This past week, I attended #140conf in New York City.  Every session was recorded for posterity, so if you weren’t there, you can see what you missed at your leisure.

Instead of recapping the event with a play-by-play, I’d rather share one key observation I made during the event that, I soon realized, applies to conferences as a whole:

Always deliver more in person than you deliver online.

More of what, you might ask?

Exactly.

Whether you’re a conference organizer, speaker or attendee, your goals may differ but the same rule applies: You always want to get more from the people you’re staring at than what they make available to you digitally.

But in order to do that, you first need to give more of yourself.

Web time is compartmentalized; face time is linear.  Face time is worth more.

We have to earn the benefits that come with face time.

Here’s how you can do that.

10 Tips for Conference Organizers

1. Promise attendees, speakers and sponsors one specific payoff; then deliver it.
2. Start on time, stay on time, stop on time.
3. Make it easy for attendees to network before, during and after the event.
4. Don’t enforce your event’s brand at the expense of your audience’s experience.
5. Nourish the attention spans of your attendees.
6. Sponsors deserve better than being chained to display tables and ignored.
7. Provide more value than the ticket price would suggest.
8. Would you pay to attend your own event?  If not, add value until you would.
9. Be conscious of homogeneity; sexism, racism and cronyism damage when implied.
10. Promoting your event doesn’t stop when the event itself stops.

That last point deserves some explanation.

Having organized several live events myself, I’m very aware that the core team of organizers is generally exhausted by the time the event is over.  The last thing anyone wants to do talk about an event they’ve already been talking about for months.

But you don’t have to.  Instead, assign one person from your promotions team to cultivate and curate the best of what other people are saying about your event.  This includes:

• Finding the most revelatory blog post recaps from attendees
• Seeking out the best photos from the event
• Identifying the most important videos filmed at (or about) the event
• Interviewing the sponsors to obtain their immediate feedback
• Asking the speakers for a list of their favorite event sound bites

Then, the week after the event, post your curated summary of conference-based media on the event’s website and email it in a final e-blast summary to all sponsors and attendees.

Why?

Because the buzz surrounding your event will now be shrinking, just as your attendees have finished recuperating from their live experience.  They need a reminder of who they just met and what they just learned.  Plus, those who couldn’t attend this time around will need proof that your next conference is going to be a can’t-miss event.

And if you don’t do it now, everyone’s memory will turn to mush.  (Trust me, without documentation, all live events quickly become either legends or lost weekends.  And no one wants to pay top dollar only to immediately forget why you matter.)

10 Tips for Conference Speakers

1. Stop repeating your bio; we can find that on our own.
2. Don’t thank the organizers for inviting you; save that for the VIP room.
3. Tell me a story.  Data without context is just numbers.
4. If your entire presentation consists of information I already know, you’ve failed.
5. Ditto presentations comprised of things I could discover by Googling you.
6. The auditorium is your bedroom.  Dazzle us.  We paid for it.
7. Everyone in the room should want to hear you speak again.
8. Always leave time for a Q&A.
9. Don’t make your entire speech a Q&A; the audience paid to hear you, not itself.
10. Leave us with an action item, so your revelations will live on beyond your exit.
11. Bonus points if you rejoin the audience after your presentation; it reminds us you’re human.

10 Tips for Conference Attendees

1. You paid to be there (with your money, time or both).  Use it.
2. Don’t come to sell; come to help.
3. You’re not required to listen.  If the stage is dry, seek wisdom in the gallery.
4. Every conversation you have could change your life.
5. Spend less time documenting the event than experiencing it.
6. A speaker is more (or less) than a sound bite; anoint your saviors accordingly.
7. Nobody wants to hear your pitch; they want to know why you matter.
8. Identify one interesting thing about yourself; when in doubt, talk about that.
9. Always make time for the after-party.
10. Always leave the after-party before you can’t.

And one bonus tip for everyone:

Time Stops at Live Events

At least, it should.

Online, our attention is perpetually assailed by more information than we can process.  As such, any interaction that lasts “too long” automatically starts to feel “wrong” because we feel compelled to look elsewhere for input.

At a live event, we have the luxury of turning off the endless stream of stimuli and really focusing on the human beings staring back at us.  We can have one-on-one conversations without the obligatory multitasking.

Enjoy this.

