Social Noodling – #TweetJam #cmswire

Bring on the Jam

I attended the #CMSWire sponsored Tweet Jam yesterday – SharePoint in the Enterprise #EIMChat and I was summarily intrigued…

Are you a player in the game?  I say kudos to CMS Wire for showing initiative and creating the proverbial buzz that they normally do around innovation and technology and getting vendors together to publicly duke it out.  They are great at that.

Rose By Any Other Name?  Where I understand the name Tweet Jam, it makes me thinks of toejam or an annoying long  music set or musicians who go on and on and on. (hmmm, maybe the name is more appropriate than I originally thought) …

Who dat?  While watching the Jam play out, it was interesting to see who was on, who wasn’t, did Microsoft SharePoint PMs participate besides asking questions, we’re there any “customers” on and/or if it was just a bunch of SharePoint choir members talking to themselves.  Interestingly enough it WAS all of the above.

My Marketeer Two Cents:  This Tweet Jam forum will either evolve or die depending on if the communities that are involved are already strong or not and if communities decide that they are worth the time.

If Microsoft or other biggies play then so will their partners, MVPs, etc…  validity by participation is part of the deal – so if the big guys stay in the ring, so will the vendors.  This goes for in-person events as well.

It behooves vendors, consultants and MVPs-types to make time for this sort of thing as they thrive off of being “players” with opinions and thoughts about the game.  Customers want their vendors to be in the know, respected in the marketplace and part of the overall community.  Toot your horn as nobody else will.

Some companies have a dedicated person or team dealing with their social strategy and some don’t – so whether you choose to be involved in these types of things or not will come down to bandwidth and value out of playing.  The value in a Tweet Jam has yet to be revealed but a company’s or individuals “klout” or perception in the marketplace is important and to be a player, again, you have to play the game.    Most companies do NOT have this social game figured out yet so the field is wide open on how to manage, play and govern one’s individual and company’s policies on it.   I know personally I go in fits and starts with Twitter myself and I do not use FourSquare or Facebook Places.

Folks like CMS Wire are pushing decisions on how we interface with each other, time will tell if it will take off or not.  Like anything else there will be so many Tweet Jam’s to choose from someone will need to build a rating system or aggregator to decide which ones to attend and a true way to filter these things.  Hey, maybe that is the next million dollar idea…  

For your old school jam needs -   Jam on it, y’all!  

Yeah or nay on the Tweet Jam?

cheers,

heather

Head Maven, www.creativemaven.com, @heddanewman

Creative Maven Sponsors SharePoint Saturdays

Join us for SharePoint Saturday Sacramento – June 18, 2011 at the beautiful Folsom Lake Community College Regional Performing Arts Center!

Mingle and learn with SharePoint business users, architects, developers, and other professionals that work with SharePoint 2007 and 2010 every day.  SharePoint Saturday Sacramento will be an educational, informative & lively day filled with sessions from respected SharePoint professionals & MVPs, covering a wide variety of SharePoint-oriented topics.  SharePoint Saturday is FREE, open to the public and is your local chance to immerse yourself in SharePoint! 

Creative Maven is proud to be sponsoring its third SharePoint Saturday.  Be sure to pick up one of our bags at the event!  Thanks to Kelley Tyburski and Kiefer Consulting for managing!!

Viral Events – What is a @SharePint Event?

With high-tech event season upon us I keep getting asked about this so I thought I’d repost a comment I made on Christian Buckley’s blog awhile back.  Being an event producer – I love these events and their viral nature.  SharePint events have no barrier to entry and a strict no vendor policy which keeps things pure and agenda-less.  I have made a few venue calls for a number of these in conjunction with events officially and unofficially shall we say and I agree with many of the “musts” that are being formulated into lists.   

-No vendor support.

-No marketing agendas.

-No one owns SharePint. Anyone can start their own SharePint event and recruit others to join.

-No members-only jackets required.

-You may only drink Guinness per Mike Ferrara – great post here

-Use the #sharepint Twitter hashtag and send the info a few times and be super clear about where and when.

-Share the information with speakers or other community members directly for retweets.

Venue Pitfalls:

Because conferences and trade shows are so jam-packed, there is usually only time for one SharePint event and the attendee number will be more than 100 people.  Most bars/venues love their places full of paying customers.  However without either someone local who knows the scene or someone to do a bit of groundwork – you can end up with a venue that isn’t big enough,  has bad flow,  not enough standing room, doesn’t have enough bar/wait staff or decides to pull out karaoke or trivia in the middle and then no one can talk.

