I recently had the opportunity to travel to Greensboro North Carolina ConvergeSouth ’08. What I would term a “mini-con”, ConvergeSouth’s focus was blogging but there were a number of “golden nuggets” being provided on social media, online video, PR, SEO and more.
Sue Polinsky assembled a group of speakers headlined by some of the blogosphere’s luminaries including Anil Dash, Chris Rabb, Pam Spaulding and Robert Scoble the prevailing theme was creating conversations via blogging, social media and online video.
A key point made in each of the sessions and panels in which I was able take in: You do not need to make big investments in equipment or technology to participate in conversations. Having something valuable and interesting to contribute, engaging an audience and being transparent. Simple pieces of equipment such as a Flip video camera (Used by Robert Scoble for some of his video segments), free editing software (iMovie or Movie Maker) and a blog and you are ready to begin. Use of a variety of social media sites to help keep the conversation going: Twitter (more on Twitter in a second), Facebook, LinkedIn, Viddler, Kyte, Qik, Ustream, BrightKite and more were discussed, and used throughout the conference.
Held on the well equipped campus of North Carolina A&T, wireless connectivity was easy to locate. The result was a great number of folks using Twitter to send Tweets about the session, with some such as TechHead Wayne Sutton live streaming sessions.
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I had an opportunity to take part in the walking tours available the day before the sessions. Myself and a small group of others, including Robert Scoble, were led through downtown Greensboro by former News & Record writer Jim Schlosser. The tour was very fast-paced but extremely interesting. Jim, a Greensboro native, had pieces of information for us at every corner….and seemed to know everyone in town!
We shot video throughout the tour and converged afterwards at the Greensboro Fire Department to learn bit about pulling the video and editing into clips. Tom Lassiter led the Mac group and gave some great tips.
Just a note on the Greensboro Fire Department: My initial reaction was, “why are we holding this at a fire department?”.
Seargent Haney has created a very impressive video department for the Greensboro Fire Department and creates ‘Behind the Flames’. With an aresenal of equipment, this was one very impressive set-up.
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An aside Note: I learned of this conference via social media. I believe a received a Tweet, which led me to a blog, which led me to the ConvergeSouth website…..which led me to Greensboro. The audience at ConvergeSouth was inundated with foks Twittering the conference. By including the #tag in Tweets, #convergesouth was a trending topic on Twitter shortly after the opening remarks by Chris Rabb.
Between Tweets, streaming video, recorded video and post-conference blog posts the conference will be very well documented, commented and tagged as a result of social media.
So if you still think social media isn’t for you….think again. And no….the “I’m computer illiterate” excuse is not valid. ANYONE can use simple tools like Twitter, and bang out a blog post….