For me, one of the high points of #140conf was a late-night conversation I had with C.C. Chapman and Matthew Ebel in C.C.’s suite at the Roger Smith Hotel.  We talked about family, technology, business, theology, sex, money and the future — essentially, everything but Twitter.  (Which, at a Twitter conference, is impressive.)

That’s not the kind of conversation that fits into 140 characters, or a blog post, or a series of emails.

That’s the kind of personal connection that makes all the digital work we do worthwhile.  It reminds us that our machines connect us to complex humans with more to say to one another than we can ever squeeze into our momentary sampler platters of partial attention online.

And I have no idea what time it was when I left.

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A few nights ago, The Streamy Awards happened.  The results — and the ceremony — pleased almost no one.

If awards can’t even please the people creating them, there’s a problem, and it starts with the basic goal:

Who are you doing this for?

Are the Streamys meant to be an award for web creators?  A validation of the web industry itself?  Or an appeal to the mainstream, intended to direct people’s attention to media they wouldn’t otherwise notice?

If you don’t know why you’re doing something — and who you’re doing it for — you’ll never know if you’ve succeeded… but you’ll definitely know when you don’t.

“It’s No Asimov.”

Let’s say you’re a mystery writer.

You’ve just spent the past year writing your latest detective novel.  But before you send the manuscript off to your editor, you’d like to get a second opinion.

So you ask your friend, who only ever reads science fiction.

This could be a problem.

On one hand, your friend’s feedback might be crucial.  Elements like plot, character, dialogue and pace are universally appreciated, regardless of genre.

On the other hand, if your friend has no exposure to mystery novels, she may not know which elements of your story are predictable, overdone or outdated.  She won’t know if what you’ve written is groundbreaking or simply serviceable.

And, because she’s your friend, she may not tell you what you need to hear the most:

What if it’s bad?

Know Who — and What — You’re Working For

If you create an ad campaign for a client, who judges whether or not it’s successful?

You might think it’s wonderful… but the client may not understand it.

You may both think it’s perfect… but the audience may not respond.

Everyone might hate it, but it might be the most effective campaign you’ve ever launched.

Does that also make it your best?

Are you focused on numbers, sales, reach or authority?  Are you more interested in the process or the results?  Would you rather cause a large, brief impact or a series of small, ever-widening ripples?

Most importantly: who decides when you’ve succeeded?

Are you trying to please your boss?

Your client?

Your audience?

Yourself?

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This week, Jeff Pulver noticed that everyone at SXSWi was keeping in touch via Foursquare or Gowalla, rather than the old standbys of Twitter and Facebook.  This shift makes sense within the context of a live event, because Foursquare and Gowalla are mobile apps, best employed in a situation where everybody’s on the move.

But Jeff goes a step further, suggesting that Twitter may have just become “less relevant.”

This leads me to two questions:

How is the relevance of a tool established?

and

When is the right time to try out a new tool?

I Never Leave Home Without My Salad Shooter

A tool is only useful if it solves a problem.  And that means a certain number of people must share the same problem before a tool can become relevant, much less sustainable.

Facebook solved a lot of the design and interface problems that MySpace suffered from… but people didn’t NEED Facebook until they realized MySpace sucked.

Twitter replaced instant messages (and even blogs) for some people… and then, over time, a lot of users worked those “old” tools back into their workflow because they realized Twitter didn’t do everything; just some things (and not always reliably).

Our increasing reliance on mobile apps means services like Foursquare or Gowalla will become increasingly relevant as their userbase (and features) increase and improve… but until there’s a critical mass of users, those services will still feel like “optional” apps to the people who can live without them.

Does the shift Pulver cites mean that Twitter really is less relevant today than it was last month?  Only if the general needs of Twitter’s userbase shift collectively toward a need that Twitter can’t fulfill — and that’s dependent on user habit and on the number of Gowalla-ing users themselves.

No One Thinks an Empty Room Is Relevant

Remember Jaiku?

Like Plurk, Ping and a dozen other apps, Jaiku was supposed to be a “Twitter-killer.”

Jaiku had a better interface, better functionality, and it even solved one of the problems Twitter created: it threaded conversations in a way that Twitter never bothered doing (and still hasn’t, even today).

But despite being purchased by Google, Jaiku still lives on the fringe of the social media conversation while Twitter thrives.

Why?

Because nobody used it.

The target users of a Twitter-like tool were already using Twitter, and unless the people THEY considered relevant all moved to Jaiku en masse, they were staying where everyone else already was.