– Opentable.com is a great resource – you can do a quick search to see if they have a private room or seating for large parties.  Many times these are free you just have to ask.

Finding a Venue & What to Ask Them:

– What is going on in the bar the night you picked?  If its trivia night or karaoke, and its a one room bar avoid it, no one will be able to talk.

– Avoid venues that require a contract for a private room, you don’t need a private room.

–Alert them of the onslaught of people coming in - they will thank you, may put up a sign and may bring on extra staff.

–Venues that typically have bigger space:  sports bars, any of the Lucky Strike Bowling Venues, Irish or English pubs, venues close to sporting arenas.

–Most people are starving after working an event all day, having a place with the grill open is awesome!

–To register or not to register, this goes back to this being loose and easy, no reg and no fees.

–If guests are cool, tip well, pay their tabs, etc… the venue will remember.  They always do.  The opposite is true though as well.  They remember…

No Pay to Play:  In my opinion, one way SharePint events could get ruined is if an event producer decides to add this to their list of “Sponsored Items” ala they start to sell “SharePint” like they do a breakfast or attendee party as a sponsorship.   Better if someone in the community hosts or sponsors. The only way to combat that would be for the community and vendors to not buy the sponsorship.  Hopefully that doesn’t happen, and it stays organic, of the community and for the community. 

History:  March 5, 2008 –  ”SharePoint By Day, SharePint by Night” – 2nd SharePint happened during the SharePoint Conference 2008 in Seattle.  It was hosted by Bob Fox and Andrew Connell and was held at Kells Irish Pub.  It was a great night and this concept took off from there.  From then notifications about SharePint events were from AC’s and other SharePoint MVP blogs.  With the dawn of Twitter and Facebook, the #sharepint hashtag took off and there are now SharePint events being held in and around hundreds of  high-tech conferences and trade shows all over the world.  Joel Oleson recaps that second SharePint event.

 Twitter - Search on #sharepint in and around an high-tech event near you….

Hope this helps those of you who are planning a SharePint!

cheers

heather

Head Maven, www.creativemaven.com

@creativemavens

Promoting and Protecting Your Image/Brand

Image is in the Eye of Everyone

As I produce more and more trade shows and receive tons and tons of business cards on-site, post-event here is what I do for networking and business development:

• Visit the Company Website
• Request to Become an Individual’s Contact on LinkedIn (if appropriate)
• Look a Person Up on Goog, Bin, … okay, Actually I Look Them Up on Facebook.

I’ve been asking colleagues and clients what they do post event/business meeting with contact and how they “check out people” afterwards.  More often than not its on LinkedIn but almost everyone I asked admitted that they look on Facebook.

Facebook has become an easy way to see what people look like as “Image” searches don’t always find exactly who you are trying to find.  I personally like the “human” factor this lends to all of us, unfortunately it also allows for more detailed personal information in the hands of many more people.  I go back and forth on FB and what I allow and don’t allow. 

Sometime soon Facebook will have more raw data on each of us than any single governmental, private or other public agency.  What to do with that info??  Time will tell.  In the meantime, make sure that your Profile Pic is looking good… and you have your privacy settings they way you want them.

A Rose By Any Other Name.

A colleague asked me about naming her new company and found that every time she thought of a great name… it was already taken.  She asked me what I thought about this and what I thought about securing one of the names she likes by changing an existing name up a bit… 

I am of two minds about this… There are many cases of image and names being the same or reflective of another company.  These things happen, good ideas overlap all the time tis the theory of memes (a unit of social information) and you have to embrace it.  Other times people are either lazy, unethical or figure if you didn’t secure it – snooze/you lose.

Embracing the Similarities!

There are two other legitimate business out there that we share a similar name with:

We Are Maven (a cool bunch of design guys in Florida).  I love their website and they do a ton of sports web design and slick ad campaigns.

Maven Creative (located in Irvine, CA – their website has been static for a long time with “New Website Launch – Sept 2010″).  I’m assume they are still going but not much has happened in about 8 months, they are also print and web design.

We don’t interact with either of these companies and seem to co-exist just fine.  We are different enough that it doesn’t really matter and frankly I’d recommend the We Are Maven guys to my clients as we don’t do what they do and I like their stuff.

