Category Archives: new media

SXSWi – What you probably already know

Posted on by Sarah Cooley
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Every year around this time, approximately  14,000 geeks venture down to Austin, TX for South by Southwest Interactive. And every year, a good handful of those people write snarky blog posts about ‘what you need to know before you get to SXSW’. In fact, I myself wrote one just last year.

So at the risk of being redundant, here are some tips that you may or may not have heard already.

  1. I usually to say forget about the schedule. What I mean by that is don’t worry about making it to all the panels or all the parties. Just go with the flow, you’ll have more fun that way.
  2. But a certain amount of scheduling can be good. For example: If you really want to spend some quality time with people, put a meal on the books. Schedule time to meet up, sit down, and eat something.  This way you will actually get to spend time with the people you want to see. I will be holding Ohours at SXSW for this very reason!
  3. If this is your first time going to SXSW If you are going to SXSW, you should fully expect to be worn out when it’s over. Make sure to drink lots of water and take extra vitamin C, to prevent getting really sick when you return home.
  4. You will walk….a lot! Everything is usually close to the convention center, but that’s going to mean a lot of walking for you. Be sure you are comfortable with what you are wearing.
  5. Enjoy the serendipity. South by can be a very serendipitous place. Crazy things happen, you end up in awesome conversations with amazing people, and when this happens just enjoy it and stay in the moment. You don’t need to take pictures and tweet while this is happening (let’s be serious, you can tweet about it later)
  6. Don’t forget to eat! It sounds silly, but with everything going on it can be very easy to forget to eat. My advice, schedule meetings around meals. This insures that you give yourself a brake, and get a chance to eat.

A little tip on what to eat at SXSW from your friendly vegan friend, Sarah Cooley (hey, that’s me!).

Remember to eat your veggies! At SXSW, there will be tons of free BBQ to partake of (in fact MapQuest will have a bus trip to Salt Lick BBQ) So I understand that it might be more difficult to fit veggies into your meals. But do your best to try and eat some greens at least once during the day. Trust me, you will feel better because of it!

I’m thinking of putting together a small casual vegan meetup at SXSW (vegans and non vegans welcome). If you would be interested, leave me a comment below. If there is enough interest we can figure out a time and day in Austin that works for everyone.

If you want to meet up in Austin, feel free to sign up for one of my Ohours slots. Or you can try more traditional methods of tracking people down at SXSW, but that usually doesn’t work.

Register as press

Posted on by Sarah Cooley
Reply
I heard about the Web 3.0 conference in NYC in May so I went over to their site to check out what the conference has to offer. I like attending these kinds of things because it helps me to understand how other people view the web. I already know how I view the web and I know that I think will happen in the future. But it is important to know what “industry analysts” say is going to happen and how they are telling companies to prepare.
For whatever reason I wanted to attend. But I can never seem to absorb the fees that these conferences charge for a pass, so I usually try to get in as press. It usually isn’t very hard, I write a blog about social media, I produce a show about online sites, services, tools and communities, so getting a press pass to cover the Web 3.0 conference should be easy. But listen to their qualifications for press.
To qualify for press credentials, you must:
  • be affiliated with a nationally or regionally recognized media outlet and;
  • hold an editorial title or;
  • hold a position as an industry analyst

To obtain your press credentials at the show, you must present either:

  • a business card, or
  • copy of masthead show name and title, or
  • letter from editor or publisher assigning bearer to cover the event

You do not qualify for press credentials if you are:

  • a publisher
  • a sales rep
  • any other non-editorial personnel
To request a press pass, please email events@mediabistro.com, and include: name, title, publication, URL, and full contact information.
Umm, what qualifies as a nationally recognized media outlet these days? I produce an online show, seen all over the world. I am the only editor of this blog, which is read all over the world, I don’t know what you want from me.
For a conference talking about Web 3.0 they don’t seem to be very open to online media as a press outlet. Or am I just misunderstanding them.

Getting to SXSW 2009

Posted on by Sarah Cooley
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It has been a long year for Random Sarah. I joined twitter, started a new blog, started video blogging, started a video podcast, created a community blog project, met a ton of people….man I’m tired already. But I had one goal when I started all this and that was to make it to SXSW interactive in 2009. I know it sounds like a strange goal, but I figured if I could only attend one conference all year I would pick that one.