Lesson?  Communities value interactions over functionality.

Thus, Twitter overcame its own sub-par design simply by being the first and most widely-adopted tool.

To supplant Twitter in terms of overall relevance, Foursquare or Gowalla would need to do (at least some of) what Twitter already does, plus add new features that Twitter can’t replicate and which people decide they can’t live without.

Biding My Time Until the Singularity

So, when’s the right time for someone who’s never used Foursquare or Gowalla to start exploring them?

What makes any tool alluring enough for you to slip it into your workflow?

Do the users drive a tool’s relevance, or do the creators?

Time… and our own choices… will tell.

Meanwhile, I guess I should download Foursquare and Gowalla on my new Droid Eris and decide just how relevant they are for me. And while your mileage may vary, if you do something amazing with either app, you might make them more relevant to me.

See how that works?

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Last Thursday, I attended the fifth installment of Ignite Baltimore, an event designed to get people excited about creating positive change in Baltimore.

And yet, somehow, the experience had the exact opposite effect on me… and this got me thinking about HOW we talk about the things we most care about, and why we might want to change our approach.

How an Allegedly Inspirational Event Turned Me Into a Loathsome Beast

Ignite is billed as a rapid-fire salon of ideas, in which a dozen speakers talk for 5 minutes (and 20 Power Point slides) about a subject they’re passionate about.  For the most part, the presentations on this night were somewhat insightful, occasionally incoherent, but mostly harmless.

And then something happened that I’m still trying to process, because it altered my perception of reality.

15-year old environmental activist Hannah Freedman took the stage and delivered an eloquent, well-rehearsed, mildly convincing argument for the importance of youth activism.  I was impressed by her chutzpah, and I was clapping at all the times when I was supposed to be clapping.

And then I noticed the body language of the couple in front of me.

Slumped.  Stoic.  Slightly pained.  They looked as though they wanted to be anywhere but here, and they projected a stark resentment of everything Hannah — and, by extension, Ignite itself — stood for.

This momentarily irritated me, and I thought about reveling in my ethical superiority for being able to appreciate something as fundamentally galvanizing as youth activism.

But then I tried something different: I adopted (what I presumed was) this couple’s point of view.

I sat there, slumped and indifferent, to see how it would feel to resent a teenager for having the temerity to care about her own future.

I found it alarmingly easy to do.

In fact, the only more alarming part was how hard it was to shake that point of view.

When Hannah concluded her speech with something like, “Because we are the future, and you can either complain about it or you can help us,” I almost shouted something at the stage, Joe Wilson style.  That’s when my girlfriend realized she’d have to psychologically restrain me for the rest of the event.

All night long, I found myself unable to resume my traditional worldview.  Anytime someone took the stage, I implicitly rejected their claims as false because they didn’t jibe with my newly-adopted values of capitalism and protectionism.

I started to hate the arts, the government and people in general.

I refused to smile or applaud.  My girlfriend Ann and our friend Maya, seated on either side of me, went from being annoyed at my behavior to being angry at my obviously negative judgment of the event, concerned that I might ruin it for someone else.

Even Dave Troy, who’s well-known as a tireless cheerleader for Baltimore’s future (and who was sitting directly in front of me) moved a few seats away.  Granted, that could have been due to any reason, but I can’t help but feel that my aural negativity drove him to seek shelter.

My Newfound Hatred, in a Nutshell

My visceral reaction to the night can be summed up by a recap of the presentations.

Of the 13 talks delivered:

• 4 of them either directly or indirectly urged attendees to fund the arts
• 2 of them urged adults to take children seriously
• 1 of them urged attendees to donate to Haiti
• 1 of them urged attendees to donate used cell phones to Africa
• 1 of them urged the creation of a federal Department of Peace
• and 1 of them explained how Wolverine embodies the American ideal

As a social liberal and fiscal conservative, I would normally have appreciated the pluck of the presentations, even if I would have doubted their ability to make a damn bit of difference.

But on this particular night, thanks to my newly aggravated and seat-slumped soul mates, I left the auditorium irate at the audacity of the speakers.  Namely:

• If the arts are so important, why can’t they MAKE MONEY without begging me for it?
• If MORE government is the solution to anything, I’ll eat my hat.
• If dying Haitians and Africans need help, why don’t they just GET JOBS?
• If kids are our future, why can’t they prove their merit without COMPLAINING?

