BarCamp 2009 Picks: Content & Marketing

October 7, 2009

After several slaving hours and sending tweeting (and oh yes, retweets) about BarCamp Nashville 2009, it is almost upon us — Saturday Oct. 17 at the Cadillac Ranch. I am ridiculously excited to see so many great pitches for speaker sessions. However, for anyone who is attending BarCamp for the first time, I did want to recommend a few. Below are my picks for speaker sessions about content and marketing.

Content

TV 2.0 Producing New Media for the XBOX 360 – Stephen Lackey

2009-04-01_con_trek-150x150Many people are missing out on the innovations that Microsoft & Crew have been brewing with the community they’ve garnered from XBOX Live. My theory for this is simple: in our close-knit crew of new age techies we like to ignore Microsoft on all fronts even if we enjoy playing video games. This is, of course, extremely detrimental — especially so if you ever want to produce your own webisode (short episodic videos available over an internet connection). Why? This is a NEW market place ripe for innovation and with a huge-ass company facilitating to anything that’s generating any sort of buzz. If you want to make it as an entertainment producer, you really owe it to yourself to sit in on Stephen Lackey’s session that will walk you though the process of producing such a XBOX show. And he ought to know, having done nearly an entire season of Con Trek, a series that covers fan conventions across the country (and exclusively produced for XBOX Live) — not to mention producing original content for his geek reviews and news site Cinegeek.

We’re all going to DIE!!! – Dave Delaney

daves-eyes-blue_biggerI feel like anything I could say about this session would ultimately cheapen it — much in the same way a 12-year-old boy would ruin the real life experience of seeing his first set of dirty pillows by telling his adolescent friends about it. [Honestly, if your lost with that analogy, disregard it and remember it has nothing to do with MR TECHNOLOGY] No matter how awesome it might be, I’m not going to be able to adequately describe it. With that said you should just visit the BarCamp Session link or go to Dave’s site, davemadethat.

Marketing

Social Media ROI: Take Your Conversation And Shove It (Into A Spreadsheet) – Bill Seaver

2009-1008-micro-logoWe’re entering into a new age of marketing — no not the web, that’s old news. By that I mean everyone at least knows that they *need* some sort of web marketing but don’t exactly know how to do it. The same is becoming true for Social Media, which up until now has only cost a person time and energy. Soon the cost will turn into dollar signs and you’re going to need to understand how to calculate the worth of your social media efforts when it comes to your business. Bill Seaver is good at that because he’s the first person I met that started exploring the new realm of social media marketing. Albeit I was very skeptical at first, but Bill has more than proven that he’s willing to seek out the new and different forms of social marketing on the internet. I recommend sitting down for his BarCamp session to anyone who has a business and wants to learn about how to make sense of the social web’s data.

Evolution, not Revolution: Why Optimizing Beats Redesigning – Kate O’Neill

excuse_meI’m not attending Kate O’Neill’s session at this year’s BarCamp, but I have good reason for that — You do not.

I’m not going to attend because I’ve spoken to Kate about the principles of form and function, optimization over redesigning. I’m going to go ahead and predict that I’d agree with everything she states in her session and at some point in the near future we’ll probably end up discussing this subject because that’s how I roll. With that said, I’ll likely hear this session’s content (or some version of it) in the near future and you won’t. Check out part of the session quoted below…

Redesigning a web site without data and testing is like cooking in the dark. Someone is probably going to end up burned, and it’s likely to be you.

How do you keep the CEO from designing the site him or herself? How do you hold back the committee of people who want home page real estate for their pet projects? And if the answer is through analytics, how do you make good aesthetic decisions while paying attention to data?

More Session picks on the way…

7 Comments | Meetups, Web Culture | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Tom Cheredar

The Status Of BeerCamp Nashville

November 17, 2008

beercampteaser

After a long and interesting discussion with other member of the BarCamp Nashville 08 organizers at the post un-con un-dinner un-get together, we decided the fate of just how to handle future non-profit events. Now part of this discussion had to do with off-shoots of the “Camp” events, such as the one I had pitched earlier in the week devoted to homegrown brewing… BeerCamp Nashville.

