Media Guerrilla

Heading to the UK...

I know, I know, posts here have been infrequent, but it's for good reasons, some of which have been spilling out over on the Voce Nation, others are still to come. Unfortunately, this won't change soon, I'm off to the UK tomorrow (with @Hyku) to meet with members of ION, an international network of consultants we work with, to exchange ideas, learnings and some best practices in the area of new media and communications.

Also, while we're visiting, this Saturday, April 12th, Neville Hobson has organized a very cool "PR geek dinner" in Soho. He just posted an update with all the details. If you're living in the area and would like to join us, please get in touch with Neville. It sounds like several people will be participating, maybe we'll record something special for FIR, regardless, this should be a lot of fun...

socialmedia, uk, ion, neville+hobson

Podtech Talks "Pressroom of the Future"

Another great Third Thursday meetup last night. Our guest speaker was Podtech's John Furrier who, among other things, shared his thoughts on the recent Podtech BlogHuas at CES and discussed how projects like this are indicative of bigger possibilities for newsrooms at special events. Jeremiah Owyang captured a live stream of our talk, check it out.

Thanks to all that attended. June's meetup will be on the topic of citizen journalism - we think. Details will be posted to the Third Thursday Meetup page shortly. BTW, if you have ideas for speakers or topics, let me know, we've got some great stuff on the horizon, but we're always looking for new topics, new voices....

Technorati Tags: socialmedia, podtech, john+furrier, thirdthursday

@ PR Online Convergence, Third Thursday

Man, days like today make living and working on the left coast worth the price of admission....

I spent the first half in Studio City, talking along side Sally Falkow, Phil Gomes, Brian Solis, Eric Schwartzman, and a host of other industry friends and peers at the inaugural PR Online Convergence conference. It's always good to hear these guys color and contextual-ize new media and its impact on PR. My thanks and congrats to John Gerstner for pulling this together.

Now I'm returning north for tonight's Third Thursday meetup where we'll be speaking with Podtech's John Furrier. Blog posts, photos and maybe a few podcasts to come. Good times....

Technorati Tags: brian solis, california, eric schwartzman, phil gomes, pr online convergence, sally falkow, thirdthursday

Third Thursday Returns This Week

A new year of Third Thursday meetups gets underway this week. With the help of some new friends (which I'll explain in a sec) we've lined up a kick butt panel of speakers to talk about the Social Media Press Release, folks like Tom Foremski, Chris Heuer and Brian Solis, certainly some of the most active contributors to this industry project so far. Joel Tesch with Business Wire has also agreed to talk, so we'll be approaching this subject from multiple perspectives, which I think is needed....

Also, on a related note, beginning this year we're changing things up a bit: First off, we're moving Third Thursdays up to SF. We'll be hosting things at Shine. This is long over due, we know, we always intended to alternate our meetups between Palo Alto and SF, it was just a challenge finding an SF venue, but we found one...which leads me to another change, an exciting one:

We're teaming up with the Social Media Club and the Society of New Communications Research (SNCR) to co-produce Third Thursdays beginning this year (beginning this week actually). This just makes sense, for multiple reasons, not least of which is that our groups are each trying to raise awareness and understanding of social media and its practical application in various industries. With Third Thursdays, we're focusing our energy on the use of social media in PR and marketing and this new partnership just brings a collection of resources together to make sure YOU get the most of it. It's good stuff, I'm glad we could team up like this. We'll talk a little more about things Thursday night.

Details are on the meetup page. Hope to see you there.

Third Thursday background

Social Media Release background

Technorati Tags: brian solis, businesswire, chris heuer, joel tesch, sncr, socialmedia, socialmediaclub, socialmediapressrelease, thirdthursday, tom foremski

Find Me @ Macworld

So, a quick schedule update: I decided to forgo the madness that is CES to attend Macworld this year. I figured it's here in my backyard, plus it has the potential to be a very memorable one. As always, it's fun to watch the crescendo(s) of chatter leading up to the keynote....

Posts that contain Apple per day for the last 7 days.

