BlogSavannah Un-Conference ‘07 Wrap Up
January 27, 2007
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It was a good day. We met lots of interesting folks. Learned some things too. Go figure.
Gorgeous was amused by the number of folks who came in, opened up their laptops and immediately buried their heads in them. Welcome to the blogger world, honey.
There were camera’s everywhere. I got busted trying to feed my addiction at the Starbuck’s trough. I think that may be one of the least flattering pics of me taken in quite a while! That’s what I get for letting a camera wielder sneak up behind me.
I was a little disappointed about the schedule because the session I was facilitating was opposite the session on podcasting led by Phil Sellers of iTourSavannah. Since I (finally) acquired an iPod of my very own a week or two ago I find myself suddenly interested in things podcastish.
However it all worked out because our intrepid host Drew over at BlogSavannah realized very early on that there was a significant portion of the attenders who haven’t started blogging yet and really wanted a brief introduction to the basics of what blogging is, the terminology, and such.
So he set up an impromptu session and had Josh Hallett, who is a blog and social media consultant out of Orlando, give a basic intro to blogging for the uninitiated while the rest of us met with Phil and learned about podcasting.
Phil started by telling us how easy podcasting was and how little equipment you need to get up and running. But then spent a bunch of time sharing all the equipment he uses to create his podcasts. He made the whole thing sound rather expensive.
Fortunately the guys from Evoca were there and did a quick little demonstration of their product. They called into their account from their cell phone, talked for a moment and then accessed the message from their laptop a few seconds later. I’ll be taking a closer look at their product in the days to come. It sound like it has some potential.
Then it was time for my session. There was lots of interest in the session and our designated room was fairly full. I had my Business Blogging 101 notes ready to handout to folks.
Unfortunately there was one lady in particular who pretty much dominated the discussion. She came across a little hostile to blogging in general and business blogging in particular. She seemed intent on getting everyone in the room to accept her particular definition of what a blog was and tried to keep the discussion focused on the dangers of blogging.
I tried to keep the discussion moving along without losing my cool or being rude. It was a good experience for me.
Amber Rhea over at the Georgia Podcast Network (who was wearing a t-shirt that said, “I’m Podcasting This”) was there recording the session. So whenever they get it posted we’ll be able to tell how successful I was at managing that challenge.
Sherry Heyl wrote up an excellent summary of the talk live while it was happening.
Then it was time for Jennifer Abshire to lead a discussion about PR and Blogging. It was a revealing hour.
If I understood her correctly she said her approach to blogging was to find the prominent bloggers in the area and then basically feed them press releases hoping they write about them. I’m not thinking that approach will be all that effective for her as that’s not really how most bloggers that I know work.
It was hard to be certain what she was getting at though because the same person was dominating the discussion there too.
Jennifer did say that she encourages some of her clients to blog, but only as personal blogs relatively detached from their businesses.
I came away with the feeling that the PR industry still has a bit to learn about blogging and it’s usefulness to their cause. At least here in Savannah.
The session I enjoyed the most after lunch was lead by Scott Larson who is a reporter for our local paper on the City Beat and is actually blogging at The City Unfiltered.
The big question in the room was Are Bloggers Journalists? To me the answer seemed obvious: Some are but most aren’t.
There was a large contingent from SavannahNow (a really good local Savannah community site owned and run by the news paper) in the room for this one. And they seemed to be the only ones in the room who struggled with the issue at all.
What they really seemed to mean by the question was Can Bloggers Be Journalists? Um, yeah. Doesn’t seem to be such a hard thing for me to get my mind around.
I’ll cut them some slack, though. The “new media” is directly affecting them and their jobs in ways I probably don’t understand.
All in all it was a good day. Somehow Gorgeous managed to remain nearly unphotographed throughout the day. This is the closest I could find of her sitting next to me.
But we were both exhausted by the time it was over so we skipped dinner. I managed to fall asleep on the couch about 8:30 last night.
You handled the challenging audience member well. I try to think of people like that as a gift, because when you have to defend your ideas, often times your convictions become stronger.
As for the ‘audience member’ telling somebody what a blog is and what they should do with it when they don’t actually do it is an interesting position. Kinda like telling somebody how to raise their children.
Thanks for the encouragement, Sherry. I agree with you that it was a good experience to go through and learn from.
Josh, I joke with folks that I am the perfect parent because I don’t have any kids and therefore haven’t made any mistakes yet. Who was it that said, “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, criticize.”?
“I came away with the feeling that the PR industry still has a bit to learn about blogging and it’s usefulness to their cause. At least here in Savannah.”
I could not bare to stay in that session.
As for the coffee picture, you may hate it now, but as a woman that lost her mother recently, if you have kids, that picture will mean something to them.
Hey Shawn, sorry to hear about your mom. I was amused as much as anything about the photo. I remember noticing her behind me just as she snapped the picture which caught me by surprise and gave me that “guilty” look. I laughed about it with her at the time. And I’m still laughing at how goofy I look now.
Glad to see you are laughing at the photo.
If I couldn’t laugh at myself I’d be very uptight indeed!
Wow - am I feeling a day late and a dollar short
I’d been discouraged on my personal Blog for quite a while and hadn’t been to Liz’s site for months. Then, after its said and done, I see you in the Savannah Morning News and now find all this.
I say to you Chris Cree - way to go! Took the risk and put yourself “out there.” You’ve come a long way in a short time - kudos to you.
Mark
Mark! I was thinking about you Friday. Bummer that we didn’t get a chance to meet.
Didn’t realize we made the paper. Should have figured that one out with SavannahNow as a sponsor for the event. Doh!
Hey Chris,
I felt your pain with the “audience member” but I was impressed with 2 things in particular:
1. You’re ability to accept and manage the disagreements in the room, as well as…
2. Your ability to facilitate the session without manipulating it. I could see you’ve got tremendous experience with what you were talking about but I never got the impression that you were trying to prove you were an expert, just share your knowledge.
I learned a lot from the discussion. I’ll let you know when our blog’s up so we can get a critique from you.
Hey Drew! Thanks for the insight. I certainly don’t claim to have all the answers. And I see a whole lot of gray area where blogging is concerned. There’s tons to be learned from most everyone.
Give us a holler when you are up and running with your site. I’m looking forward to seeing what y’all come up with.
Ah, the “audience member.” I got a reply from that person on my blog. Of course, I had to respond. Having been a presenter for another technology workshop before, I have to give you kudos for maintaining composure and not calling an all-out war. I really felt that there were so many people in the room that were new to the blogging world and just wanted insight and ideas, not to have the entire blogging medium blown apart.
As for Gorgeous not being photographed, there is one of her on Pixels, but she is next to me.
I agree with the PR thing. I was hoping to come away with some tactics from that session that I could use for CPR, but was shocked that it was more reliant on professional bloggers to promote. It seemed sorta backwards to me. I look at blogging for PR (for our purposes) as a way to provide further insight and validation to our activities. I have not been on top of it as much as I should, but am trying to get better. I feel that there is so much else going on that isn’t seen through our website that others should know. I look to our blog as a way to invite others to this information. But that’s just my opinion.
Say hi to gorgeous for me.
Ah, There she is (on the left).
Jim Turner over at One By One Media had a good post over the weekend about some PR folks getting a failing grade where bloggers are concerned.
I think it will be a while yet before the old school communicators really begin to understand blogging and all it can do for them. I guess the rules are just a little different than what they are used to.