On the Flipside…When Imitation is Not Flattery

Going up to GoDaddy and putting “the” or “a” or “new” in front of another companies name and trying to pass it off as legitimate is unprofessional and just bad business.  Which is the advice I gave my colleague.  If you like the name “DreamWorks” or “Microsoft” or “Sunrise Identity” you should not purchase ”thedreamworks.com” or “amicrosoft.com” or “newsunriseidentity.com” – and try to pass it off as new or that you did not realize, etc…  Bloggers, e-shopping companies, this applies to you too, with putting “blog” on the end of an existing brand.  Expect a friendly cease and desist letter and you should be embarrassed and go find another name. 

With the glut of people who buy and hold domain names it is tough to find something that is not already taken or being held hostage.  We have had to go out and spend a decent amount of money to protect our brand by looking at suggested names from GoDaddy or Dotster and hold them (this is one of the many ways Domain Registry companies make money). 

With the new .co that Domain Services are pushing there is a whole new way for your brand to get diluted.  If companies do purchase their .co name then it validates the usage in the marketplace.  So to buy or not to buy is the question.  If .co become popular what is next?   ”.c” then becomes de rigueur?  Let us hope not.

All in all like the T-Shirt from our local Sebastopol coffee shop (My Friend Joe) says:

Ethics Get Your Further

Pretty simple.  Happy Monday!

Heather

About Heather Newman, Owner & Head Maven, Creative Maven Inc.

@creativemavens, @heddanewman

Kogi Where Tweetin Meets Eatin – Tablesmackin via @whereLA

Video maven, Allison and I were walking up to the Golden Gopher (my favorite downtown LA faux-dive) one night to check it out for a potential after party place about two years ago and we were not thrilled that there seemed to be a line out the door on a weeknight.  We soon discovered it wasn’t for the bar, but for the Kogi BBQ truck parked outside. At this point Kogi was still a brand new concept and was funny to see Louboutins and Manolos in line for it that night. Kogi is still all the rage and the way you find out where they are is to follow them on Twitter.  @kogibbq or their website – http://kogibbq.com/  Kinda reminds me of my favorite street meat in NYC (Halal on 52/53rd and 6th Ave), I’ve stood in the rain and snow for that myself.

Props to @WhereLA Magazine Editor Katie McCarthy who coined “Tweeting meets eating” – for this month’s Where Magazine (my bible when I come to any city) the article is all about food trucks and curbside eating and is great.

Kogi is damn awful good and definitely part of the zeitgeist of LA, along with tons of other fun, quirky purveyors, I’ll let you know where we end up this week and who we try…. 

What are your favorite street vendors or trucks… in any city – love to know!

Happy Late Night Curbside Eating y’all!

Mavens on the Town in NOLA

About Heather Newman, Owner & Head Maven, Creative Maven Inc.

@creativemavens, @heddanewman



The Art of Self-Promotion #1 – Speaking at High-Tech Events, Conferences & Tradeshows

I was recently asked following question:

I am thinking about getting back into speaking at some more conferences abroad. I am honestly not that well-connected ((internationally) after leaving a large technology company based in Redmond, WA) so I was wondering if you have any good input to where and how to market myself?

Here are some ideas and opinions I have about this and I invite those of you who choose speakers for conferences or who speak regularly to chime in and see what you think too.

1. Understand the Event Producer Game

For the most part event producers in the high-tech arena fall in to a handful of categories:

 ○ Big Time - Large technology companies that host their own events to showcase and educate their customers and partners on their products. i.e: Microsoft (TechEd, PDC, Convergence); Oracle (OpenWorld), Lotus (Lotusphere) – The crème de la crème.

○ 3PM Circuit - Third-party media companies who host events to educate attendees and as a revenue-stream/channel to sell subscriptions, memberships, ad space, publications (and all the articles, top ten lists and best of listings inside as well). Just look at the very bottom of an event’s website to see who is “producing” GenericCon, GenericConnections, or GenericSummit. I call it a circuit as I know many people who speak at all of the events in a circuit and do very well by them. There are some great events in this space and some not so great, do your homework.

○ Opinions - Analyst companies who host events to educate consumers about their non-biased opinions of who the movers and shakers are in the marketplace. i.e.: Gartner, Forrester, IDC (only if you sponsor or are an analyst will you speak here).

○ Assoc. - Professional associations, community and user groups usually host educational and community building events to strengthen community ties and add memberships to their associations lists, newsletters, certifications and content. i.e.: Professional Association of SQL Server (PASS), SharePoint Saturdays, and the like. (These are great for getting your feet wet.)