Technorati Tags: apple, ces, macworld

Third Monday Debuts

Awesome, it looks like the debut of Third Monday in Ottawa was a success, nearly 40 marketing and PR pros packed into a local watering hole to hear Shel Israel speak.

Congrats to Joe Thornley and his team of organizers.  Next up, Third Tuesday Toronto.

Also See:
Third Thursday

Technorati Tags: marketing, PR, thirdtuesday, socialmedia, thirdmonday, thirdthursday

BlogOrlando Kicks Off Tomorrow

Josh Hallett has pulled together an impressive lineup of speakers and sessions topics for BlogOrlando — the two-day unconference kicks off tomorrow.  You can soak in all the usual digital detritus via the blog, the tags, the Flickr stream, and I hope, eventually, the podcasts.  I wish I could be there....

Technorati Tags: marketing, PR, blogorlando, socialmedia, unconference

Find Me @ WOMBAT, BloggerCon

Alright, I'll admit it, I'm becoming increasingly apathetic when it comes to industry conferences, particularly those focused on new media.

Too often it feels like the same old A-list blowhards and tool pushers talking about, well, themselves, with just a few minutes of conversation and networking sprinkled in between things to make it bearable for the attendee.

But with that said, I'm holding out hope for two events this week: WOMMA's WOMBAT conference, which kicks off tomorrow at the Hilton in SF, and then BloggerCon, the "unconference," which kicks off on Friday at CNet's offices (also in SF). I'll be at both, looking forward to blogging from each. Email me if you're attending one of these gigs and we'll meetup.

Technorati Tags: Bloggercon, conference, unconference, Wombat, WOMMA

3rd Third Thursday Next Thursday

A week from today we'll be hosting our next Third Thursday meetup at F&As in downtown Palo Alto. Early response and interest in this meetup series has been amazing, we currently have 200+ PR, marketing and business folks registered through our Meetup page, and we've been averaging about 75 attendees per event so far.

We've also started talking with a few folks outside of the Bay Area (and the country actually) who have expressed interest in bringing Third Thursday-like meetups to their cities, which is pretty cool, given we're just getting off the ground with this thing. Hopefully we'll have more to share on this soon.

Next Thursday we're going to talk about community building strategies and tactics with folks from SAP and Linden Labs (the makers of Second Life). Eastwick's Giovanni Rodriguez will be leading the discussion. We'll be kicking things off at 7PM, details are on the Meetup page. Hope to see you there....

Update: Dave Roberts, "Community Cruise Director" for Vyatta will be joining our panel.

Third Thursday Background

Technorati Tags: community, Eastwick, Giovanni Rodriguez, PR, ThirdThursday

Richard Edelman "PR in 5 Years"

Richard Edelman in his Q&A sit down today at Syndicate was asked, among other things, what the PR industry might look like 5 years from now. A few of his responses paraphrased here:

Press releases will be deconstructed: how companies produce and package their news via the press release will change (but not die).

PR will play a critical role in early stage product development: with PR teams increasingly listening to and participating in edge conversations, the richness of this information in aggregate will be invaluable for product development. Also, the concept of co-creation, where "edge conversationalists" are invited in to actively influence and shape new products will be a unique value that PR can bring to bear for both the company and the audiences that care about these products.

PR will have a seat in the c-suite: as the eyes, ears and voice of a company, a bridge really to the conversational edge, executive teams will need to rely (heavily) on the input and counsel of communication leaders when it comes to strategic business decisions.

Josh Hallett with Hyku has a recording of the conversation available here.

Also See:
Edelman: there has to be a better way (Brian Oberkrich)
Edelman keynote at Syndicate touches upon industry changes (PRWeek)
Richard Edelman (David Weinberger)

Technorati Tags: PR, Richard Edelman, syndicatenyc

Find Me @ Syndicate NY

I'm stepping out for a few days to attend and speak at the Syndicate Conference which kicks-off tomorrow in New York. I'll be speaking on a panel Wednesday afternoon with Brian Oberkirch, Dave Parmet and Joel Richman. The topic: everything you wanted to know about PR and syndication, but were afraid to ask. Man, you gott'a love the runway they've given us with this session title....