In short: stop telling me why I should care about your problems; SHOW ME WHY IT’S RELEVANT TO ME.

BE RESPONSIBLE.

PROVE THAT YOU’RE DOING YOUR BEST, and maybe I’ll feel like your cause is worth my time / effort / resources.  (But, honestly, probably not, because I work hard for my money and I’ll never warm to the idea of you begging me for a handout.)

Nonetheless, MEAN SOMETHING to me, and maybe I’ll care.

(And for fuck’s sake, Wolverine is Canadian.)

So… About Last Night…

Needless to say, I woke up feeling “normal” again on Friday, but it still took me a few more days to wrap my head around why I was so upset on Thursday.  And I think it boils down to the following:

• I cannot believe how easily I adopted a POV I normally reject as inhumanely self-centered.
• That kind of ingrained resistance to change is addictive.
• Hating everything didn’t make me feel better about myself, but the alternative didn’t make any sense either.  Thus, I was trapped in an illogical whirlpool of loathing.

All of which made me realize that liberals will never be able to convince the conservatives of the world that liberal ideas are valid because conservatives and liberals don’t even see the same reality.

If two sides can’t agree on the facts, their shared needs and the benefits of the most likely outcomes, there’s no hope for “bipartisanship,” much less a civil discussion of what we as a country (or a city) need in order to prosper (or even survive).

So, as a way to make up for the karma I likely burned during my Thursday night shitstorm, here’s my morning-after pitch on how we (usual) liberals can better bridge the gap between what we think matters and what everyone else thinks is important.

3 Ways to Keep the Haters From Dismissing Your Worthless Ideas

1.  Stop treating the arts like a helpless, valueless charity. The arts have been around for as long as we’ve been civilized.  But to hear modern arts professionals explain it, the arts will shrivel and die unless bleeding heart patrons (and our own tax dollars) can keep them on life support.

If the arts aren’t at least partially self-sufficient, no amount of hand-wringing will convince the people holding the purse strings that they’re worth supporting.

Here’s a secret: no one wants to invest in something that doesn’t believe it can survive under its own power.  People are funny; once a charity or an artist proves it can keep itself alive no matter what, we’re more inclined to support it with our own donations because it respects itself.

Begging?  Never sexy.  And if you believe that opera, theatre, live music and visual arts are sexy and life-affirming, you need to start by affirming your own will to live.

2.  Kids: Stop Talking Down to Your Parents.

Listen, I know we live in a fucked-up culture where the opinions of 14 year-olds are more highly-prized than the opinions of 65 year-olds because those 14 year-olds have access to more disposable income than the Medicare generation does.  But just because we who market products to children tell kids that we value their opinions, that doesn’t mean we really do.  At least, not beyond the ways in which their opinions can be exploited to make us rich.

If you’re under the age of 22 and you want to change the world, be my guest.  The world could use a good sprucing-up.  But you won’t get there by admonishing the adults for ignoring you, because the fact is, adults ignore everything, including their own consciences and common sense.

Revel in your youth.  Then do something.  We like to say “actions speak louder than words” because, like most cliches, this one is always true.

3.  Lead by example.

One of the best presentations of the night, even despite my hate-induced stupor, was delivered by Ellen Worthing.  It was about “bushwacking,” the art of (literally) going off the beaten path to discover something all your own.  In Worthing’s case, she detailed her frequent excursions into the bowels of Maryland, aided by her GPS unit and a suspicion that something more interesting was “out there.”  And she was usually right.

Ellen’s presentation filled the audience with admiration for her rugged individualism.  She tacked on an obligatory “follow your own path” generalism in her last slide, as a way of making her presentation about “us” instead of just her, but it was unnecessary; by showing us what she was capable of, she ignited more inspiration in her 500 listeners than anyone else did all night.

And, best of all, she didn’t ask anyone for money.

In Conclusion…

I’m sure Ignite Baltimore got a lot of people talking, which is the whole point.  (Technically, the whole point should be getting people to take action, but that’s a little too optimistic for a $5 event with a cash bar.)

And maybe the ideas people absorbed that night will get them moving.  Maybe some old cell phones will get donated to medical workers in Africa.  Maybe a few more people will pay for a night at the opera, or will venture out to an art event they might otherwise have ignored.

But if we really want to ignite Baltimore and get people moving in a positive direction, what we need are more people who lead by example and fewer people trying to guilt the public into a handout.