That said, you and your content need do one of three things:

-Draw Butts in Seats (BIS) which increases revenue for the event

-Enhance or expand the importance in the marketplace of the event (fresh, new content)

-Shake things up (though they will never admit it) some organizers want a few rabble rousers to speak in order to give things a goose, get some press and tweet, tweet, tweets!

2. You Must Rock and Be Specific

What do you know and know well? Attendee/customers and all the other speakers (PMS, devs, consultants) who are there to propel their businesses, consulting services, products and themselves will be there watching, assessing and reviewing (blogs & tweets). If you don’t know your stuff, haven’t presented in a while or are regurgitating content (yours or massaged from another). GET THE HOOK & GET OFF THE STAGE.

○ Know your subject and know it well. Be ready to riff, keep going if your demo fails and to be asked the hard questions.

○ Practice, practice, practice. (Us theater folk)…NEVER go on stage without rehearsing. I still do anytime I know I’m putting it out there.

○ Tell your barber, bartender, or colleague the rough outline of the talk – if you can’t, you don’t know it

○ Once you passed that test, give it to your spouse and kids, and take them for pizza after – they will be one of your toughest audiences

○ Tape yourself and watch for the “ums” and that you haven’t smiled once. Let people see you actually LIKE what you are talking about  – More Tips on Presenting will follow in The Art of Self-Promotion #2 - Find Your Inner Orator

3. Ready Made or Get It Ready Content

Do you already have content that is ready-consumable that you can use (blog posts, books/e-books, standard presentations that you keep in your back pocket)? Fantastic! If not, you need to do some research, and start looking at event content in your arena.

○ What grabs you – most event websites show at least the titles if not the entire abstracts of sessions. Review how titles are built that grab attention and aren’t cheesy

○ Where do you fit – get familiar with track names, which one would your talk fall into? Make it easy for an organizer to pick you by using the track name in your title or abstract

○ Who’s on first – look at job titles and company names and see who is getting chosen. See who is “buying” into speaking slots through sponsorships (showcase session or vendor session) and who is just speaking. You can always purchase a sponsorship/booth if you want a guaranteed slot.

4. First Not Best (with props to Al Ries and Jack Trout, if you haven’t read The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing, you are just plain silly – thank you @TFerriss)

I know I said know your stuff and be a rock star, which I still uphold. But another item to consider is to be on the look out for “Calls for Content” or “Calls for Papers” at the events in your industry that you attend or would like to attend.

BE FIRST! Early birds often get the worm on these. Great titles, snappy abstracts and if you have established a name for yourself are all good too. But don’t miss an opportunity because you weren’t paying attention. Sign up & subscribe to the event’s newsletter, blog, Twitter account. Create a rule in your email to watch out for the words “Call for Content”. If you are super smart you would get to know the event organizers when you go to these events.

Maven Insider Tip (MIT) – event organizers tend to be women (apologies for the stereotype)

What do women like? (That’s a whole other blog post, however…) Having their names remembered and an attendee telling them what a great job they have done organizing the event  (and that you’d love to be a speaker sometime). Whomever is organizing – male or female, everybody loves a compliment – get to know them. They are an influencer and love people who make their jobs easier.  Bugging someone about speaking at an event the day before it starts is a sure-fire direct route to the “round file”.

5. Make Your List Check It Twice

After all that you need to put together your list of events that you’d like to target and see if you can figure out when they go out with their Call for Content or if they don’t officially have one, what do they do? Most of this info is on an event’s website.

If not you can start by sending an email to the info@genericevent.com and simply ask. Again if you know a producer ask them. They may not be able to tell you but you can ask to be considered, put on “the list” or when to check back.

Maybe send them something like this….

Hi Heather, I’m interested in being a speaker at this year’s generic event do you know when the call for content opens? If not is there a way to be put on the email list for notification? I would appreciate it.

One last question, is there someone else I should ask about this – a content owner or manager that influences these decisions? Here are a couple of ideas I have that match up with some of the tracks from last year’s event (insert link or attach it) that I think will really excite attendees. You did such a great job organizing the event last year and I’m eager to be a part of it. I hope all is good with you. Thanks for the information.

Best,

me

Happy Hunting and I’d love to hear if any of these ideas helped snagging a speaking slot or other helpful hints from you rock star speakers out there.

Cheers!

Heather

Head Maven

 

About Heather Newman, Owner & Head Maven, Creative Maven Inc.

@creativemavens, @heddanewman

Check out Geekwire.com – @geekwirenews

Event/Expo Maven, Sarah Cook’s Brother-in-Law John just launched a great new site/blog/news extravaganza for us Geeks!!  Check it out!  It’s awesome.  Twitter at @geekwirenews.  www.geekwire.com

Congrats John & Todd!!