Looking for me at the conference? Send the text message "mmanuel" to 66937. You'll get an automatic reply with my contact info, or just look for the highly caffeinated white dude typing feverishly on his Mac....um yeah, that probably doesn't help, on second thought, just stick to the text message.

Technorati Tags: Conferences, Events, syndicateNY, Social Media

Third Thursday: Corp Blogs Unplugged

Our next Third Thursday meetup is right around the corner, on May 18th, again in Palo Alto.  For this next one, we'll be talking with corp comm leaders at Cisco, NetApp and Ingres about their business blogging initiatives, and as best we can, really try to peel back what it took to bring these particular projects to life, how they operate on a day-to-day basis and what, ultimately, makes them successful.

Here's the excerpt from the Third Thursday meetup site (RSVP ASAP).

"For our next Third Thursday meetup we've assembled a solid panel of corporate communicators from B2B giants, Cisco, Network Appliance and Ingres to cut through the new media rhetoric and talk candidly with us about what it *really* took for each of them to bring their corporate blogging initiatives from concept to reality, including all the hoops and headaches they encountered in the process.

This discussion, lead by Third Thursday co-conspirator Jeremy Pepper, will also dig into the behind-the-scenes mechanics and the day-to-day operations of a corporate group blog, as well as an executive blog, and what it takes to successfully oversee these projects from a PR and marketing standpoint.

This is a must-attend meetup for corporate communication folks that are in the early stages of blogging projects and could benefit from practical peer advice and group discussion."

Technorati Tags: Blogs, PR, Silicon Valley, socialmedia, ThirdThursday

Michael Arrington, TechCrunch, Guest Speaker at April 20th Third Thursday

Following up on my previous post, next Thursday, April 20th, will be our kick-off Third Thursday meetup, and I'm fired up to say our first guest speaker will be Michael Arrington.

Arrington is the founder of edgeio and the author of TechCrunch, a highly influential blog about Web 2.0 trends and technology. Arrington will be joining us to talk about the do’s and don’ts of engaging the blogging community, where TechCrunch has had success working with companies, along with any insights, anecdotes, advice he might have for using new media in PR and marketing programs.

This meetup will be held at Fanny & Alexander's in downtown Palo Alto from 6:30-8:30PM on the back patio (discussion to begin 7-ish). Attendance is free, but please register in advance via our meetup page. We plan to capture and share each meetup via the typical outlets (e.g., podcast, blog entries, photos, tags, etc.), so if you can't make it, no worries, we'll do our best to extend the reach of Third Thursday online. In fact, if you can help with any of this, please let me know.

If back channel interest and enthusiasm for this meetup thus far is any indication of how necessary this sort of thing is, Third Thursday should be a very valuable event for local PR and marketing folks.

See you next Thursday, the first round's on these guys.

Related Posts:
Hello, My Name is "Third Thursday"
SF/SV PR MeetUp (Jeremy Pepper)
Third Thursday (Giovanni Rodriguez)

Find Third Thursday:
Upcoming
Craigslist

Technorati Tags: Bay Area, Events, Marketing, Meetup, PR, Social Media, ThirdThursday

Hello, My Name is "Third Thursday"

For several weeks now I've been co-organizing a side project called "Third Thursday" with a few industry cohorts, including Jeremy Pepper at Weber Shandwick, Giovanni Rodriguez at Eastwick and Phil Gomes at Edelman. While bits and pieces of this project are already known by some, consider this post its formal introduction.

In short, Third Thursday is a new meetup we're organizing for Bay Area PR and marketing folks interested in learning more about social media tools, trends and best practices, and their practical application in marketing and communications programs.

This meetup was born out of our collective frustration, err, desire to try and fill an industry knowledge gap that exists right now, today, inside many companies and consulting firms that recognize the promise and potential of social media, and are eager to implement related projects, but could still benefit from some practical, real-world insights, expert advice and peer discussion on everything from blogging and podcasting to social networks and new media measurement, among other things.

