I’m coming to terms with the fact that I likely won’t be attending SXSW this March. I also doubt I will be going to PAB and PodCamp Toronto. These are conferences I really wish I could be there for.

I’m not complaining, because I’m lucky to have a great job with amazing people. The thing is that my vacation days are too few to spend away at conferences, I spend what I have with my family.

I miss you

The thing is that I miss you. I miss my friends from the aforementioned conferences. Each one is like summer camp to me (ok, not PodCamp Toronto, because that’s in February).

The less often I am able to attend, the more these friendships become dreaded long-distance relationships. We all know how they end up, right? I’d sooner be always connecting, but I know it’s not always possible.

I try to stay in touch online, but it’s next to impossible to do so. With Google Plus being added to the equation, it’s even harder to remain connected to everyone across so many social networking sites.

So consider this a message to you, my long-distance conference comrades. Know that I’m thinking of you. Know that I miss you. I hope our paths cross again one day sooner than later. Slan go foill!

What do you do to keep connected and to help cure the post conference relationship ruts?

I was watching New York Times best-selling author, Julien Smith‘s presentation on Ustream live from PodCamp Montreal today. As he was presenting I was enjoying the back channel discussions in the chat room with some new and old friends.

I was talking with musecrossing quite a bit, I didn’t get her name (what’s your name?). She wasn’t familiar with Julien, so we were talking a bit about him. I was telling her about his old podcast In Over Your Head and about his excellent book Trust Agents.

Something struck me when musecrossing asked how Julien and his co-author Chris Brogan met. How did two bloggers meet to produce a New York Time’s bestseller?

I replied that they both met at the first PodCamp in Boston a few years ago. Just as I wrote this my friend Merlene Paynter replied: “I think Chris & Julien met at the first Podcamp Boston several years ago.” We both replied the same thing. A light bulb went off in my head about the value in these gatherings. I should mention that I’ve never questioned the value in attending, but it was interesting to think a little more about the topic.

Attending conferences and unconferences is key to building relationships. I’ve often talked about handshakes, high-fives and hugs that take your online relationships so much further when you actually meet in person.

Relationships often begin at events too. I first met Julien at Podcasters Across Borders in 2006, I don’t think we had ever met online before that. I first met the guys at Griffin when they sponsored the first BarCamp Nashville in 2007. Who knew then that I’d end up working for them?

The third BarCamp Nashville is coming to town October 17th, I encourage you to come join in on the incredible sessions and hallway conversations. Don’t be a wallflower either. Start your own and join in on discussions. Be a part of BarCamp, it’s free to attend. You’ve got nothing to lose!

By attending a conference or unconference you’ll be building new relationships, some of which will become friendships. Who knows, you may even end up with a New York Times best seller too. What’s stopping you?

<waving hi to my friends in Montreal>

I came across a couple of tweets the other day from friends who said I was their first follow. The tweets were being generated by a nifty little service that searches your Twitter history to see who you followed first called My First Follow.

As it turns out my friend Julien Smith was my first follow. It makes so much sense to me too, because he’s a great guy who is a real asset to our space. Julien is a veteran podcaster who I first met back in 2006 at the first PodCasters Across Borders. I’m a big fan of his former(?) podcast In Over Your Head and his blog. You should swing by to see why he inspired me to get tweeting.

I’m very excited to see what he and Chris Brogan will deliver when they release their book Trust Agents. In the mean time, you can get a taste of their collaborative work from their first white paper together: Trust Economies.

Who was your first follow? Why did you follow that person?

I recently posted about being upset that I was missing the third annual Podcasters Across Borders (PAB) conference. Unfortunately circumstances did not allow me to head to Kingston, Ontario to re-connect with my fellow podcasting brothers and sisters from home, I miss them.

Luckily in this day and age we are privileged enough to have simple tools to experience the next best thing to being there.

The picture in this post illustrates how I was able to create my own PAB control center. I could watch and listen to the conference, see pictures  during and after the sessions, interact with the attendees, and even ask a question to a speaker (thanks Eden).

Here’s five things you must have to attend conferences from your couch:

1. Ustream live video: Ustream is a free video streaming service that allows you to broadcast, in real-time, straight from your computer. I need to give a special mention and thank you to Chris Penn for setting this up.
2. Meebo Chat Room: Meebo is one of a few different free chat room hosts. It is very simple to set and to embed directly into your blog, like Chris did on Marketing Over Coffee. I embedded the chat room into Dave Made That (as seen above). This way I could view the photo slide show as I interacted with the users. The chat also was a “back channel” for the attendees to interact with one another, and with the visitors who were not fortunate enough to be there in person.
3. Flickr Slideshow: Flickr is the most popular photo hosting service online. It’s free to use with a Yahoo account, plus you can pay for a pro account now, and upload videos too. Although, I’m not sure why you would want to with countless other free video hosting sites out there. I pay for a pro account to have plenty of space to host my images. Photos “tagged” with PAB2008 automatically feed into the slideshow. I used the following code to get this to work:
   • <iframe src=”http://www.flickr.com/slideShow/index.gne?group_id=&user_id=&set_id=&tags=pab2008” align=”middle” frameborder=”0″ height=”300″ scrolling=”no” width=”325″></iframe>
     <small>Tag your photos: <strong>PAB2008</strong> </small>
4. Twhirl: This is a Twitter client that runs on Adobe Air. Twhirl takes my Twitter account and makes it available on my desktop, without the need of a browser to view it in. This is very handy to have multiple items open at the same time. It updates in real time (with a slight lag), so I can see when I have new messages, or when there’s new messages from PAB.
5. Friends: What’s the point of all of this interaction if you don’t have friends at these conferences? Having friends there sure helps when you need a camera’s audio repaired (thanks Chris), or you have a comment for a speaker (thanks Eden), or you simply want to see how everybody looks this year (beautiful by the way!).

