i am in madrid; it's hot - pero tengo cervesa. i am here for the /etc web site workweek - the collective effort of 5 women to spend a week together rebuilding the group's web site. this is sprint methodology - a concept that i first met in agile software development, but one that is being increasingly applied as a successful creative collaboration methodology. over the years, i've also participated in a number of theatrical "sprints", although we didn't call them that. in fact it could be argued that the normal development process for theatre productions in new zealand is the sprint - a 3 or 4 week turn-around of devising/rehearsing/presenting; except that it doesn't usually continue the agile process after the first sprint - evaluation, refinement and the next sprint and iteration, and as a result the work is often undercooked. theatre projects that better fit the sprint method/analogy are some of the workshop-performances i've participated in at theatre festivals, where a small group come together for a few days to create a performance, then meet again in another situation, perhaps a slightly different configuration of people, for another "sprint". each "sprint" generates a stand-alone performance, or work-in-process showing, as well as contributes to a larger evolving body of work that forms the whole collaborative project. two such projects that i've been part of are "water[war]s" and "women with big eyes" (with the magdalena project). recently i participated remotely in a floss manuals sprint, developing a manual for CiviCRM (which is something that i use with the magdalena aoteroa site). in this sprint, a group of about 15 people met somewhere in the USA to create a manual for CiviCRM, and a few more of us were online, doing things like copy-editing the content. most of the time there were people active in the IRC channel, chatting about the project and about other things going on around them, so that i could get a sense of their environment, time zone and the commeraderie generated by the intense process. sprinting seems like a very logical & effective way to work in many situations: in software development, where each sprint focuses on specific feature development, & allows for a lot of flexibility & adaptation as the project progresses; in theatre, where limited resources make it a practical way to work, & the time pressure forces us to be resourceful & imaginative; & also with networks, such as the eclectic tech carnival organisers, where we don't get to meet physically that often. it also makes sense in the context of our hectic lives, to block out a week or a few days when we agree to put everything else on hold and commit to intense focussed work, instead of trying to juggle & multitask, deadlines pushing out & out ... here in madrid, we're half way through our second day, and the wiki we're using to plan is filling up with tech specs, user requirements, design ideas, etc. we're getting encouraging emails from others in the network & chatting to each other across the table and in the IRC. lunch is about to be served and after that, we'll do the new drupal install. it's moving forward quickly in an organised and collaborative way.