That said, the goal of Third Thursday is really to try and close this knowledge gap and move industry thinking a little further forward, and we figured where better to start than in our own backyard.

Third Thursday is also a peer networking event, meaning come for the speakers and learning, but stick around for drinks and discussion. In the spirit of meetups, we're aiming to keep our meetings very casual and open and really focused on a small but growing community of social media practitioners.

We'll be hosting Third Thursdays the third Thursday (yes, how clever) of every month, with things officially kicking off next Thursday, April 20th at Fanny & Alexander's in downtown Palo Alto, just two blocks from the PA Caltrain Station for you SF and SJ folks. Our game plan is to rotate these meetups around the Bay. I'll be sharing the details of April 20th's meetup in a follow-up post here shortly. In the meantime, if you're interested in getting involved, please register (for free) at our Third Thursday meetup page.

Questions, ideas, suggestions? Submit them here or leave a comment.

Update: Michael Arrington, the author of TechCrunch, a highly influential blog about Web 2.0 companies and products will be our guest speaker at the April 20th Third Thursday. More details here and on the Third Thursday meetup page (reg req'd).

Technorati Tags: Bay Area, Marketing, Meetup, PR, Social Media, ThirdThursday

My Wishlist for New Media Conferences

As I was reading through Andy Beal's "Beginners Guide to Reputation Monitoring" it occurred to me that this sort of stuff is *exactly* what I'd like to see incorporated into new media conferences moving forward (read "New Media Events, Less What, More How"). Beal's post is great, but it just scratches the surface of what could potentially be covered, so, with that said, here's a working wishlist, albeit a short one, of the types of topics I would like to see conferences dig deeper into (additional ideas welcomed):

Monitoring Online Discussion & Response

• real-time tracking (tips and tools)
• real-time response strategies/structures

Mining Online Sentiment

• machine v. human analysis
• longer term impact case studies

Reporting Models

• format and content best practices
• tools and services

Mapping Social Networks

• tracking online relationships
• determining popularity v. influence

Participation Models

• community managers v. employee evangelists
• corporate forum reps
• external PR v. internal PR (effectiveness)

Online Crisis Tactics

• case study analysis
• best practices for preparation/reaction

Also Read:
What goes online: Keith O'Brien at PRWeek shares his thoughts on new media events, the good, the bad and the geeky. Ironically, Keith and I met for the first time last fall at BlogOn.

Technorati Tags: Conferences, Events, PR, Social Media

New Media Events, Less What, More How

At last week's NewComm Forum, some of the smartest people in the business converged in Palo Alto to share their insights and perspectives on how social media is impacting marketing and public relations. In the interest of time, I'll point you to the Conferenza Blog for smarter commentary and analysis, plus the related Flickr photos and del.icio.us tags for color and entertainment.

Also, I'll share just one (err, another) observation:

I'd like to see more of the "new media" conferences start moving beyond big picture situation analysis talks and surface level discussions and instead dig deeper into the tactics of implementing social media programs. Or, put another way, I'd like to see less "here's what's going on" and more of "this is how we do it." I think the industry's at point now where it's ready for this transition, and I know enough case studies and proof points exist to support it.

Also See:
The New Comm Forum: What we’ve missed (Constantin Basturea)

Technorati Tags: Events, newcomm, PR, Social Media

NewComm Take One

I'm too tired to write anything of significance, so instead I'll just share one random observation from day one of the NewComm Forum: It's fascinating to experience first-hand how social bonds born in a virtual world can perfectly manifest themselves in the real one. Cheers.

Technorati Tags: Events, newcomm, PR, Blogs, Social Media

NewComm Forum Approaches

The new media marketing universe, or at least what looks to be a good chunk of it, is set to descend on Palo Alto the week after next for the second annual NewComm Forum. The speaker lineup looks sick, as does the schedule, so my hat's off to Elizabeth Albrycht, Jen McClure and their team for pulling together what I expect will be another kick-butt conference. If you can peel away from things to attend either the pre-conference boot camp, and/or the day sessions it'll be well worth your time and money -- in fact, I was given this promotional code (NCFR200) last week which apparently shaves $200 off the registration (more here).