The plan was pretty simple: Find a company that needed help during SXSWi and work for them for the week in exchange for a conference pass and accommodations. It was a plan that I had seen many other people execute before so it didn’t seem to difficult to me. However, over the last few months it has become very clear that this year we are dealing with SXSW recession edition.  More and more, companies didn’t have the same big budget for conferences that they once had. They were going to try and get by with as little as possible. And in this economy who can blame them.

But I still have a problem: I have a plane ticket to Austin and no conference pass. I am planning on shooting a few episodes of my show What’s it all about: Web 2.0 at SXSW but this all requires a sponsorship that I don’t have. So, I have come up with a new SXSW recession plan. I will be there for all 5 days of the conference. So I am looking for 5 Companies who would like me to represent their brand during the conference. (This idea was totally inspired by Girl in your shirt and I Wear Your Shirt)

The plan is simple: Each day I will wear the shirt of a different company. On your day I will be required to wear your shirt all around the expo and to any events I attend that evening. You would send me a company shirt along with something about your company that I would tell people every time they asked me about my shirt. I will be your active brand ambassador for the day. In addition to talking about your company, I will wear the shirt on my show that will be seen by many more people than just people physically in Austin attending SXSW. Your company will be the sponsor of that episode. All of this would only cost you $150 for the day! Seriously, I know you have $150 in your budget to sponsor a totally deserving blogger to go to SXSW!

UPDATE: In addition to having me wear your shirt and talk about the company for a day, and a sponsor spot on What’s it all about: Web 2.0, I will blog about your company before SXSW in a post about my SXSW Sponsors, and a post after SXSW, thanking my sponsors with links to all the photos, and videos taken of me during the conference. You will also get ad space on Random Sarah for the month of March. (125×125)

Why should your company do this? That’s easy! Because it would cost you a lot less than paying for my whole pass and hotel stay, and you get a up and comming girl in the world of social media to talk about your company all day. This is especially great for companies that may not have the budget to attend SXSWi this year. I will attend for you!

If you are looking for more information about me you can check out the rest of Random Sarah which is my personal blog, including my old video blogs. Check me out on Twitter and Tumblr. And check out my old episodes of What’s it all about: Web 2.0

Please contact me if your company is interested in me being your brand ambassador for the day.

Related links:

Want a brand ambassador for SXSW, meet Sarah (Sanford Dickert, Social Engineer)

Social Communications Summit Ideas

Posted on by Sarah Cooley
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On Tuesday I attended Jeff Pulver‘s SocComm (Social Communications Summit). There were some really great speakers and a wonderful active audience. It was a long day but it was a lot of fun. Over the next few days I will be writing posts about some of the thoughts and bits that inspired me to think and discuss further at SocComm.

Today I really want to talk about something that Fred Wilson said during his presentation on truth. He predicted that Harvard university will not exist in 50 years, that everyone would be able to create their own form of education. This is something that is very interesting to me, and I sincerely hope it comes true.

A few days ago I re-blogged this video on my tumblr titled: Learning to Change-Changing to Learn this video was produced by the Consortium for School Networking. Founded in 1992, the Consortium of School Networking (CoSN) is the premier professional association for school district technology leaders. CoSN is committed to providing the leadership, community and advocacy tools essential for the success of these leaders. Their mission is to empower K-12 school district technology leaders to use technology strategically to improve teaching and learning.

Some of my favorite points from the video:

Education was ranked the lowest industry in IT intensiveness!

Kids are rich content developers!

Every turned off device is potentially a turned off child!

We live in a “nearly now” space.

We have a classroom system when we could have a community system!

This is the main reason that when I have children, no matter where the education system is, they will be home schooled. Having been in the education system for the majority of my life so far I can tell you that it is useless. I have learned more by asking questions, talking to the right people, and attending events like SocComm, than I have in entire semesters of higher education.

Social tools have the power to teach us anything we want to learn. The Internet bridges the physical gap between me and a school in France. I should be able to take classes whereever I am from the BEST Professors in the world! This future, and the future that we are all building for the next generation is what makes me wake up in the morning.

I know that I am a part of an industry that will shake every other industry as we know it – from Publishing to Government, from Education to Hospitality. Everything is about to change and I have NO IDEA where the chips will fall and when the walls will crumble, but I can’t wait!

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