^ above: The one on the right is grape flavored.
The middle one is tutti-frutti flavored.
Hurry Up!
Yesterday we were in Santa Cruz do Sul, RS, Brazil, for a student conference on OpenSolaris. We had some time in the afternoon to sight-see (then were working again from 6-10 pm), including a walk to the cathedral.
Along the way we were highly amused by this animated crossing signal, which Jogo told us was manufactured, along with some other experimental traffic control systems, in a nearby town.
The soundtrack was provided by a car cruising the neighborhood with a loudspeaker on top, advertising something.
The Twitter Diaries: 2009-06-21: Chicago, CO
- @AmberCadabra I’m guessing you’re getting a lot of ROI questions. What’s your answer? in reply to AmberCadabra #
- @travelocity bait and switch? Twice started looking at flights MIL-AUS at $1217, twice arrived at “We’re sorry, price changed” – by $300! in reply to travelocity #
- @EnricCirne wd be interesting to know: had you heard of Gaiman before you started following? why do you follow him? in reply to EnricCirne #
- comparing flight prices in realtime via Skype with Enrico back in Italy. BA.com = exactly the same. Unfortunately, also expensive. #
- @timbray re Iran motorcycle cops footage, give me a link – I can translate the Italian for you #iranelection in reply to timbray #
- I’d really like to hear from someone who knows Farsi – what are they saying? http://bit.ly/ZD54P #
- “the crowd found isolated policemen, now THEY’RE getting beat up” “They got him, there’s risk of a lynching” http://bit.ly/CBWVS #
- http://bit.ly/CBWVS – shots of burning motorcycle, speaks of “the 1st victim,” not clear if that refers to the policeman or the motorcycle #
- oh, no, there’s the policeman – bruised but not much #
- not clear who’s doing the footage in Italian. No TV logos on it, tho the style seems pretty typical of an Italian TV commentator #
- it did come from Italian news crews, see more on http://bit.ly/9C5Yv Italian journos apparently still there, tho some got beat up #
- RT @DeirdreS: #iranelection http://bit.ly/9C5Yv Italian journos apparently still there, tho some got beat up #
- LOL! Google ad on this morning’s Producing Social Media post is for Zmanda! http://bit.ly/1194h9 #
- raining hard, seems to have got in the habit here every afternoon. And my flight for Chicago leaves at what time tomorrow…? #
- <groan> Berlusconi says “I’m going to Obama nice and tanned.” Gaffe compounded. #
- @darrinschaos waiting til D Day to see whether I can afford that much camera. ; ) in reply to darrinschaos #
- ack! looking over my tweeple, connected to a site that first played music, then asked me to take a questionnaire, then gave another popup… #
- still wishing for a “why I’m following you” on Twt. Baffled by many of my followers. Travel & food categories obvious enough, but some…? #
- @Roam2Rome suspect that generational shift holds in many countries. But it’s always a mistake to assume older people aren’t interested. in reply to Roam2Rome #
- is there a way to allow anyone to DM me whether I’m following them or not? #
- RT @scottycline: New proxy server is up 4any protesters who need it. IP is 69.92.182.124 por … #
- now that I look at who’s following me (slowly), it would be useful if follow notifications worked anymore. Some v interesting new folks #
- just heard today that there’s going to be a TED India. Massive cool. Wish I could be there. Hmm. Must think… #
- some neighbor’s yappy little dog has woken me up at 6:30 and 7:30 am, then again when I was trying to nap this afternoon. KILL KILL KILL #
- @CommunispaceCEO the catch for social media experts is to distinguish themselves from those who merely claim to be social media experts in reply to CommunispaceCEO #
- @Roam2Rome re clothing, sometimes I like to fit in, others I like to mix it up. I am convinced that Indian clothing looks great everywhere in reply to Roam2Rome #
- “lat or par meaning being beaten to the verge of death.” how scary is it that Farsi has 2 words for “beaten to the verge of death” ? #