On day two of the conference, I'll be leading a panel talk with the influencer marketing team at Yahoo! ("Engaging the Influencers"), who are also my clients, and we'll share and discuss how the combined Voce/Yahoo! team is actively listening to and engaging with influencer communities, as well as reviewing some of the tools and tactics we regularly use, and finally digging, I hope with help from the audience, a little deeper into some real-world examples of how this program works *with* marketing and PR inside the company. If there are things you'd like to hear us discuss, leave a comment here or send me an email.

Two more conference-related things worth pointing out here:

First, my "esteemed" colleague and now two-time NewComm speaker, Matthew Podboy (Active Voice), will be leading a discussion the afternoon of March 3rd, entitled "New Marketing Case Studies," with Dave Parmet and DL Byron, which from what I hear, should be very interesting.

Finally, and most important, Voce's teaming up with the SNCR, BlogHer and Girls for a Change to host a dinner fundraiser the evening of March 1st to support non-profit organizations pioneering the use of new communications tools. It's a good cause with some great entertainment lined up, so I wanted to simply call it out here and encourage folks to RSVP.

See you at NewComm next month!

Technorati Tags: Bay Area, Events, PR, puppy, puppy, SNCR, Social Media, Voce

Find Me @ Syndicate

Posting has been light the last several days as I try to wrap up all sorts of projects before the holidays.  And now I'm stepping out for two more days to attend and speak at the Syndicate Conference which kicks-off tomorrow in San Francisco.  Now, I have to admit, I've been a little under whelmed with tech conferences lately, but I think Syndicate's promising a good mix of panel sessions and keynotes, including a track dedicated to PR and a keynote from Larry Webber, so what the hell, I'll remain optimistic.  And I'll try to do my part to make Wednesday's panel session on the “Endangered Press Release” as valuable as I can folks.  If you're attending the conference, shoot me an email and we'll meet-up.

Update: The Voce Nation's hosting a casual mixer late Tuesday evening in SF at the Hilton, if you're interested just shoot me a note and I'll share the details...

Technorati Tags: PR, Social Media, Syndicate, Voce

Find Me @ BlogOn Next Week

BlogOn 2005 kicks-off next week.  Some great sessions are on the schedule and I'm looking forward to attending.  Shoot me a note if you'll be there too...

Update: There's a BlogOn meet-up wiki here.

The Week That Was

Insane.  That’s probably the best word I can use to describe this week. 

The second annual Web 2.0 conference has reached its close and while hanging out at the conference and “related events” the last few days has been very cool, I have to admit blogger frustration set in pretty quickly as a slew of juicy info bits and bytes fell on my lap and flew across the blogosphere and I just didn’t have the wherewithal (or the time) to add my own two cents to the conversation.  That said, I’m using this post to scratch an itch on all sorts of subjects and observations that shook out of this week -- some related to the conference, some not.

I’ll aim to share a little more substance on some of these when I can resurface from my Web 2.0 stupor.

Technorati/Edelman Blogger Survey – Phil takes an initial stab at analyzing the results and shares some highlights.  It sounds like he’ll be digging deeper on the data and sharing more shortly.  IMO, I think the results are interesting and insightful and “trust” is obviously the big underlying theme here – one that has huge implications for how PR will successfully fit in the blogosphere in the long run.  Steve’s right to argue that we need to balance analysis like this with training and application, but the industry needs some guideposts too and I think this survey is providing that.

Yahoo RSS White Paper – This was presented last night at an after-hours party here in SF.  It’s a good read with some interesting stats, download it here (PDF).  Surprisingly, while RSS adoption is growing rather steadily, the average consumer doesn’t know they’re using it.  It’s hard to say what the implications of these stats are for companies that are dabbling with syndicated content, although I suppose if nothing else, the stats show RSS is finding its way into people’s info consumption patterns – whether they know it or not.  And some would argue that’s enough to justify further experimentation.