Because the only thing more addictive than doubting the relevance of everything is being inspired by seeing someone else exceed our own pessimistic expectations.

* If you’ve ever seen an episode of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, you know what I’m talking about: anytime Will Smith’s friend (and real-life DJ) Jazzy Jeff says or does something inappropriate, Uncle Phil bum-rushes him out of the house, limbs flailing.

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If you’ve ever seen video of a TED talk before, you know the basics: smart people, big stage, big ideas.  That routine remained unbroken at TEDxMidAtlantic, which — except for a few Power Point snafus and a herdlike approach to managing the coffee line — conducted its business of inspiration quite efficiently.

Instead of recapping the high points of the speeches themselves — all of which (including Will Noel’s enthralling saga of the reconstruction of a long-lost text by Archimedes) are now immortalized in video — let me share with you five other lessons I took home from TEDxMidAtlantic; ones that weren’t exactly articulated in the speakers’ presentations.

1. Live by the speech, die by the speech. No one gets asked to give a TED talk without the presumption that some kind of magic will happen as a result of their shared wisdom.  But whether their presentation style is overly-rehearsed, Power Point-dependent or mostly improvisatory, even TED speakers walk a line between imparting moments of clarity and falling apart at the seams.  Some were so tethered to their Power Point presentations that they were incapable of presenting an idea without them.  Others had delivered the same speech a dozen times before, a familiarity with the material that allowed them to build a nearly evangelical fervor… until they lost their train of thought and derailed the magic while grasping for their next metaphor.  So the next time you’re speaking in front of a crowd, relax; even TED presenters occasionally stumble.
2. Speeches from the heart top speeches from the monitor. While it’s impossible to state broadly that one style of speech was resoundingly more powerful than another, I will say that the presenters who spoke about ideas, concepts or convictions that fueled them on a daily basis were far more compelling than those who relied on numbers or platitudes to make their cases for them.  No amount of name-dropping, scare tactics or well-oiled talking points could replace John Forte‘s disarming candor when admitting his own life-altering mistakes or Naomi Natale‘s unbound passion for eradicating injustice.
3. A roomful of people who like to think is not the same as a roomful of people who like to talk. In fact, it’s almost guaranteed to be the opposite: small groups of people who’ve been lucky enough to recognize one another from previous encounters, surrounded by floating islands of socially awkward individuals.  If someone doesn’t break the ice, those islands will become glaciers, and no one will ever meet anyone — which is half the point of an event about ideas.  Getting a flock of interesting people together in a room is impressive, but the transfer of electricity can’t happen if those people don’t engage.
4. Despite TED’s format, actions still speak louder than words. Granted, the event is called “Ideas that matter,” not “Actions that matter.”  It’s up to the audience to consider the ideas presented and then decide how (or whether) they can implement those concepts in their own lives.  But when you spend a full day being inundated with life-affirming (and potentially life-changing) stories, brain overload is almost inevitable.  One way to mitigate that collapse would be to suggest potential actions, either within the speeches themselves or as ancillary materials online or in print, so that attendees can follow through once their brains have caught up.
5. Your laptop is not an amphitheater. Yes, you can watch any TED talk from the privacy of your own home, or on your iPod while commuting.  But it’s not the same thing.  Like movies, plays, political debates or any other public exchange of information, just seeing it is different from actually being there.  When you’re at home, you have a million distractions fighting for your attention, as well as the ability to pause the information flow.  When you’re witnessing the exchange live, you’re forced to pay attention and absorb it in real time, surrounded by others who are doing the same.  The information is identical in either format, but the difference in the way you experience it matters.

That said, absorbing genius on your laptop is still far preferable to never absorbing genius at all.  So, by all means, take 20 minutes (an eternity in Internet scale, I know) and watch any of the TEdxMidAtlantic speeches.

And then do something about it.

Having now fully recovered from PodCamp Pittsburgh 4 (including two additional days of travel), I can finally sum up the entire experience in one word: necessary.

If you’re like me, you spend more time online every day than you’d like to admit (or than your significant other thinks is sane).  You create media, you consume media, you share media and you form tenuous “relationships” with people you’ve never met.  You develop a cabal of fellow Twitter users or Facebook friends, and you spend your weeks commenting on one another’s lives, actions and opinions, leading yourselves to believe that you’ve formed some kind of meaningful bond in the process.

