SXSW Sum Up

An amazing time, I must say. SXSWi 2008 had most everything I was looking for. Great panels, great people and great parties. It was lovely to reconnect with our great friends Lisa and Vince. It was also great meeting some new people:

• Jason Toney
• Shelby LaBadie
• Paul Nixon
• Jason Santa Maria
• Rob Jones
• Scott Faris
• Michael Marotta

Highlights include:

• Michael Lopp’s “I want a Pony” slide
• How to Rawk SXSW
• Respect!, the Happy Cog + Bowman panel
• Naz Hamid’s Design is in the Details
• Design Eye for South By

Being my first time at South By, I was most surprised with some of the panel titles and descriptions. While most delivered what was expected, brilliant stuff by the way, a few didn’t really stick to the subject or just had information which wasn’t very relevant to me.

I’ve heard it from a few others, but I’ll chime in as well. Here are my suggestions for future Interactive events:

• Create an Expertise Scale – I think a big need for panel information is designation of it’s skill level. Introductory, Average and Expert levels may help to drive some more intriguing discussions. Too often I saw some confused faces in the most advanced panels and people leaving panels which may have been too introductory for their interests. Which leads me to my next point…
• Scheduling – Half of the conference, I found myself wanting to go to more than one panel at any set time, while the other half I found myself somewhat disinterested. It’s not that the panels didn’t have meaningful information, it was just information I felt comfortable with or information which didn’t pertain to me. Perhaps, if using the Expertise Scale for panels, that scale could also be used for scheduling. E.g. the 10am panels have a maximum of two Introductory, two Average and two Expert levels. That way, at any given time, you only have to make a choice between two different panels depending on your skill level. Hopefully, those two panels will be very different topics, to help minimize any conflict
• Indoor Rickshaw service – I know where every room in the Convention Center is! My feet told me so.

Being an Austin local, the next 360 days will probably go a little slower than for everyone else. I get to drive by the memories every day. It’s a wait worth while though as I can look forward to another most excellent time with friends at next years version of South By.