QuahogCon is a regional conference for the hacker culture in all forms: Hardware, Software, Security, Social, Eco Hacking, Zero Impact Living. This year's conference will be from April 23 - 25 at Hotel Providence in Providence, RI. Tickets are $100. Details and RSVP.

A year or so ago, the DC401 crew decided that Providence really needed it's own hacker conference. We go to other hacker conferences around the country: ShmooCon in DC, ToorCon in San Diego, and DEFCON in Las Vegas, of course. New England doesn't really have much going on for affordable conferences. There are often conferences that happen up in Boston, but they tend to run at least $500 for two or three days of talks. One of the other things we decided was that we wanted to mix in some hardware hacking and Maker culture along with the core information security talks. Thus, QuahogCon was born out of a desire to fill what we felt was a gap in the scene.

What is a hacker conference after all? It's an opportunity for people to get together and learn about new research that's going on, often very bleeding edge stuff. Even more so, it's a great opportunity to get to meet other folks in the community who are interested in the same things you are, whether it's information security, crypto, hardware hacking, lockpicking or just plain old making stuff, there will be people who share your interests and want to share knowledge. There are also contests to give you something fun to work on and other activities for when you want to take a break from the talks.

How does QuahogCon fill all of these general hacker con requirements? To start, we've got an incredible schedule of talks lined up. There are 22 great talks spread out over the two days of the conference. Some of our featured speakers are Dan "I broke DNS" Kaminsky  giving our InfoSec keynote talk, Josh Wright speaking on Zigbee security, and Mike Kershaw talking on current WiFi threats. On the Maker side of things, we've got Matthew Borgatti giving the Maker keynote on personal fabrication tools, Darren Wigley and Larry Pesce on their ShmooBall cannon, and Mariano Alvira on his MC1322x project. For activities, we'll have a crypto challenge, the Hardware Hacking Lounge with workshops by Mitch Altman and Jimmie P. Rodgers, Hacker Jeopardy games both Friday and Saturday evenings and a party in the ballroom Saturday night.

As for people to share knowledge with, that's where you come in. Get yourself a ticket today. Register by March 1st to ensure you get one of the really cool hackable badges. If you're coming from out of town or just don't want to miss any of the fun, we've got a conference rate at Hotel Providence. This is going to be a great conference, all it needs now is you.