The short of it is, it’s not going to happen.

The slightly longer version is that after talking with folks that night and hearing Dave Delaney’s thoughts on the subject, I’m not so sure there really need to be a separate “Camp” for beer. I say that with full understanding that the response I got to hold an event like that were phenomenal. I got at least 50 responses via twitter and a handful through e-mail. I learned that there is a local homemade brewing culture in Nashville and honestly, they’d like to see an event large enough to foster education and discussion of craft beer. The interest is certainly there, but the BarCamp mythos is one of technology and by venturing into very non technical fields (such as beer, and man I did try to interject the tech) you risk diluting the whole spirit of the unconference.

It’s that and my heart just isn’t in it enough to stage an entire event for a subject that I know very little about. But with that being said, I very much want to see something like this happen. It’s part of the reason why I said something about BeerCamp in the first place. So if someone else wants to pick up the leader stick and run with it, I’m totally cool and will help in any way I can.

This of course puts some of my other ideas in the graveyard as well…

JarCamp Nashville

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A discussion of Jam and perserve lovers among the many many locals in the area who specifically jar their own jam and pickle their own vegetables. It’s really crazy that no one has thought of this before. It certainly has wings and would have flown high if not for my change of heart. Also gone is…

CodCamp Nashville

camp2

Local fish culture. Need I say more? Probably not but I’m going to anyways. This unconference is for lovers of fish and by that I mean if you love the entree of fish then come. If you happen to be a strict vegan, that’s cool bring your pet goldfish Goldie and demonize your fellow neighbors.

RickRollCamp Nashville

camp3

Probably the greatest of all musicians, Rick Astley, evokes a universal appeal. This camp, which I hear is already going forward, would celebrate Rick and his rich history of never letting us down. Ever. He means that too. Never.

BlandCamp Nashville

camp4

This one actually begins as soon as you stop reading my blog.

CampCamp Nashville

camp5

An event where local folks come together to talk about Camp culture, how to start a new camp, how to exploit it, make money off of it…etc. It seemed like the most natural thing to do for all us BCN08 organizers. Sadly, no one else actually shares this sentiment.

DaveCamp Nashville

camp61

An event to celebrate the culture of Canadian folks named Dave. Why Canadian people only? Well because that country has several wild Yetti roaming the white tundra while we only have one big foot (lame). Also because I didn’t think it was possible to love ham anymore than I already do but the Canadians found a way: Call it Bacon. Brilliant. I’m really sad this one isn’t going to happen because it means no free iPod accessories and no interesting discussion from Canadian Daves living in Nashville.

-t.c.

3 Comments | Side Projects, Social Media | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Tom Cheredar

Speaking this Weekend: Link Journalism

October 17, 2008

If you haven’t been following me on twitter, you probably don’t know about my speaker session this Saturday at BarCamp Nashville. I’ll be talking specifically about “link journalism,” which I intentionally used since it was the latest buzz word created by the New York Times. (If that’s the term people will identify with then I’m OK with using it.) I wrote about the practice of linking to sources on NewAssignment.net (to the credit of social web genius Muhammad Saleem) and ever since then I’ve been convinced it was essential to modern journalism.

I don’t want to be the only one talking either. If you’ve got questions or examples of how you’re using it then by all means cut me off. I just want to get more people thinking about linking to other sites while writing or reporting.

Where: Sommet Center – Downtown Nashville
Date: October 18, 2008 (Saturday)
Time: 3:25 p.m. (Length is only 20-25 min.)

Part of my pitch from the BarCamp Nashville Site:

How often do you link to a source when it’s mentioned in a blog post? How about when you use jargon in a paragraph — do you drop a URL pointing to Urban Dictionary.com? These are the kinds of things that are now possible in today’s world of article writing, news gathering and the emerging trend known as “link journalism.”  The best part about link journalism is that anyone can do it, no degree required. All you need is some technology, the Internet and the desire to provide the best information available.

Please come and share your knowledge…Please!.

1 Comment | Journalism | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Tom Cheredar

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