Event: Rochdale Digital Festival

Saturday 04 March 2017
11.00am - 3.00pm

Number One Riverside
1 Smith Street
Rochdale
OL16 1XU

DETAILS:

The free one-day festival, aimed at de-mystifying technology and showing how useful, easy and fun to use it can be, is being staged at Number One Riverside in Rochdale town centre on Saturday 4 March.

Names already confirmed to be at the festival include Barclays, 02 Rochdale, Boots, and Hopwood Hall College.

Organised by Rochdale Borough Council, in partnership with BBC Radio Manchester, who will be broadcasting live, the festival has been designed to improve people’s digital skills with hands-on help and advice for all age groups.

With almost half the world using the internet as mobile networks grow, visitors will be able to find out how to do online banking, browse products, shop or read a book online, and get tips on using smartphones and tablets. There will also be demonstrations of how to use the council website to avoid telephone calls or making face-to-face visits. There will be friendly faces on hand to show how easy it can be and tablets, phones and computers will be available for people to try.

There’ll be lots for under 18s and families too, including Rochdale Coder Dojo - a self-led community group - supported by skilled mentors to learn computer coding through play with the latest digital kit. If you’ve got young children- look out for ‘Hacker tots’- a play space where they can use ‘Little Bits’- electronic building blocks and ‘Scratch’, learning code, making fun things and lots of noise!

Girl engineers – ‘Robogals’ will be also appearing – with their amazing robots, inspiring young women to consider engineering and technology related careers.

You’ll be able to find out how to build sound scapes and raves using a Rasberry Pi- a small computer used to teach programming through fun, practical projects. 

Barclays Digital Eagles will be showing how to do your banking online and the popular ‘Help Bar’ will return too, for anyone who needs assistance with laptop, tablet and phone issues.

A series of free Masterclasses for businesses will also be held, revealing tricks of the trade in bite-sized sessions, with topics including internet security and how to build a better website.

There will be friendly faces on hand to show how easy it can be and tablets, phones and computers will be available for people to try.

The festival will bring together a range of exhibitions, performances and workshops and there will also be a ‘help-bar’ where an 02 ‘guru’ and students will help you get the best from your smartphone and tablet.

Rochdale Digital Festival is being held as part of BeOnline 2017 – a national two-week campaign to help people discover the internet.

Entry fee: Free

01706 924340