Pushing Forward the PR Meme – I need to grok this and share something more substantial later, but generally speaking I think the spirit of what Steve, Jeremy and others are considering  is good and where I and those I work with can share our  insight and experience – in the interest of pushing industry know-how a little further forward -- we should and I’m game.   Period.

Following On-Line Conversations is Hard Work! – When I first read this, my reaction was something like, “yeah, no shit.”  Jeremy captures a pain that cuts to the very core of present day social media monitoring and participation, especially for corporations.  This is the very messy and very *real* part of PR 2.0 that I and many others deal with every day.  Workarounds exist, but man, it could all be so much more efficient..

DIY PR -- I'm going to post something separate on this topic, I need some distance from this week's discussions to get a clearer take on this one, but the question goes: in a Web 2.0 era, where a DIY business mentality has permeated across a crop of new companies, is the importance and need for a dedicated PR program disappearing?

Social Media Policies -- I've been toying with this one for a while now, but I think companies need to broaden their thinking when it comes to employee policy making.  An industry push toward "blog policies" is moving awareness in the right direction, but it's tragically shortsighted too.  I'll have to drivel more on this later.

The Flock Has Landed – Lastly (at least for this post), I want to simply say congrats to my Voce cohorts on the launch of Flock this week.  The coverage, the buzz and the party was amazing.  A few of us are toying with the idea of podcasting some Voce case studies in the near future, this will hopefully be one of them.  Flock on guys...

Voce, Cooley Co-Hosting Panel on Corp Blogs

I’m *really* fired up about an event Voce has in the works for next week so I’m cross-posting a piece here that I recently scribbled for the Voce Nation.

In short, we’re teaming up with the law firm Cooley Godward on a panel discussion that will dissect some of the policy/legal issues organizations should consider as they move forward with corporate blogging initiatives.  As I’ve said before, I think one of the biggest hurdles to larger scale adoption of corporate blogging resides with a lack of education and understanding of what the real and perceived risks are of corporate and employee blogs.  This, plus a dearth of good corporate blogging models and best practices to mirror – or at least a lack of open access to the people behind these efforts – is more than enough to deter most organizations from pushing forward with their plans.

That said, I think we’ve assembled a great panel of speakers – all of which can talk directly to these issues and more important, really arm the attendees with some practical advice and best practices that they can take back and share with their organizations. The original post follows below.  If you’re interested in receiving an invite, leave a comment here or drop me a note and I’ll see what I can do.

As corporate America continues to examine the impact of social media on business, particularly blogging, it’s clear that some significant challenges remain, not least among them are legal and communication issues involving fair disclosure, corporate policy and to a greater extent, freedom of speech.  While a growing number of companies recognize the need for transparency in their communication with customers, partners, investors, and the media -- and see social media as a means for helping with this important goal -- transparency must be balanced with purpose and responsibility.

With this in mind, Voce’s teaming up with Cooley Godward and co-hosting a roundtable discussion on corporate blogging next Wednesday evening, July 20th in Palo Alto.  The purpose of the discussion is to examine and hear first-hand how some of today’s leading corporations and decision makers are approaching the new opportunities and challenges of business blogging.

A select group of panelists will lead the discussion and share their views on corporate, executive and employee blogs and how they are deploying them, or not, within their organizations.

The panel includes:

• Jodi Baumann, Senior Manager, Corporate Public Relations, Network Appliance
• Chuck Schwab, Attorney, Cooley Godward
• Chris Shipley, Technology Analyst and Executive Producer of DEMO conferences
• Catherine Peterson, Vice President, Investor Relations, Business Objects
• Jeremy Zawodny, Technical Yahoo, Yahoo!

Charlene Li, principal analyst at Forrester Research will moderate the discussion.

Unfortunately seating is limited, so if you’re a corporate communicator, marketing practitioner or legal professional that’s grappling with these issues and would like to attend, please email John Welton or call 650/228-5183 and request an invitation.