Feel free to ask me any questions should you have them. If you have items you can’t live without when attending conferences from your couch please let me know.

See you next year for sure Pabsters. :-)

[tags]pab2008, pab08, podcasters across borders, barginista, marketing over coffee, ustream, flickr, meebo, virtual conferences, chris penn[/tags]

I recently upgraded my very outdated version of WordPress for my blog/podcast Two Boobs and a Baby +. The template I was using was one that I had tweaked here and there using my archaic idea of PHP (I used HTML instead). When the upgrade was completed my blog was down.

I was getting loads of errors messages, had trouble logging into the admin and more. My site was a mess and I was stuck. I created a new folder and uploaded a clean version of WordPress to try to migrate the two, but it didn’t work. I tried a bunch of different things, but had no success, so I did what any social networking geek would do, I tweeted for help.

Minutes passed and friends on Twitter reached out to me to help. Friends like @groovysoup, @studionashvegas, @hockeyskates, @kg4hsr and @tommyvallier. While everyone scrambled to offer to help, Tommy Vallier IM’d me over Skype to get right down to business.

Between chatting about my wishing I was at Podcasters Across Borders this weekend, my love for Kingston (Ontario), beer, scotch and other great topics, he fixed my blog. He fixed it all. Tommy Vallier is my hero! Thank you SO much Tommy.

I’ve had other good Twitter friends help me with WordPress woes before, @imnico comes to mind immediately.

This is just a big virtual hug to my friends in Twitterland and on the other social networks I spend so much time on. You are all my heroes. Thanks everybody.

I’d love to hear how friends on Twitter have helped you, or how you have been able to help your Twitter family. Let’s share some stories people.

[tags]@groovysoup, @studionashvegas, @hockeyskates, @kg4hsr, @tommyvallier, @imnico, Tommy Vallier, Podcasters Across Borders, PAB2008, Kingston, Ontario, Two Boobs and a Baby[/tags] 

Mark and Bob are the long-time hosts of The Canadian Podcast Buffet, a weekly spotlight on new Canadian podcasts, production tricks and tips and an all around fun 30+ minutes. I consider these guys to be two of the most important people in podcasting today. They have dedicated countless hours to supporting the Canadian podcasting community and are both truly incredible people, not to mention experts in audio production and promotion.

Three years ago Bob and Mark decided that a new conference was needed to embrace podcasting in Canada and beyond. Podcasters Across Borders was born. It has been held each year in one of my favorite cities in the world, Kingston, Ontario.

My first year at PAB was a wild one, because it was my first geek conference. Walking into a room and hearing so many familiar voices was bizarre, because I hadn’t met most of them before. The voices included people like: Nora Young and Cathi Bond, Julien Smith, Scarborough Dude, Jay Moonah, Tim Pilgrim, Shane and Tom, Cat, Tod Maffin, Arthur Masters, Bruce Murray, Hugh McGuire, Andy and Vivian, Ross and Karen and a bunch of people I’m forgetting at the time of this quick post (so sorry to have missed you, you know I love ya.)

I won’t go into great detail of the session content from PAB2006 and PAB2007, but I can assure you that PAB2008 is so worth attending. Like most tech conferences I attend, my highlights always involve the cold beverages and conversation that goes on afterwards. I’m going to miss that the most this year.

The three hour jaunt from Toronto to Kingston (brutally painful along the 401) was nothing compared with traveling from Nashville where I live now. My podcasting partner in crime and fellow boob will be away that weekend, and my in-laws are unavailable to sit our kids for the few days of PAB2008. So I’m stuck here longing for K-town and my fellow Tim Horton’s hopping, Creemore chugging, maple-cured mates. I’ll be thinking of you guys.

As the title of this post goes: If you have any interest in podcasting you need to be here, this is no understatement. Make the trip to Kingston this June 20, 21, 22 for a weekend that any podcaster would be nuts to miss. Have fun.

[tags]tim hortons, creemore, pab2006, pab2007, pab2008, podcasters across borders, canadian podcast buffet, mark blevis, bob goyteche, Nora Young and Cathi Bond, Julien Smith, Scarborough Dude, Jay Moonah, Shane and Tom, CatFish Show, Tod Maffin, Arthur Masters, Bruce Murray, Hugh McGuire, Tim Pilgrim, Andycast, CLIP podcast, Zee and Zed, DryShave, Kingston, Ontario[/tags]