And then, when you close your laptop, you return to your own four-walled reality without any tangible proof that anything you’ve done made a damn bit of difference to anyone.  Including you.

If Only These People EXISTED Outside of This Magic Electric Box!

What live events like PodCamp — or like this week’s BlogWorld Expo — allow us to do is transfer those intangible relationships we’ve developed online into the physical forms of friendship that we’ve come to expect and understand from our pre-web days.  Suddenly emoticons are replaced with actual smiles and sneers, body language and inflection supply the missing context from our tweets, and human beings prove themselves to be more than a collection of blog posts and Flickr tags.

We realize we are talking to human beings every day, and that we’re not getting the whole story online.  People we disagreed with turn out to be more like us than we thought, and people we look up to are revealed to have the same flaws and idiosyncracies that remind us all that we’re human.

It’s deceptively easy to think you know someone online.  And it’s even more tempting to think you can form an accurate opinion about them based on your electronic interactions.  For example, I didn’t know Steve Klabnick or Eric Williams very well “in real life” before PodCamp Pittsburgh 4, which sometimes made it difficult to keep a level head when we’d be debating politics, theology or intellectual property on Twitter.  When all you know of someone is his avatar, it’s impossible to understand who he is and why he might believe what he says.  And it’s this type of snap judgment in a world of decreasing focus that leads us to believe we know people better than we do.

And then suddenly, when you’re face to face with someone at a live event, it hits you:  we really are all in this together, and our differences are mostly a matter of opinion.  At the end of the day, we’re all just a long walk and a 649 shot away from seeing eye-to-eye — or at least from agreeing to disagree.

Because there’s more to life than snap judgments and ironclad theories.  There’s the timeless value of sharing a room with people who all have at least one thing in common, and then discovering the depth and degree of the differences.  Which is why the electricity of a live event beats the online equivalent every day of the week.

This weekend, I attended my first Small Press Expo, which is (according to its website) North America’s Premiere Independent Cartooning and Comic Book Arts Festival.  My friends Rachel and Josh went last year and they loved it, and since Baltimore is only an hour away from the event’s Bethesda ballroom, I joined them on this year’s trip down from Pittsburgh.

Being surrounded by hundreds of comic book creators, cartoonists, illustrators, publishers, writers, critics and fans was truly exhilarating, and not just because I’m a longtime comics fan who appreciates the indie scene.  A roomful of inspiration, creativity and self-actualization is naturally infectious, and meeting other creative people always makes me want to create something myself.  Thus, I end up leaving these types of events with a million new thoughts swirling in my head (and, in this case, a mini-comic about mermaid love gone wrong).

Some things I noticed, which may be applicable to your event / business / frame of mind:

People respect you when you do it yourself. Regardless of how talented you are, people admire anyone with the pluck to try something on their own, much less anyone who can earn a living on their own terms.  “Being an artist” is a universally romantic yet seldom-realized dream, so an event like this gives everyone who attends a chance to support those people who are brave (or delusional) enough to make their own rules.  (That said, it does help if you’re actually talented; people are far more inclined to support someone whom they personally think deserves to “make it.”)

Making money is allowed.  (Encouraged, even.) Unlike other web content creators who seem reluctant or unable to charge for their work, the vendors at SPX are unashamed to charge for their creations — and the attendees are unoffended.  Since everyone involved is either self-published or allied with a small press, all purchases help support people who make art for a living.  Nearly everyone I saw had purchased something, and lots of people were sitting happily on the floor outside the main exhibition hall, reading through their fresh stacks of brand new comics.

If there’s something for everyone, everyone leaves happy. No matter your tastes, this event had a book for you.  Vendors were selling comics about super heroes, sci-fi, fantasy, comedy, relationships, biography, parody, ninjas, animals, kids, horror, history, surfing, pornography and pin-up girls — and everything in-between.  If you couldn’t find something worth your time at SPX, you weren’t paying attention.  (How many events can you honestly say that about?)