- @ThinGuy mine, too, interpreted “get all that stuff off the floor” as “throw it all in the laundry basket” in reply to ThinGuy #
- burst of creativity on the preso was soon over. I’m gonna be one of those speakers who submits slides at the very… last… minute… #
- Woman on airport pkg shuttle saw a huge funnel cloud s of denver. While the van radio is playing “somewhere over the rainbow”. #
- @algore why do
You want more followers? You hardly tweet. in reply to algore # - United’s freq flyer program is too old. Half the passengers on every flight use the red carpet. It ain’t special anymore. #
- @ThinGuy today’s flight us den to chi. So they get me coming and going. I’m platinum for lift on klm, much good it does me in reply to ThinGuy #
- @Shamu arrived ohare. Noticed there’s A graveyard next to the runway in reply to Shamu #
- @jdlasica In NYC, what will you do that isn’t mass transit? it’s the only kind that makes sense there in reply to jdlasica #
- So this is Chicago. Cta train into the city. I’m a public transport kinda gal #
- This Chicago hotel has, of all things, a British pub. Magner’s cider, bangers and mash for dinner! #
- Kinda freAked that my room has no windows, only skylights. Maybe I’ll like that in daylight #
- time to iron. It’s been a while since I attended a conference that wasn’t all geeks in t-shirts and jeans. Wearing an actual suit jacket… #
- @sfoskett Nope, this is the Club Quarters. I had bangers and mash. Stomach a bit delicate today… in reply to sfoskett #
- @ThinGuy better to go with a younger airline where people haven’t had so much time to build up the mileage. Make ’em want you! in reply to ThinGuy #
- @jeffreytaylor @missbhavens we have to find a time and place for all THREE of us to meet. I suspect it will be an epic occasion! #
- @dave_enz Haven’t heard “tidy casual” before. Non-ragged jeans and a collared shirt? We’ve been warned FISL is t-shirts, layered for cold in reply to dave_enz #
- @bubbva I’ve barely been to Chicago before. I think I was sick last time I came here, too. Not Chicago’s fault. Hope to get out tomw night in reply to bubbva #
- Learning a lot at this conf but can’t tweet it for lack of bandwidth #
- conosco Stefano Maffulli? sembra che saremo ad una conferenza assieme… #
- @missbhavens @jeffreytaylor yup, when he said “Disneyland for adults”, New Orleans immediately came to mind. I may be there mid-Oct in reply to missbhavens #
- @reiger when? in reply to reiger #
- @stacylwilson ah, now I recognize you on Twitter! Your icon photo doesn’t do you justice. #
- @ElaineEllis you’re in Chicago? So am I! in reply to ElaineEllis #
- @debworks hi! #
- @lskrocki hearing good things about you from a fellow speaker/attendee at #commtell09 in reply to lskrocki #
- why I wanted my daughter out of Italy http://bit.ly/zGcRu #
- RT @monkchips: very very very funny. Jim just showed us the ayePod… one for the scots. @9600? http://bit.ly/101DoQ LOL of the day! #
- @koolinus I gave Italy 17 years. It just got too hard for a middle-aged foreign woman to have a professional hi-tech career there. in reply to koolinus #
- #commtell09 Gallup relies on a robust social network with deep profiles to be able to quickly tap employee expertise worldwide. #
- BTW, if you’re interested in Sun-related video (mostly very technical talks), I aggregate “my” stuff at http://bit.ly/19B0bm #
- reminder: Are you a student interested in high-performance computing? If so: it’s PARTY TIME! http://isc09studentparty.eventbrite.com/ #
- @koolinus I know. And I feel deeply for all the bright, talented young people I’ve met in Italy who deserve so much better. in reply to koolinus #
- @jdlasica less than 1 mo, actually http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23ohac – was May 31st, tweets all gone already MAJOR FAIL #140conf in reply to jdlasica #
- Hearing social media war stories from other companies points up how very unusual Sun is in this: http://bit.ly/16ijZh #
- read #commtell09 later today to see live tweets on my preso about employee video. (Being on the receiving end may be scary – my first time!) #
