For the last few years I’ve taken a pass on attending or speaking at the ever-more-popular SXSW (pronounce it “south by southwest” to sound cool) conference and happening in Austin, Texas. Each year my friends all migrate deep into Texas and I read about all their exploits, the great sessions, the fun parties, and the general hilarity, while thinking “yeah, next year.”
Well, 2009 is next year and this time I actually have a proposal in to speak at the conference. Unlike other conferences, however, SXSW takes into account audience interest with an online voting process that will either demonstrate the accuracy of The Wisdom of Crowds or ruin the conference in a half-baked popularity contest. 🙂
Be that as it may, hey, I’m not above it. Register with the Panel Picker then vote for me:
      How to Screw Up Your Online Reputation
Here’s my session description:

“A fun and lively presentation on what does and doesn’t work in the online social media world, addressing best practices and worst mistakes. And if you do screw up, how do you fix things and recover? And (shhh) is it worth doing stupid things to just garner attention? Maybe…”

Doesn’t that sound fun and interesting? 🙂
Turns out a bunch of my friends have also proposed panels, so if you’re in a voting mood and these sound interesting, I’m sure they’d appreciate the votes too:

• My long-time pal and fellow cool Boulderite Derek Scruggs: Customer Support – From Preventative Medicine to Intensive Care
• Patrick O’Keefe on managing online communities: Are You Ready to Manage an Online Community?
• Startup promoter and generally nice guy Dave Cohen ‘s SXSW panel: Startup Funding Rethought- Beyond Bootstrapping, Angel, VC
• Super-smart Greg Cohn of Yahoo Developer Networks: The New Incubators: EPIC FAIL or Full of Win?
• b5media guru Jeremy Wright talking about Twitter: Microjournalism: Breaking The News in 140 Characters
• Long-time pal and women in tech advocate Dori Smith: Women in Tech (Everything You Know is Wrong)
• Fellow Linux Journal columnist Doc Searls at SXSW 09: Rebuilding the World with Free Everything
• Former Forrester big-brain Charlene Li on the future of social networks: The Future of Social Networks
• Andrew Hyde’s wittily named SXSW 09 proposal: Happiness (or Not) In Startups
• Problogger Darren Rowse: Responsible Blogger/Public Relations Interaction
• Gwen Bell and her Women in Tech session at SXSW: Women Engaging Tech: Ferocity Fuels the Phenomenal
• My partner in crime Andy Beal’s SXSW panel: Managing Your Brand in a Radically Transparent World
• and, while you’re voting for SXSW, here’s Kit Seeborg’s panel too (which I’ll be part of, so you gotta vote for us!): Your Name Sucks!

If we can all get spots on the conference grid, it’d be an amazing lineup. If not, well, I’m sure we’ll all have an awesome time too.
And if you’re more of a film person, you’ll appreciate that I’m also going to be attending the SXSW Film Festival too, probably disseminating @FilmBuzz stickers too!