.

At June's Nerd Nite SF, find out why dead fish in stinky jars matter, how scientists are using your lipoproteins to create medicine nano-taxis, and how World of Warcraft gold can be exchanged for real sex. Alpha Bravo will man the turntable, spinning records not merely for their rhythmic aptitude, but also for their nerdy subject matter.

As they say in Boston, it's like the Discovery Channel…with beer!

*Presentation #1:
'I Was a Teenage Ichthyologist'
by Bart Bernhardt
Our esteemed Nerd Nite SF co-boss recounts a misspent youth measuring dead fish and storing them in jars of alcohol while volunteering at the California Academy of Sciences. It turns out these specimens were crucial to challenging the resumption of logging in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Also: how not to get laid as a teenager.

Bart Bernhardt is a marketing analyst by day, Nerd Nite co-boss by night, and all-around nerd the rest of the time. He earned the nickname 'Master Baiter' due to his superior chum preparation skills at the Bimini Biological Field Station's shark lab.

*Presentation #2:
'It's Not Its Size, But How You Work It'
by Brady Burgess

Fungal infections can be lethal, but sometimes the medicine is almost as bad as the cure - one of the most effective anti-fungal medicines (besides a miniaturized Dennis Quaid) has some truly horrific side-effects (so does Dennis Quaid). Brady is working on a way to deliver this medicine packaged in custom nanoparticles and thereby making it safer.

After securing a Master's degree from UBC in Vancouver, Brady Burgess moved to sunny California to join a biotech start-up. Brady sincerely wishes to apologize to the many mice that were harmed in the making of his presentation, and that it's nothing personal.

*Presentation #3:
'Is It Fake Money If You Can Buy Real Hookers With It?'
by Jennifer Russell

You'd think corporate governance consulting would be pretty boring, but Jennifer has seen some pretty freaky things. She recently had to look into the seedy world of online virtual currencies. While the digital economies of Eve Online, World of Warcraft, and other virtual worlds are the dream laboratories of some economists, they are also sometimes their nightmares. Market manipulation, ponzi schemes, speculation, and, of course, sex. Some of it even real. Which begs the question, is it really fake money if you can buy real hookers with it?

If corporations are people, then why don't they have a conscience? Jennifer Russell founded a consultancy around being a company's outsourced conscience, helping with governance issues like finding and eliminating fraud. Working with virtual currencies rocks her world, as they're totally unregulated markets, like the Burning Man of money.

*Musical Entertainment
Deejay Alpha Bravo will be spinning records selected not merely for their rhythmic aptitude but also for their subject matter, encompassing William Shatner-narrated sea expeditions, post-punk paeans to the usefulness of bricks, commercial jingles, synth-jazz-disco explorations of cloud structure, music for librarians, and thick slices of less frequently heard über-80s pop. Alpha Bravo is VP of left-field pop label Radio Khartoum and was one of the forces behind legendary SF pop club nights Anisette and Schokolade.