March 2006 – Planning My Month In America

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The DukeOkay so I’m now seriously planning in my head what I’m up to in March. As usual, March appears to be “the month of conferences” it makes sense for me to attend a couple of these – hence March as my month in America. Cameron did ask ‘haven’t you heard of the internet?’ when I told him the plans, but the response to that is simply ‘well I met Mick at Etech 2004 and look what happened…’

Etech starts as the fixed point of the trip – I’m definitly, no stopping me, guaranteed going to be there. While I’m not speaking this year, I’ll be going podcast crazy at the event to bring all you people who have heard of the internet some of the best as-live coverage as possible. Joining me in co-hosting duties will be (fingers crossed) Nicole Simon.

It looks like just before Etech I’ll fly into LA, because BarCamp is the Saturday and Sunday directly before Etech. W00t!!! Lance Anderson has promised to take me on the LA tour as well as supply a handy sofa. And I get to take a delightful 2 hour train journey down the coast to San Diego on Monday mornign for Etech. Sounds like a plan to me.

The ‘still to plan’ bit comes after Etech. Now I could just fly home and be done with the USA after that, but there’s the intruiging possibility of paying a visit to SXSW Interactive and doing some reporting there. It adds another week to the schedule and the subsequent cost, and I’m still trying to decide if it will be worthwhile in the long run in terms of contacts, news, and influence. Anyone had experience of SXSW and could guide me (better yet, anyone with a sofa in Austin TX?)

Now lets say I’m completely mad (or have gigs to cover the above events) then I can potentially do a mileage run from Texas to Las Vegas by nipping home to Edinburgh for a few days, then hauling myself back out to Mix06 – possibly with a stop in Seattle the weekend before. It’s all doable on paper, and while I’m still waiting for some parts of the budget to fall into place, I’m going to be at some of these events, if not all of them.

Hmmm… does anyone want to buy an advertsing patch on my waistcoats?