Develop a coverage strategy when attending large events. Since this was my first time to SPX (and since I was conveniently broke and therefore unable to indulge my appetite for reading material), I was content to wander the floor and observe.  Rachel made two passes through the room — once to reconnoiter without buying anything, and then a second swoop to make her actual purchases.  And Josh beelined directly for the books he already knew he wanted in advance, making all his major purchases in the first half hour and then returning to explore the $5-and-under offerings.  Having pre-set expectations helped each of us find what we wanted, and we all left happy.*

There’s only so much time to talk. Josh zipped through the event without engaging anyone he didn’t want to talk to, stopping only at the tables of the artists whose work he already admired or whose work kept his attention for longer than a moment.  On the other hand, Rachel and I moseyed from table to table, inevitably getting embroiled in conversations with the artists about their work, their lives and their print quality.  If you’re in a hurry and don’t want to get trapped in endless conversations, be spatially aware of when a vendor has no one else nearby to speak to and nothing else physically to do — those are the times you’re most likely to get waylaid.

Longevity trumps talent. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: if you keep doing something long enough, even if you’re an average talent, you’ll eventually be respected as a veteran.  You can’t help but acquire knowledge over the years, and that wisdom — coupled with your obvious hard-nosed grit — will earn you generations of fans who admire you simply for fighting the good fight.  (Again, it helps to actually be talented, but it helps even more to get out of bed every morning and do whatever it takes to keep going.  Talent is singular, but tenacity is something we all like to believe we can achieve; when you do, you become inspirational.)

Different price points provide fans with different opportunities to support you. Dedicated fans are happy to pay $20 or more for your work.  People who’ve never heard of you (but like what they see) would prefer to pay less.  And products under $5 let people take a chance on your work without incurring much risk, or to support you fiscally even if they’re not your biggest fans artistically.

Be personable. I realize that people who create comics for a living are trained to express themselves non-verbally, but events like this are a showcase of talent and personality.  As interested as I am in your work, I’d rather talk to you for thirty seconds than watch you ink a page of your next issue.  I can always buy that issue later; I can’t talk to you again until next year.  (I know, I know: “There’s a thing called the Internet.”  But it’s not the same.)

Give me a reminder. People moving through an event like this are going to see a lot of media all at once.  They’ll be overwhelmed.  Provide them with a freebie so they can find you online later and learn more about your work at a time when they’re less informationally challenged.

We need more events like this. Not just for comics, but for all fields, artistic and beyond.  The communal energy of SPX is reminiscent of the kinetic energy at the first PodCamp, which started out as a meet-up for people who make web media.  The opportunity for like-minded individuals to meet in a common space and share their expertise with peers is rare, but the benefits — both professionally and intellectually — are worth the effort.

*  Admittedly, I didn’t have nearly enough expendable cash for an artistic smorgasbord like this.  Judging by the line waiting to access the ATM, neither did a lot of other people.  I should start a trust fund for next year.

As the clock ticks down on public voting for the 2010 SXSW media panels, I know what you’re thinking.  When you’re not desperately spamming your Twitter followers, Facebook friends and actual acquaintances to vote vote vote for your panel, you’re quietly coming to grips with the inevitable: What if my panel doesn’t get picked?

150 panels have been pitched for the Film category.  331 panels have been pitched for Music.  But with 2293 panels pitched for the Interactive category, something’s gotta give.  And that weak link just might be you.

Maybe no one’s interested in your topic.  (Doesn’t everyone use ActionScript 3?)  Maybe no one knows who you are. (Heresy! This is social media!!)  Or maybe everyone does know who you are, but they think you’re unqualified to speak about the topic you’ve suggested.  (BLASPHEMY!  I’m a guru!!!)

Chin up, kid.  We all suffer the stink of failure every so often.  What separates the winners from the people most likely to get a degree from Full Sail University is tenacity.  So pick yourself up, dust yourself off and get back to “work.”  You can start by doing one of the following:

1. Cry. But Twitter about it.
2. Drink. (It is a federal holiday.)
3. Network. If only you’d known another 1000 people on Facebook, you’d probably have gotten in.  These guys can probably help you.
4. Read. Others have failed before you, and then written about that failure in a book you can pay money for.
5. Write a Book About Your Failure. (See above.)
6. Pray. Although considering the number of people who’ll also be praying for this exact same reason, you may trigger a Fail Whale in heaven.
7. Retail. Because you can always use more practice selling strangers things they don’t want.
8. Prostitution. Not unlike social media expertdom, though it does require you to meet people face to face.
9. Phone Sex. Same as #8, but do-able over Skype.  (So you can multitask.)
10. Get Better at What You Think You’re Already Good at Because Not Enough Other People Believe You.

Good luck, and I look forward to seeing most of you on this exact same blog post next year.