I Went to SXSW
posted at 10:20 pm
on Mar. 23, 2007
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[-[-GAH!!!-]-]
Picture that as the sound of me surfacing from under the load of a thousand tiny To Do items, things like “Clean cat litter” and “Redo press nav graphic” and “Make list of things to blog about.” On top of those To Do items, pile actual tasks, like launching a few Web sites, and unpacking and getting ready to sell my house. Then on top of that pile the whipped cream of stress, all the photos I took at SXSW this year.
SXSW, the interactive-music-movie-whoarewekiddingit’saPARTY conference in Austin, was superb this year, and what made it even more fun was going with Matt and seeing all the people I’d seen last year, double plus good to see them again. The evening events were once again great, and while I don’t think I had the same stamina as last year, I had an inkling of what to avoid, and that helped compensate.
The lack of stamina (failed my CON saving throw?) was a direct result of the flu caught from Northern Voice this year (next year’s slogan: Catch Moose Fever!) and I’m basic over it now, I’m pretty sure almost.
Definitely the best panel I attended was Wil Wright’s keynote talk about Spore (official site) (his new Sims-like computer game) and the comparative construction of narrative in film and video games. He talked about twice as fast as most conference speakers, and often had no words on his powerpoint slides. Basically, the man is an idea machine running at full tilt, and it was a wonderful experience to sort of mentally jog along side him for a while.
I also noticed that though it was a large keynote type session, those who might ordinarily have been checking email, twittering and otherwise dividing their attention were totally focused on him. Lesson here: SXSW attendees are very smart and you have to go pretty fast to keep their attention.
It was too bad we didn’t have Hop Studios represented on a panel this year. I’ll have to try to rectify that next year. I’m focussing more and more on citizen journalism, and I think by next year I’ll have something interesting to say—and maybe if I talk as fast as Wil Wright, I’ll only need a 15 minute panel, which they can surely squeeze in, right?
ps where are the SXSW photos? I finally decided to post and get to the photos when I get to them. Stay tuned!
