The first CFE virtual meetup happened a little over 9 years ago in August of 2017 under the name Certified Fresh Events (CFE). Yes, 9. Including that first event and as of the end of July in 2025, CFE has hosted 236 events/shows (approximately, as I don’t track these but did my best to count them) including:
- 118 virtual meetups
- 14 virtual conferences
- 44 talk shows
- 53 live coding shows
- 6 virtual workshops
- 1 in-person event (in Orlando, FL)
- 13 Jamstacked newsletters (during the year it transitioned from Cooper Press until it ended)
Even spread out over 9 years, that’s a lot of stuff. The site currently hosts a completely free archive of every recorded session and show for a total of about 409 free recordings. For those of you curious and, honestly, just to write it all down for my own memory, here’s a history of how CFE came about and evolved.
If you’re interested to know what’s next, I’ll share that in my next post.
Origins
Back in 2017, I had no real interest in running virtual events. Honestly, those of you who have been in this industry long enough know that virtual developer events really weren’t a thing in 2017.
What I loved – and had a lot of experience organizing – was in-person conferences. But I was new to the Orlando area at the time and knew the complexity of organizing and especially selling tickets to in-person events, so I decided to build some awareness around a “brand” of developer events by building a mailing list. The way I decided to do that was via running a few, free virtual meetups.
Evolution (2017-2020)
All of this was self-funded. Despite the fact that it was all virtual, the costs were not insignificant between the event hosting platform, email platform, artwork and more, the costs added up. In order to help keep the lights on, I also ran some paid virtual workshops and had some initial sponsors including Netlify (who were, until just recently, my last remaining ongoing sponsor) and IBM. These did not cover the full costs, but stemmed the losses until I could finally launch the in-person event.
In late 2019, I finally announced the first official in-person event, Flashback Conference. This was a small conference in Orlando focused on web development with a mix of web history. The event would happen in February 2020, mere weeks ahead of the full Covid shutdown in the US.
This was obviously not great timing. Nonetheless, whether it was the timing or a concept that was maybe too niche (though I still like the idea), the event was a financial failure, costing me a substantial amount of money out of my personal pocket as the business was already operating at a small loss.
Nonetheless, all the awfulness aside, the shutdown also proved the value of the virtual developer events idea, so I decided to double down on that and even invest in a new site design. This included more meetups and new virtual conferences that still run to this day (TheJam.dev, Moar Serverless, etc.).
Peak Form (2020-2024)
The virtual conferences were a financial success (relatively speaking). For the first time, the business was actually profitable. Sure, it wasn’t anywhere near enough to quit my job, but I was finally able to begin recouping some of my investments and losses. Eventually, I made everything, even the conferences, free to attend and even removed the registration for the backlog content, which was never monetized anyway.
This worked well for some time. From a financial perspective, it peaked early last year. From an attendance perspective, the events never got back to the numbers they had in 2020/21 during the shutdown. In 2021, I started experimenting with adding “talk shows” hosted by some of my friends in the community, which were basically interview shows with prominent developer community members (Code Sandwich Hour, UptimeFM, DevRel(ish)). In 2023, I started adding live coding shows (2Full 2Stack, Code Br).
At this point in 2023, I was running 3-4 virtual conferences a year plus 2 meetups a month and 3-4 shows a month. It was a pretty full schedule. The idea was that maybe it would eventually become effectively a developer TV channel with a schedule filled with a variety of programming (pun somewhat intended).
Current Form
Around the middle of last year, sponsorships almost completely dried up. Netlify, until just recently, had remained the only ongoing sponsor (still at the rate I set back in 2017, but I was nonetheless super appreciative). Virtual conference sponsors largely disappeared as well, other than Cloudflare. The Jamstacked newsletter, which moved from Cooper Press in 2023, also lost all sponsors.
The good news was that back around 2022 I decided to start paring back on all the costs and doing all the behind the scenes work myself (I’d previously relied on some paid assistance to help with a lot of tasks as my day job schedule was always pretty full as it is). This meant that the site could survive without losing money again but also meant I dedicated a lot of free time to keeping things running.
Then in late 2024 I ended up in the hospital for a week. That combined with the demands of my new day job really made me realize that I couldn’t keep up the pace of content – nor did I want to. I ended Jamstacked that month and phased out the monthly meetups at the start of this year.
From the start of this year until today, CFE.dev now “just” hosts the 4 yearly virtual conferences and 3 ongoing shows (DevRel(ish), 2Full 2 Stack and Code Br) plus the free archive from the past 9 years.
That being said, even at this reduced schedule, I’ll admit my heart hasn’t been in it this year. While I am proud of what I built, the site has (largely due to my own inadequacies as a promoter or simply lack of time) never broken out of a small niche audience. I still get a thrill when folks bring it up when they meet me and talk about how it helped them, but those instances are rare despite 9 years of effort. I am not looking for pity, but I have spent a large portion of my weekends and evenings keeping things running and that is something that is difficult to sustain long term.
What CFE.dev Is About
One the defining features of CFE.dev from the beginning is that it has never been about me. Typically, I am a background player. My most prominent role has been to introduce other speakers at meetups or events or be the co-host of DevRel(ish). Most of the content in the archive has nothing to do with me.
I started CFE.dev because I love learning from other developers. I love offering a platform for them to share their ideas and opinions. And I want to share that with other people who also love learning – and make that learning free and accessible to anyone who wants it anywhere in the world.
Yes, in person conferences are awesome and nothing beats the chance to meet with and speak with other developers face-to-face, but not everyone is afforded that opportunity. CFE.dev has brought together some of the best speakers in the world on a platform that has (largely) been free and accessible to anyone.
It has also been a platform for new voices. I have always encouraged new speakers and, over nin years, many people got their start speaking on CFE. Speaking online isn’t always easy but it also doesn’t require the cost (in time and money) that other speaking opportunities might and so it is a great option for first time speakers, and it is something I’ve consistently encouraged.
So to sum up, CFE.dev has been about:
- Offering the opportunity for anyone, anywhere to learn about topics related to development and working in tech for free.
- Giving a platform for everyone from well-known and seasoned conference speakers to brand new and underrepresented voices to share their ideas and opinions.
More Still to Come This Year
We’ve got two of marquee events that I partner with FITC coming up. CodeWord Conference is all about working with content on the web. We’ve got some great speakers and talks lined up already – and, of course, it’s all free. Join us on September 25.
Later in the year, PixelPalooza is all about working with media (images, video, etc) on the web. I am currently looking for speakers at that event if you are interest.
I hope you’ll join me at one or the other of these. In my next post, I’ll cover what’s next for CFE.