- @u8out not sure I get the intersect between CRM and social networks. Let me know how it is – I’ll be traveling that day in reply to u8out #
- @koolinus as in Sunnis, about Iran? in reply to koolinus #
- RT @lordorica: SAP embedding twitter into their CRM software, so companies can support customers who report problems via their social nets #
- @koolinus me la mandi? in reply to koolinus #
- cool, all companies should do this, maybe include staff lists AT&T – Social Media http://bit.ly/PK7aE #
- Facebook allows marketers to do incredibly targeted ads. So why do I keep getting stupendously irrelevant ones? #
- Bought a romance novel (a genre I never read) because there’s a Deirdre in the title. So the unsuitable suitor is… a mathematician. #
- @sumaya “how are you” is easy because most of the time people don’t expect a real answer. “where are you from?” is hard. in reply to sumaya #
- note to self: become italian prime minister RT @StephenAtHome couldn’t be worse than Berlusca, and at least you have a real sense of humor in reply to StephenAtHome #
- @Padmasreewas interested to learn at #commtell09 about Cisco’s social media activities, internal & external. We think alike. ; ) #
- @timfoster nor any language I’ve ever heard of, at least in that useage in reply to timfoster #
- didn’t get home til after midnight, but woke up at 6 am as usual, in the office before 8. Now very tired. #
- Silvio Berlusconi and the press: Language problems | The Economist http://bit.ly/Q4175 #
- watching #Chess in Concert. I’ve waited 25 years to see a decent production of this show. So far, so good, tho changed from the 84 version #
- #Chess Adam Pascal is no Murray Head. Idina almost comes up to Elaine Page, but… we’ll see on the hard songs. #
- #Chess Kerry Ellis singing “Someone Else’s Story” (which I hadn’t heard before) was worth the price of admission. #
- wild lightning out there #
- wishing I was with my vlogging peeps in NYC. But I must admit that going to Brazil Saturday doesn’t suck. At all. #
- Boss says “I hope we find time to talk.” Well, we’ve got a 24-hour trip together to start with… good thing we like each other. #
- @seancarlos how about people married to Americans? in reply to seancarlos #
- final day in the office before being away until July 27th. Making sure I get all the bits & pieces of info & equipment I need to bring. #
- @jeffreytaylor wd be helpful if there was something on the stream to tell me who’s talking #openvideo in reply to jeffreytaylor #
- registered for OSCON (gee, that’s a whole month away!) #
- Jon Stewart takes on Berlusconi – priceless! http://bit.ly/10xb8L #
- RT @oracletechnet: James Gosling on life post-Oracle http://bit.ly/7FGzd (from EWeek) #
- Gosling: There is Life for Java After Oracle-Sun Buyout “Sun is now a viral body in a strange host.” http://bit.ly/2mtTqc #
- I’m about to be out of the office for almost 6 weeks. What am I forgetting? #
- woke up at 5:30, but that’s good since I’ll have to spring fwd 3 hours for Porto Alegre – then back 15 for Auckland. Jet lag hell coming up. #
- @templedf good luck with the festivities in Hamburg. Sorry I can’t be in two places at once! in reply to templedf #
- Berlusconi pays “image girl” 10,000 euros to party with him [in Italian] http://bit.ly/2PXtpJ #
- @AmberCadabra you waited way too long. Massage is one of the best things you can do for yourself. Or, rather, have done to you. in reply to AmberCadabra #
- farming out a lot of my video editing backlog so that, in this next month while I’m traveling, I can concentrate on writing. So much to do! #
- another Berlusca girl – who went well beyond “image” – was paid in “help in having a residence built” [in Italian] http://bit.ly/u7MGR #
- On my way to dia. I love almost any kind of travel and do a lot of it, but this is a BIG trip even by my standards. Whee! #
- @jeffreytaylor tell mike I say hi, when you get the chance in reply to jeffreytaylor #
- Very easy exchange rate for Brazil. #
- Flight to sao paolo canceled. We’ll probably be 24 hrs late #