 

 

 

 

 

No I will not fix your computer!!!

Prince Concert – Oakland – Feb 23 – Funky and Tight

Prince is and has been one of my favorite artists since I bought one of my first few .45 records.  Funny enough the best thing about pulling these out is that song prices are now back to what they were in the early 80′s.  99 cents,  baby.  But back then you got a “B” side…  Here that music industry?!? 

Yes, I still have my vinyl

This was my second Prince concert, I saw him in Seattle at the Key Arena for his Musicology Tour which was amazing.  Stand out vision was Prince sitting on a chair playing an acoustic version of Little Red Corvette, beautiful. 

Wednesdays concert however was out of this world.  My two favorite songs bar none are Baby I’m A Star, which he played full length and Love Bizarre which he also played full length with Sheila E.   I may never need to see another concert again.

Go See This Show

A friend and I were in the upper balcony but it didn’t matter.  We had an amazing view of the symbol stage and danced for three hours.  My event planner self drooled the entire time.  Lights, screens, confetti bursts were impeccably tight just like Prince commands his band and wears his pants.  Not a surprise, but a delight.  Kudos, production team, you rocked it.

 We demand a lot our of our artists (our royalty)… we grow up with them, we support their extravagant lifestyles, we live their heartbreaks, foibles and achievements.  Ultimately we just want to see them have an amazing time when they perform.  All of us in Oakland on Wednesday night bore witness to that.  An artist so very ahead of his time for so long, reveling in a gigantic, prolific body of work, with fans who couldn’t get enough.  A GREAT NIGHT of smiles, booty shakes, licks, riffs, and funk.  We needed some foot spray.

Opening Band

Larry Graham and his band (Graham Central Station) opened with some amazing funky stuff which included hits from his days with Sly and the Family Stone.  The set was one-hour and crazy fun.

Prince Set List – Wed Feb 23 – Oracle Arena, Oaktown

Let’s Go Crazy

Delirious

1999

Little Red Corvette

The Glamorous Life – Sheila E.

Somewhere Here on Earth

I Love U But I Don’t Trust U Anymore

Controversy

Sheila E. came on again and stayed till the end

Clap Your Hands, Stomp Your Feet

Love Bizarre (Prince & Sheila E.)

Play That Funky Music

Larry Graham back onstage with members of the Family Stone

Thank u (Sly Cover)

Prince tossed his guitar in crowd

Sexy Dancer/Freak Out (Le Freak)

Love Rollercoaster/Housequake (partial) – Cellphone Wave

In The Arms of An Angel (Singers)

If I Was UR Girlfriend

Kiss

Purple Rain

Dance (Disco Heat)

Encore

Baby I’m a Star

2nd Encore

When Doves Cry

Machine Gun

Prince riffing electronic style on his piano and samples of:

Nasty Girl / Sign O the Times / Alphabet Street / Forever in my Life / Darling Nikki (this was a huge tease, we all went crazy but he didn’t sing it) / Pop Life / Single Ladies / Darling Nikki again (another tease)/Black Sweat / Single Ladies (tease, and giving Sheila E. a hard time)

The Bird

Jungle Love

Pure utter delight.

Bocce & Great Zin In The Neighborhood – @Gratonridge

Had a ton of visitors to the house over the last two weeks and we explored a bunch of lovely family owned wineries within a few miles of the house.  One of our favorites:

Graton Ridge – http://gratonridge.com/  We had a lovely tasting at Graton Ridge – Barbara was so sweet and their Pinot Noir and Zinfandels were wonderful.  They have a gorgeous picnic area and bocce court.  I cannot wait to bring friends and come back soon. 

If you are in the area, do go say hello!

Technorati Tag – SCHPZ3C6RDVK

Macworld 2011 – Small but Jampacked with Accessories – @igrilltweets @TenOneDesign @sleeve360 @freehands

Everyone is talking about how Macworld has diminished in importance since Apple pulled out.  This was my first Macworld so I have no comparison to past shows.  However comparative to the high-tech events that I work on and attend, this was teeny tiny.  However many many gentlemen with gigantic backpacks were all a flutter in every aisle.  Ariana and I looked across the entire expo and we counted 3 other women, typical.

