Community: 0937 Portugal

A community based around a forum: 0937 Portugal Article by Luís Baixinho Photography by Comunidade 0937

Origins
The community originated from an internet forum devised by Luís and Tânia Baixinho, with the former being a LEGO Ambassador at the time, and Pedro Silva. Launched in August 2006, Forum0937’s goal was to provide a platform for LEGO related exchanges between people who spoke Portuguese as their mother tongue, especially in Portugal and Brazil. The website is http://forum0937.miniancora.com/index.php.

Growth and projects The community’s first project was its Wiki appearing on October 2006. The Wiki0937 is an open encyclopaedia dedicated to the LEGO theme. Through it, senior members of the community translate and explain the lingo and technical terms used worldwide, as a means of “fading” the natural barrier that sometimes is a foreign language. Growing steadily thanks to a number of regular contributors, it has a feature that allows members to “ask” for a topic or concern to be answered. As in most virtual communities, bonds between members matured into true friendships and the desire to know each other in person appeared. Out of this a second project emerged: the 0937Map. This is a tool used to identify the geographic location of members and thus to promote informal and casual meetings! By its eighth month, the forum reached the 10.000 (10,000) posts milestone which reveals the dynamic trade style of the whole community, presently having around 110 members including some foreign language guests who have since become regulars and act as links to the Spanish and Polish communities. Because of this an international board was created and is open to anyone who doesn’t understand the Portuguese language.

We were also recently graced with the choice of one of our own members to enter the LEGO Ambassador Program. She is Tânia Baixinho; one of the few women taking up the hobby. Other features of the forum include an “Ask LEGO” board, where questions posed by members are answered by Jan Beyer of the LEGO Group, a set review board and of course a creation discussion section where our members’ and other known AFOLs’ creations are analyzed in search of innovative building techniques. This all happens in a specialized environment where everyone is aware of the difficulties each MOC represents and focuses on quality. Although most creations are based on System themes, we also have Technic and Mindstorms fans and almost every theme has at least one enthusiast. Lately two of our own creators have been under the international scope: Rupi with his LEGO-comics (among other things), and Evildead who’s gone the Vignette way.

Real world
Our community isn’t limited to the ethereal world of the internet, and in late 2006 there was a first informal gathering of members marking the birth of the community.

The first major event was held in Coimbra (in Central Portugal), on the 24th of March 2007 as a one-day public exhibition. Since we are a very young club we decided to do a public display rather than a private one, to show ourselves and our hobby to the public as well as to inspire others to create and join us. The show was considered a success by everyone involved, having around 1000 visitors, and as a direct consequence we’ve drawn some media coverage from nationwide news outlets, TV included.

Future
We hope to keep on growing as a community, although we’re also awarethe same pace of growth can’t go on indefinitely; our target population is limited and scattered in two continents. Nevertheless, we have a number of projects in line, such as a larger public display and maybe even a visit to LEGOworld later this year. Of course, we hope to meet you there!

Links:
Brickshelf Gallery

http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?m=0937Community