- Flight to sao paolo canceled. American airlines handling this very badly. 90 minutes in line already #
- Finally on our 2nd flight, destination Buenos Aires. Not our original destination, but we’ll get there #
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The Twitter Diaries: 2009-06-14: CO
^ Colorado wildflower
- Eating at panera before dropping E at sfo and going on to sjc. Won’t see him til august #
- Now to prepare for speaking in Chicago and Porto Alegre #
- @lskrocki WTF? I didn’t know we got tornadoes in Colorado! in reply to lskrocki #
- made it to SJC in plenty of time to not pay $54 extra (per hour!) on rental car. Got to security before I realized I still had the keys #
- @pizzocalabro Brazil, New Zealand, and Australia – three new (to me) countries in one month! in reply to pizzocalabro #
- Are You There God? It’s Me, Monica – http://bit.ly/u6Qou – ironically, I wrote about this years ago: http://bit.ly/rxbGa #
- @lskrocki Humph. If I wanted tornadoes, I’d live in Kansas! in reply to lskrocki #
- I am freakin’ flying home into tornadoes? Damn damn damn. I don’t scare easily on planes, but this might do it. #
- @rosso harass them to give you credit and a link in reply to rosso #
- yup, figured. Weather delay into Denver #
- Landed dia. Hungry. Won’t make it home without food, not much there anyway. Hope we at least have milk for breakfast #
- I’m in one of my moods when I can think of something snarky about everyone I see #
- @nonstick those who work with me know that the key is to keep me fed. #
- @dave_enz great thanks! I’ll book flights this week #
- Spain’s El Pais deserves a medal for services to Italy #
- oh, right, that’s what my Tivo was recording – the Tony Awards! Hope I recorded long enough, suspect not… #
- Find someone NOT on Twitter who’s EVER heard of Laporte, Arrington, et al. If you can’t, then please stop tweeting about them. #
- Who’s in/near Chicago? I’ll be speaking next week on UTILIZING SOCIAL MEDIA TOOLS TO BUILD ENGAGEMENT AND COMMUNITY http://bit.ly/39dP3Z #
- frustrating to list 5 steps to get to the-thing-that-isn’t-working only to be told “It works for me” – by someone who has only done step 1 #
- ps re the conference http://bit.ly/39dP3Z – I can offer a speaker discount, DM me for details. #
- RT @plasticbagUK: great Twitter feature? Temporary mute. Like, “I don’t want to hear from this person for a couple of hours”. – YES! #
- hmm. Got some great footage of the carpet at our OSUG bootcamp. We’ll pretend I was wrestling the union steward for control of my camera. #
- @darrinschaos happy birthday to you, and to @jscusc ! in reply to darrinschaos #
- Sunday Morning, Coming Down http://bit.ly/y5w19 #
- so what’s the best travel pillow out there? #
- @glynnfoster honestly not crazy about the new t-shirts. What has soccer/football got to do with OpenSolaris? in reply to glynnfoster #
- what’s with the juvenile “first post!” crap? Maybe popular bloggers should automatically delete those. #
- @alydenisof I believe we allow the faux Brits to use “twits” as more natural to them. in reply to alydenisof #
- I wish the cos who spam me had a minimum grasp of demographic targeting. I have NO INTEREST in Miley Cyrus tickets, thx v much AmEx! #
- @amber_benson amber_benson you’re welcome. You might remember my daughter: http://bit.ly/99e2K #
- @katlemieux thanks. Sun does a lot with SL, but I haven’t gone back to it myself since way back when I first tried it. Too much overhead. #
- @llcrowe thanks, but seems too bulky gien everything else I have to carry… in reply to llcrowe #
- covering meetings for the boss this week. I’m learning a lot. I guess. #
- RT @MMaryMary: I don’t leave people voicemail for the same reason that I don’t put back airline seat backs. – me, neither! #
- I have HOW MANY more hours of meetings today? #
- my head is going to explode, any minute now. #
- @darrinschaos depends. You gonna make it worth my while? ; ) in reply to darrinschaos #
- duplicating 250 USB sticks with video. The glamorous life of a social media guru… #