We did expo only and I got the funny “artsy” pass.  The Mobile App Showcase area that got so much play in the press was super small.  The event organizers used circle kiosks and grouped them so closely together it was really hard to maneuver through.  I would have set up a large square with storage in the middle and given vendors a space along the square.  Most of app vendors didn’t need a kiosk as they were showing apps directly on phones.  A Wolfvision Visualizer projecting onto a larger screen might have helped as well, although they are spendy.  Most of the expo hall booths that we set up do not have a commerce end to them.  It was weird and cool to be able to buy things from the vendors.  I picked up a couple of things for my husband’s iPad. 

For the most part it was the accessories that I liked, I have a Zune MP3 player and a Windows 7 Phone so I don’t use iTunes and there really weren’t many “partners” there, no Adobe, no Microsoft booths. 

Items I Brought Home:

"Fling" just sounds better than "Joystick"

 

Fling  – Made by TenOne design, Fling is a tactile analog joystick for the iPad. There are two suction cups attached to clear engineer grade resin thumb pads. They attach to the sides of your iPad and practically disappear when you use them.   You shoot, hit, etc… with one and move with the other – really innovative. @TenOneDesigns

 

Sleeve 360 - I watched one of the mobile app vendors spin his iPad around and thought it was cool and turned and there was the Sleeve 360 booth.  There are tons of cases that prop up the iPad in different angles but this one tethers to your hand.  It also props up and it does envelope your iPad to protect it.  Its nice when you are carrying your iPad from room to room you put your hand in the sleeve and hold it (as we know dropping an iPad is very very bad).   @Sleeve360

Items I Liked:

iGrill - Produced by iDevices.  This is just awesome out of the box thinking.  Only real non-tech or music application I’ve seen for an ianything product.  Connect your iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch to the iGrill thermometer via Bluetooth, and monitor the temperature of what you are cooking  from anywhere within 200 feet via the iGrill app. I LOVED that you could use this in your kitchen and hang it from your stove with the probe inside the oven (no opening the door).  This device is now in Apple Stores.  iDevices is a company to watch for new interesting products and apps.  Retail iGrill is $99.99  @igrilltweets

Grilling Up Some Turkey at MacWorld

Freehands Gloves - I’m in love and I actually just ordered a pair of these.  I’m a chronic texter and I take a million photos so I’m not sure why I didn’t get a pair at the event.   Freehands gloves feature fold-back index finger and thumb tips to let you text, adjust your MP3 player, take photos and adjust one of your contacts in the cold.  They have tons of styles for both men and women and the most expensive pair is $27.95.  @freehands

Free Your Fingers!!!

Assero Defender - This is great for the person on the go that wants to actually use their iPad when they aren’t sitting.  It’s a backpack/shoulder bag/Baby Bjorn for your iPad.  Basically you can flip the front zip pocket down and use your iPad while standing or walking.   A mobile office with lots of smart bells and whistles for the user, nice job. @Assero2010

The Pièce de Résistance:

EZTY – Moveable, reusable long life clips and tie wraps.  This little gadget is awesome and I love that they are reusable and removable.  I hate using zip ties and then having to just toss them – so wasteful.  They have some other great products as well – Joan who gave the demo was lovely too.  High strength interlocked connections, “Tilt & Zip by HAND” for fast connection of ovals, Cut & Connect any length needed, Flexible-Stretchable snug holding of objects, NO TOOLS.

How Did They Know I'm a Superhero?

Something that struck me about all of the vendors I talked with (which include all of the above) is that they were all nice people who were passionate about their products and came from all over the U.S. to exhibit. It was nice to talk directly with the people who dreamed up, designed and created a product.  Something that you don’t always get at a conference.

After a good two-hour walk around the stalls, Ariana and I headed to a favorite by the Moscone Center – Fang Restaurant – 660 Howard St  – Yum!  Salt & Pepper Mushrooms, Cooling Lettuce Wraps and Pan Fried Chicken in Yellow Curry were fantastic.  Also try the Chrysanthemum tea, tastes great and gorgeous in the cup.

All in all an interesting day.

Macworld 2011 (www.macworldexpo.com) is a four-day event that educates, entertains and immerses attendees in the Apple products community. A comprehensive expo hall offers access to hundreds of Mac products and services, paired with expert advice, demonstrations and instruction. Macworld 2011 conference programs feature industry leading minds, presenting cutting edge product training on the topics attendees most want to see. From Mac Power Users to creative professionals to first-time users to Enterprise computing professionals, Macworld 2011 has the conference content, special presentations and exhibit hall attractions that create what has been called “Mecca for Mac Users.”