SXSW: Day 3

Yesterday morning was a mad rush at the Starbucks stand. Today, it was pretty dead. I guess everybody partied too hard last night. Started the day with Every Breath You Take: Identity, Attention, Presence and Reputation. You would think by now people would remember to put their phones on vibrate. Especially people that have whole songs as their ringtones. Most of the panelists spent most of the time presenting with slides and there wasn't much time for questions. This could have gone on for another hour. Mostly about managing your identity and how your reputation develops and propagates (your reputation is assigned to you more than you create it).

One cool thing about Austin: They have free wi-fi on the bus. On the bus!

Next panel: Non-Developers to Open Source Acolytes: Tell Me Why I Care. I'm on the "tell me why I care" side of the fence. Which is not to say that I don't care. I'd just like to know if I'm missing something. The gist of it is 1) open source is about having the freedom to make software do exactly what you need it to do and 2) with so many eyeballs on a project, it's that much harder to corrupt. Also remember, open source does not necessarily mean free. Selecting open source options is somewhat analogous to choosing organic food or fair trade coffee in that it's a conscientious, value-oriented choice. Also discussion on the philosophy of open source, mainly centered around what's the impetus to work on an open source project and how much of that is money-related. Liz Henry liveblogged the whole thing. Factoring in content, organization, panelist preparedness, and moderator effectiveness, this is hands down best panel I've seen so far. Go BlogHer!

I have severe MacBook envy. SEVERE.

There was house music played last night. Real house music. And I missed it. I'm so disappointed.

Went to Las Manitas for real Mexican food. Fabulous guacamole. Met up with folks at The Hideout to chill and kill some time. Got caught in a downpour on the way back to the convention center, but strangely only got wet on the front of my body. The back was nice and dry. Showed up early for a mini-session and ended up smack in the middle of another. Oops. Lesson learned here is that spam is evil and you can't get away from it.

Next panel: Fictional Bloggers with Odin Soli of Plain Layne fame. All the good stuff is on the wiki.

Next panel: The Rise of the Blogebrity. Mixed feelings on attending this. Didn't want to give anybody any more attention than they already have, but I was kind of curious to hear what they have to say. Started to sum this up, then got bored with it. I may have missed the best part because I had to leave right before Liza asked her question.

Having said all that, I think I saw Rex Sorgatz a couple times today, but I wasn't sure it was him in that yellow t-shirt (now looking at his Twitter icon, yes it was him), and he probably wondered why I kept glancing quizzically at him, and I wish I had gone over and talked to him. Today would have been a better day to have my "I Love Minneapolis" t-shirt on. *scuffs toe*

Went off to have dinner with Amy. She took me out for some good ol' fashioned Texas barbecue at The County Line Bar-B-Q (who will ship you BBQ if you so desire). Mmmm... meat with sugar on top. Three different spellings of barbecue in one sentence.

Went back to the hotel ready to chill for a bit and recharge all my batteries (phone, laptop, myself). Except now there's lightning and a tornado watch. Damn weather kept me in for the night. Looks like thunderstorms for the next couple days, too.

[flickr photoset]