- @llcrowe Sorry, by travel I meant one for use on the plane! Tho one for hotels would also be nice… in reply to llcrowe #
- was pulling into the Wal-Mart parking lot (Broomfield) when the tornado siren went. Agh! Don’t let me be trapped in Wal-Mart! #
- @bubbva fortunately, the siren didn’t last long. There was real nightmare potential there though in reply to bubbva #
- I wish I could figure out how to turn off the FB “notifications” about horoscopes. Stop spamming me with rubbish I don’t believe in. #
- phone conf today with my co-panelists from http://bit.ly/39dP3Z – we all have interesting stories to tell about enterprise social media #
- wondering if I should just turn off comments on my personal blog. It’s almost all spammers these days. Clever ones, but still spammers. #
- why does the same ticket cost $130 less on travelocity than purchasing directly from ba.com? #
- @sogrady apparently, putting together an Airbus and having it STAY together are two different propositions. in reply to sogrady #
- any opinions on orbitz vs expedia vs travelocity? #
- @dreamofitaly wish I was seeing low prices on tickets FROM Italy. Any tips? in reply to dreamofitaly #
- @ingenthr kayak is great for researching fares, but they actually send you to the other sites to buy in reply to ingenthr #
- @dreamofitaly flights originating in Italy are more expensive, but the SAME flight costs $130 more from ba.com than from Expedia. Boh. in reply to dreamofitaly #
- @travelocity you’re going to have to sell harder than that! Why are you better? in reply to travelocity #
- @jailmedia fortunately, the individual in question (not my daughter!) has been released in reply to jailmedia #
- @Cdash burning question: why can I set up auto-payment for my personal AmEx, but not for corporate? in reply to Cdash #
- will be speaking in Wellington, NZ on Extending Conversations http://bit.ly/1QQAUt July 6-8 #
- @MissExpatria Italian schoolchildren are graded on verbosity. Ross was never taught how to structure an essay, just to use fancy words. in reply to MissExpatria #
- I really, really miss the great travel agent we had in Milan. She got us tons of great deals. But the agency went out of business. #
- @lbridenne76 nah, just crushed by the global changes in the travel industry. How many travel agencies do you see around these days? in reply to lbridenne76 #
- continuing to harass corp travel. My 5+ week trip just keeps getting more complicated (and more fun!) #
- @cbs4denver experiences in Europe, esp. Ireland, show that a plastic bag tax encourages people to use reusable bags. Soon becomes a habit in reply to cbs4denver #
- I still haven’t figured out who Gen Y and Gen X even are. Except that I don’t think I’m in either, and I don’t fit the profile of any… #
- hmm. @ThinGuy says Gen Y was born post-boomer, pre-1980, @zenxacred says they were teens in late 90s/00s. I was born in 1962, grad 1981 #
- OMFG. You have got to be kidding me. Please, someone tell me this is a cruel joke. #
- videocameras manned by expensive union crews with NO F’IN TAPES IN THEM? I don’t know whether to weep or scream or just throw up. #
- there are tapes after all. I can sleep. #
- @davewiner gris gris gumbo ya ya, but apropos of what? He’s not dead, is he? in reply to davewiner #
- is this is ad for an MMPORG or a steamy romance novel? I’m confused. #
- Are you a student interested in high-performance computing? If so: it’s PARTY TIME! http://isc09studentparty.eventbrite.com/ #
- new FB group name translates as “What else does Berlusconi have to do to change your mind? Screw your grandmother?” http://bit.ly/QgXhM #
- @kbeninato @davewiner probably says a lot (weird) about my childhood that I could likely sing all of the Night Tripper album from memory in reply to kbeninato #
- @kbeninato @davewiner & at the end of the live-action 101 Dalmatians, I mortified my daughter yelling in a Milan cinema: OMG it’s Dr. John! in reply to kbeninato #
- @kbeninato glad you found me. I was born in NOLA, family there still, have not been back in ages. May make it, finally, in October. in reply to kbeninato #
