Roland Tanglao's Weblog

[crossposted from the Northern Voice 2008 Website]

New to Vancouver or just not into figuring out the bus system? And need to get to the NV08 Opening Party? Then join me at Blenz at 508 West Hastings (at Richards, in front of SFU Harbour Centre).

• WHEN: Thursday Feb 21, 2008 at 5:15p.m.
• WHERE: Blenz Coffee at 508 West Hastings (map, pictures)
• BRING: $2.50 Cash fare (and another $2.50 to get back)
• BUS ROUTES: One of Number 10, 20, etc. (many routes lead to the Waldorf)
• PRE-REQUISITES - On NV08 Opening Party list
• LOST? call or text me, Roland Tanglao (photos of me), cellphone +1 604 729 7924

Really stoked to be co-presenting VideoBlogging 101 with Jordan Behan and "pro-video Lab-with-Leo and man about town" Warren Frey, as part of the almost sold out Northern Voice 2008's MooseCamp (specifically Internet BootCamp, the only pre-scheduled part of MooseCamp) on Friday February 22, 2008 at UBC. Goal: get people motivated to try videoblogging. Got questions or stuff you want covered? Please add them to our Videoblogging 101 wiki page by editing the page (or email me roland AT rolandtanglao.com).

Meet Jordan and Warren on Qik.com video after the jump:

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The Moose is Loose in 2008!

Want to speak or lead a discussion? Then fill out the speaker submission form (speaker submissions close Monday December 10).

Got an idea for a topic or discussion but don't feel like speaking on it or leading a discussion? Then check out our Call for Ideas (we've seeded the list with two initial ideas: microblogging and mobile blogging but these are just examples!) and add your own idea and rate others' ideas!

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I really believe this was the best Northern Voice ever. Why? The people ! The right mix of people! People of all "skill levels" with something to contribute. A diverse set of people with diverse skill sets. And a willingness to learn and humility from everybody (local or not, famous or not and we had plenty of famous and expert locals and famous and expert out of town people) to learn from each other.

No, I don't get any commission from Adobe for p*mping Lightroom, LOL! As I said at Photo Camp I kind of feel that I've grown up with it as I watched the program improve from Beta 1 to 4 to 1.0 and listened to the Podcasts and except for the lack of unsharp mask functionality, it really is a "do ALL of your digital photography workflow" for serious amateurs who shoot a lot of "giggage" and heck it seems like a lot of pros are using it too (and unlike Aperture it runs on my three year old Powerbook G4). Anything requiring more editing requires a program like PhotoShop or Elements, etc. I definitely am saving my pennies and hope to buy Lightroom at the initial offer price of $US 199.

I only wish that I had felt better so I would have taken more photos; it seems that every Northern Voice I end up being a little sick. More rest for 2008!

FROM ongoing · Photo Camp and High-End Compacts:

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There was a lot of talk on workflow, something that is increasingly becoming an issue for your average digicam hobbyist. In particular, Roland Tanglao gave a presentation on Adobe Lightroom, and Adobe ought to put that boy on commission, because I bet fifty people are going to buy it. That would include me.

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UPDATE: For those who are academically "challenged" like myself, you  don't need high grades in school or anything academic like that. It's all about contributions, need, a high quality  blog post, video blog or podcast and diversity!

According to dictionary.com, bursary is "British English"! Is this true? For those who are British English challenged, a bursary is the same as a scholarship. We've received several interesting applications already! Apply today and see you in February!

From Get a Travel Bursary for Northern Voice | Northern Voice 2007:

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This year Northern Voice is offering six travel bursaries of CAN $500 each. The organizing committee will be awarding these bursaries based on a number of criteria, including:

* The contributions you can make to the conference
* Your level of need
* The quality of your submission
* The diversity you might bring to Northern Voice

We’ll announce the recipients of the bursaries on February 2nd, 2007. The bursaries will be paid out via cheque mailed out to recipients or picked up on the day of the conference.

To apply, write a blog post, or record a podcast or video blog post describing why you want to come to Northern Voice. Then submit it via our travel bursaries page.

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The speaker submissions are flowing in (submit today, the more the better; all you need is a good abstract on a relevant topic), the organizers are meeting, we're updating the website, and the registrations are coming in. In other words, the sprint to Northern Voice 2007 is on! [Thanks to Darren for the cool graphic; get your own Northern Voice 2007 graphic!]

Some great news about Northern Voice 2007 (which I am one of the organizers of):

1. Speaker Submissions: The Deadline has been extended to December 1st as Lauren wrote. You don't have to be famous or a professional conference presenter: we're looking for both fresh and experienced voices who wish to present or chair a panel on topics related to the blog-o-sphere, videoblogging, podcasting, virtual worlds like Second life, the two way web/read write web/web 2.0, blogging 101, podcasting 101, etc. It's all about the abstract. If it's well written and topical, your chances will be much higher. Submit today!
2. Registration is open now! Pre-register and save $10. That's right it's only $30 for a single day and $50 for both days as opposed to $40 for one day and $60 for both days at the door. I bet we'll sell out like last year so pre-registration is recommended. Register now!

BarCamp Vancouver is officially full. If you have signed up and find out you can't go, then please remove your name from the BarCamp Vancouver attendee list.

If you are on the wait list, don't despair, being a free conference with a suggested $20 donation, there's always a few people who don't show up.

If you are on the fence, sign up on the wait list! Looks like there's going to be some great sessions about podcasting, Drupal, Rails, mobile phones and devices, a PhotoCamp led by Kris Krug to reprise his fantastic MooseCamp PhotoCamp (from NorthernVoice 2006), non profit technology and many other topics!

I think Jon is onto something. Mesh sounded great (could people blog more podcasts and videoblogs of the conference please? That's it, my goal will be to make sure that Northern Voice 2007 is 100% podcasted and videoblogged at decent quality, sorry Tim but not everybody can do awesome HD video for everything) but we are missing the common Web 2.0 thread that "meshes" everything together which I think lies somewhere in open source, ubiquitous inexpensive broadband (fixed today and mobile tomorrow), RSS, people (not just white male Californians, but women, Canadians, Indians, Filipinos :-) , etc.) and "Silicon Valley everywhere" (including Vancouver in my biased opinion with great startups like sxip, Dabble DB, eqo, etc.)

FROM Jon Arnold's Blog: Mesh Conference - Final Thoughts:

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There was lots of good content and obviously some great energy. I'm sure the successes of the show were a happy mix of good planning and putting everyone together to share and feed off each other. I definitely learned a lot, but for someone who is on a steady diet of VoIP and telecom conferences like VON, Internet Telephony and Globalcomm, this is a different world in many ways. Didn't hear much talk about VoIP or podcasting or SIP - stuff like that. But that's ok - Web 2.0 is about so many things.

And that's where the challenge lies for me. A lot of great perspectives were put forward at Mesh - both from the speakers and the attendees. However, there wasn't a lot of connecting the dots - maybe by design - but I'm left with the feeling that for as much as I learned, I still don't have a sense how these things fit together.

This actually brings me back again to the Mesh logo. You can't help but be drawn into that image and the energy it seems to radiate - which is exactly what happened at the show - so, kudos for the logo designers. The energy was there alright, but like the logo, I didn't really feel that all the strands - yellow, blue, green, etc. - connected. They're oscillating around each other, and bumping into each other a lot, but never really intersecting or truly meshing into a unified form. At the end of the day, much like Earth at Creation, I'd like to see this humming mass of energy and chaos sort itself out and unravel nicely like a ball of yarn.

My conclusion is that this did not happen, and I'm concerned that for some, the conference was just a blur, like this....

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