Monday, February 26, 2007
PodcampToronto 2007
I attended the first ever PodCamp Toronto the last weekend in February. Wow! What a weekend! My head is bursting with new ideas, new lingo, new possibilities...
I had absolutely no idea what to expect of this "unconference" on podcasting. Over 300 people signed up for the weekend and there were 3 sessions going on at a time between 10 am and 4 pm. People came in from Ottawa, Montreal, the States and areas around Toronto as far away as London (Ontario, that is). You can view the schedule and even see the sessions that were recorded here.
The spirit was wonderful. Everyone was open, happy to meet and greet new people and share information. It was run on a totally volunteer basis and the organizers did a terrific job.
I hadn't been in the building for more than 5 minutes when I bumped into Stephanie and David Ciccarelli from voices.com I've been corresponding back and forth with them for the past couple of years and am a member of their site They are a terrific couple and it was great finally meeting them in person.
Not five minutes later I finally met my colleague from Buffalo, Peter O'Connell We've been talking online about meeting up for months so it was great to finally get a chance to talk to him face to face. Peter also presented a session on PodPresence (aka "Awesome Sounding Podcasts") and proved that he's not only a great voice talent but knows his stuff and can really take charge of the room.
I also bumped into Bill Sweetman from whom I had taken an internet marketing course a couple of years ago and Amber MacArthur who did the TV interview with me that aired last October.
Here's a picture of yours truly (white sweater and blue jeans just behind the video camera) at the first session with Mitchell Joel on branding.
Thanks to rhyndman for the picture. The original can be found on Flickr
This was an excellent way to start the weekend and it just kept getting better. Some of the sessions I managed to attend included corporate podcasting, another one on building a community to leverage your brand, Peter's talk on PodPresence, editing techniques, how to increase your podcast's reach (can be applied to blogs and websites as well), how to monetize your podcast, how to choose a unique name for a podcast and more - then I ran out of juice and had to go home to rest my head!
I wanted to be able to divide myself into three to attend more sessions. Thank goodness they are online so I'll be able to watch them at my leisure.
I learned a lot about podcasting and SEO and social networking and Web 2.0 and branding - until my head was spinning. I also learned how much I still have to learn - this technology changes minute by minute. An invigorating weekend for sure.
Labels: podcamptoronto
It was a pleasure to meet you too!
I want to thank you again for writing such wonderful articles for the clients to give a voice talent's point of view when budgeting and if sound should be used on a website.
The MESH Conference is coming up in Toronto in May. Maybe we'll see you there too? I believe Amber will likely be there also.
Best wishes,
Stephanie
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