- covering for the boss today involves a FIVE HOUR meeting. I really don’t know how she does it. There must be secret executive stamina shots. #
- OTOH, being in a videoconf room for 5 hrs means I won’t have to listen to the jackhammering outside my office window. #
- bing search picks up my Tweets rather than content from the page they’re linking to. ??? search on “Italian slang” to see an example #
- @italylogue I think I now qualify as a reverse expat. After 17 years in Italy, the US is in many ways a foreign country to me. in reply to italylogue #
- @italylogue tons of articles in my head on moving back to the US, no time to write them! in reply to italylogue #
- anybody in Chicago? I’ll be there Monday evening-Weds evening #
- my good mood was more fragile than I’d thought. #
- @nonstick can’t. The VP can see me on the videoconference. in reply to nonstick #
- What’s more cruelly and stupidly ironic here? The event, or the comments speculating on why it occurred? http://bit.ly/AQmYb #
- Indian colleges ban jeans to ‘protect’ girls http://bit.ly/Ouyjs – “eve teasing” happens to women in Indian clothing, too! #
- “In Italy, the general assumption is that someone is guilty until proven innocent.” http://bit.ly/DzVlh – ? how do you explain Berlusconi? #
- @kbeninato NOLA at Halloween wd be amazing, but I’ll be in Tuscon then in reply to kbeninato #
- I need a hug #
- thanks for the hugs, folks! Will that also work for margaritas? ; ) #
- A parade of window cleaners passes. Wonder if they have trouble with the owls #
- @dave_enz looks good! in reply to dave_enz #
- @jeffreytaylor zoned printer cartridges? that is totally weird. What is their excuse? in reply to jeffreytaylor #
- @jeffreytaylor but you told anyway. ; ) in reply to jeffreytaylor #
- moving finished projects off my Mac and onto archive to make room for new video. Finally getting some use out of that Thumper I bragged on. #
- Dinner: pasta with pesto the real Genovese way, with potatoes and green beans #
- I’d be more excited about the upcoming weekend were it not for the suspicion that I’ll be doing a lot of work… #
- @lskrocki thanks – and rather appropriate for me right now! in reply to lskrocki #
- @ajkeen you paying the tickets? in reply to ajkeen #
- @lskrocki actually, I was referring to the song. ; ) but, yes, people can be amazingly resilient. “Slumdog” was very true to life that way in reply to lskrocki #
- @briansolis re Dell, so much for the theory that Twitter is “only for seduction, never for sex.” ; ) in reply to briansolis #
- driving to work, “Chess” came up on my iPod shuffle (of ~10k songs). In my inbox an offer from Amazon for “Chess in Concert” DVD. Scary. #
- ooh, wow – Chess in Concert looks great (okay, I’m a musicals geek) – I ordered it. http://bit.ly/ZdjYS #
- seems unfair that anyone I follow is allowed to DM me, but I can’t DM them back unless they’re also following me. DM rights should be equal #
- does anyone have a graphic showing locations of Sun offices worldwide? need urgently for a preso #
- starting to make noise about the Sun videos we’ve been translating – http://bit.ly/1mMLR #
- @sumaya The Economist. in reply to sumaya #
- @c0t0d0s0 please help spread the word about Student Event at ISC – Eventbrite http://bit.ly/3YrAsv #
- so far today: wkd on Chicago preso, discd FISL preso, edited & uploaded 1 OHAC video, lined up ~6 hrs of video for translation, tracked vids #
- …and the very watery cup of coffee I just managed to brew is definitely not going to suffice #
- @italylogue @divinacucina I always liked Milan, too. But had to leave before the pollution killed me (literally). in reply to italylogue #
- RT @c0t0d0s0: just blogged: ISC’09 Student Event http://tinyurl.com/mp3h96 – Thanks! @templedf FYI #
- @sumaya what will it be and when? #SocialYou in reply to sumaya #
- @ThinGuy if they gave you a show, you would have to have an affair with your bodyguard in reply to ThinGuy #
- @missbhavens depends whether you’re doing this way too seriously or not. I don’t recall taking more than a day or 2, only to meet visitors in reply to missbhavens #