Startup Offers Backstage Pass to DEMO Planning

Now this is pretty cool…the good folks at Jambo Networks have started using their blog to provide an inside look at what it takes to prepare for the DEMO conference next month. It’s funny to read this because I’m also in the process of doing a lot of the same things in support of DEMO for one my clients, JotSpot. A few of my colleagues are also elbow-deep on DEMO stuff for Orb Neworks. Last year it was Stata Labs. It’s a great conference, hands-down one of top 5 tech events for the year. Which reminds me, I’ve got to blog about Guidewire Group at some point -- Chris Shipley and Mike Sigal have some amazing events on the horizon.

[Via Keith Shaw, DEMO blog)

Vloggercon Planning Underway

On the heals of Heather Green's BW story on Vlogging, JD Lasica at New Media Musings points to a new non-conference in the works for early next year -- Vloggercon.  Details coming in the weeks ahead.

Update: The Vloggercon Blog has launched with more details on the upcoming event.  It's set for Jan. 22nd in NYC.  Also, check out their blogroll.  It has some helpful links for learning more about vlogging.

Attending BloggerCon Today

I'm attending my first BloggerCon today.  This should be really interesting.  It's the first non-conference I've been to where the opening non-keynote is a song.  Some of the sessions I'm aiming to attend and will report on later include the Podcasting session with Adam Curry, the Overload session with Robert Scoble, the Mobile Blogging session with Craig Cline, and finally the Making Money session with Doc Searls.

Update: It's humbling to sit in a room with folks like Larry Lessig, Dan and Steve Gillmor, Dave Winer, Doc Searls, and a host of other A-List bloggers as they exchange their thoughts and ideas on new technologies and trends.  Where I could I tried to participate and offer my two cents on things, but just observing these guys go back and forth alone was educational.

Unfortunately I've had this freak'n lingering chest cold all week and it prevented me from attending the afternoon sessions as I had planned, but I suppose the beauty of a blogger conference non-conference like this is that I didn't have to attend to hear and understand what went on in these sessions (see cosmos).

For what it's worth, here are my basic thoughts on the first two sessions:

Podcasting -- I've been reading and hearing a lot about podcasting lately, so it was awesome to finally get the run down on this stuff, especially from somone like Adam Curry.  I still get the vibe that podcasting is in its infancy, but there was certainly no shortage of folks at the conference who were doing cool things with syndicated audio.

On thing I found particularly interesting was a podcast of an earnings call -- which got me thinking about new ways PR and marketing folk could use podcasting as a way to distribute information.  Amy Gahran (via Steve Rubel) had something on this a few weeks back, which cites some good examples.  I was thinking of things like a monthly CEO interview.  Imagine high-profile execs like Larry Ellison or Steve Jobs just talking casually about the industries they work and compete in.  Perhaps even better, bi-weekly talks with the engineering or product management teams at companies like Yahoo or Google.

There's obviously a ton of potential with the "podosphere," so this space should be interesting to watch.

Overload -- This session was a little harder to follow because the comments and topics bounced around so much.  Robert Scoble shared just how much information he typically absorbes on a daily basis, which includes something like 900+ blog feeds, 500-1000 emails, lots of instant messages, etc. -- pretty impressive stuff.

The big takeaway here IMO was actually captured best in a comment a member of the audience made who basically said we all have to come to this Zen-like acceptance that we simply can't keep up with all of the information available.  New tools will continue coming to market that help, but the rate of innovation will never really catch-up with our insatiable appetite for information.

All this being said, I was glad I had the chance to attend BloggerCon and I'm looking forward to reading what others have to share.

Blog Events Becoming Big Business?

Not that I'm complaining, but I've noticed blogging events seem to be surfacing with more frequency. A short-list of what's on the horizon over the next several months, includes:

*BloggerCon III -- Nov. 6, 2004, Palo Alto, Calif.

*The Blog Business Summit -- Jan. 24-25, 2005, Seattle, Wash.

*NewComm Forum -- January 2005, Bay Area (TBD)

I've also heard talk of two new BlogOn conferences slated for next year. Good stuff.