- I love working with engineers; their “just the facts” attitude suits me. #
- @sumaya I’ll be in Brazil, presenting on videoblogging! #socialyou in reply to sumaya #
- Presenting the New Toshiba OpenSolaris Laptops – Video http://bit.ly/4ibPlG #
- Meet some OpenSolaris User Group Leaders – Video http://bit.ly/2rJb5 #
- OMG how did I not know about this? Hysterical! http://bit.ly/11zb9w #
- @reiger hopefully will see you at Usenix, if not before. in reply to reiger #
- @sumaya well, hey, didn’t you go to Jordan or thereabouts? I was jealous then! #socialyou in reply to sumaya #
- @lskrocki the comb-over is precisely intended to stop horrible embarrassments like mom kisses. in reply to lskrocki #
- okay, so now I have http://www.facebook.com/deirdre.straughan – so what? #
- @MissExpatria never used GoDaddy, but have been mostly happy with DreamHost for years in reply to MissExpatria #
- I have so little influence over Google earnings on my site. Don’t have time to seek more direct ads, so far they find me. #
- I should buy a better camera for this trip but don’t really want to spend right now, and don’t have time to do the research. #
- @darrinschaos I have a point and shoot, plan to buy a DSLR later. I have to carry video equipment this trip anyway, so a big camera… nah in reply to darrinschaos #
- is Twitter search broken? Looking for the live tweets we did at #ohac, get no results. #
- hmm. Does Twitter search not have an archive beyond ten days? just-now tweet with #ohac shows up, dozens of tweets from May 31 do not. #
- mini bulldozer being used to spread dirt – job cd be done quietly, cheaply, without pollution using a wheelbarrow and a shovel! #
- @davest now I’m even sadder I can’t be there! in reply to davest #
- @stoweboyd @jeffreytaylor should dine with you and cool people. in reply to stoweboyd #
- saw “Up” today. Lovely, but opening seq made me want to shout: “If you have a dream, bloody well pursue it NOW!” You never know. #
- Calacanis must be pissed: “his search engine, Malaho” http://bit.ly/9XW4A Thought the NYT had fact-checkers, or at least spell checkers. #
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Producing Social Media
Last week was a big one for Sun conferences, with CommunityOne on June 1st and 2nd, JavaOne starting on the 2nd. Like many other Sun folks, I was very busy with preparations in the weeks leading up to these, and played several different roles throughout conference week.
For some of us, C1/J1 were preceded on Sunday, May 31st by the Open High Availability Cluster Summit. Unlike our previous “specialty” summits for Open Storage, this one was organized mostly by the cluster engineering team themselves (though we of the community team like to think we’ve set a good example), who did a fantastic job of marketing it, achieving over 170 registrations.
They did ask me to cover video and social media for the summit. As I was doing it, I realized the job should be called “social media producer”. It’s more work than you might think.
In this case, I assumed my tasks to include:
- live video streaming of the talks (double tracks in the afternoon), with monitoring of any chat on the stream
- recording video for future editing and posting (NB: the video stream site can also capture the video, but the quality is poor)
- live-Tweeting the proceedings with the hashtag #ohac (why these tweets are no longer available via search.twitter.com is a mystery).
- assembling and managing a team who actually did most of the work (in part because I was ill, and not up to doing it myself all day as usual)
Room sound and lighting were handled by SWANK Audio Visuals, who were a pleasure to work with. I let them know in advance my requirements for camera position, with an Ethernet connection for video streaming and electricity for the camera, and found everything ready for me as requested Sunday morning. I set up my usual videoblogging gear, with the SWANK crew there ready to make the last-minute adjustments that are always needed.
Some things we figured out the hard way:
Unlike the the Open University’s FlashMeeting that I used for the last Open Storage Summit, UStream requires a separate feed for the audio, into the mic jack of the laptop you’re streaming from. [NB No longer true in 2012 with more recent UStream Producer software.] We took this from the sound board, but it needed an XLR grounding adapter (which, fortunately, the A/V crew had) to eliminate a very annoying hum. I was alerted to this hum by Mark Carlson, who was watching the stream remotely, via SMS – how many different forms of communication can I use in one day?
The fact that I learned about the problem from Mark tells me that it’s necessary to periodically monitor sound levels and quality into both the camera and the UStream. I used my iPhone headphones for this – not great, but better than nothing – or carrying around yet another piece of dedicated gear.
Another UStream gotcha: it requires you to press two different buttons to start broadcasting and start recording, whereas FlashMeeting simply stores everything that goes on during your broadcast. Because I wasn’t used to this, and not all of our ad hoc social media team had had the UStream training offered by Sun’s media team the previous week, we may not have hit the record button on every talk (don’t worry – we still have videotape).
UStream in its normal configuration includes a chat window which I had planned to use to encourage conversation among the online audience and to take questions from them. (It’s also useful for monitoring stream quality – people complain instantly on the chat if there’s a problem.) But for this event I was using the Sun UStream account, which, for reasons unknown to me, has disabled chat. All I could do was hope people asked questions via Twitter. No one did, which was disappointing – we had had good participation this way at the Open Storage Summit, with online questions to relay to the room for almost every talk.
I had one user contact me via email afterwards to complain that he had not been able to get the stream to work from his home. He’s an engineer and certainly knew enough to try it on various systems, so I’m at a loss to know what went wrong. Hoping the Sun media team can figure it out so it doesn’t happen again.
I had been so ill the week before that I wasn’t thinking clearly, and spaced on the fact that I’d need a laptop with a FireWire connector to connect the camera for the UStream, so I’d only brought along my MacBook Air (which, horribly, lacks FireWire). Fortunately, we had two Toshiba Portegé R500 netbooks along, which have FireWire and mic jacks and were easily set up to be our streaming stations. If I were to spec out a portable social media production station, one of these would be part of it.
What went well:
The C1/J1 conferences function, in part, as an opportunity for current and former Sun employees from around the world to gather and see each other. Everyone was looking for a reason to be there, so I had volunteers to help out with video and other social media tasks: Aaron Newcomb (who already knows his way around a video camera), Alan McLellan, and Alta Elstad – the Triple A team!
Alan and Alta attended the UStream training on Friday, so they were able to start and stop the UStream recordings for each session. They also jumped right in to live tweeting (using my Twitter account part of the time, hence all the activity) – as Sun tech writers, in fact, they were far more effective at this than I would have been.
Alan was confident enough to take over the videocamera in the main room so I could go rest (still ill), and Aaron arrived in time to run the camera in the second room in the afternoon. (I had hoped he would also do some video interviews on Monday, but he found himself disabled by an unexpectedly drained camera battery. Another lesson: always have a charged backup battery.)
Results:
- 8+ hours of video recorded (requests for it to be posted quickly started coming in the next day). Like most of the highly technical video I produce, the viewing statistics on this stuff may never look impressive. It’s certainly not viral video. But it will be immensely valuable – and most of it will remain so over time – to a select worldwide audience.
- Up to 9 or 10 people on the video streams at any given time – people who couldn’t join us in person were nonetheless able to participate. This number may seem small, but the conference itself wasn’t that big, maybe 150 attendees total.
- Lots of Twitter coverage
Costs:
- Time and effort by people who wanted to be there because they had direct interest and expertise, and didn’t have to be paid (extra) to do the social media work. All parties benefited.
- (My) time to produce the event, then edit, post, manage, and measure the final video.
I’d call that a fair return on investment.
photo at top: me and Alan, hard at work (photo by Lynn)