SXSW Interactive is almost upon us, and before we kick off, I’d like to provide what I think will be some of the highlights and where you will likely find me during this 10-day media extravaganza.
First, I’d like to recognize the hard work of the students on this blog. Jake, Melody, Jordon and Priscillia have been prepping for SXSW since last semester, and they are ready to provide the comprehensive coverage that you have grown to expect from SXTXState.com. Jordon has already begun covering SXSWEDU. Please join us. Comment and share via social media.
This year, there are several panels that I am excited to see, but I am thrilled that former students Megan Kilgore and Kiana Fitzgerald are on this year’s schedule. They did the SXTXState project last year, with the final requirement being to create their own panel proposal for this year. I am very proud that they were accepted and made the transition from observer to participant in the SXSW community.
Why Non-Profits Should Embrace Data Journalism with Megan Kilgore of Capital Area Food Bank and Becca Aaronson (Texas Tribune) and Javier De La Torre (CartoDB).
Not Enough Of Us: We Are Not Black Twitter – Kiana Fitzgerald of NPR is joined by photographer Adrian Walker and Justin Roberson of Mostly Junk Food.
The keynotes and featured sessions rock this year. I am very excited to hear both from Edward Snowden and Julian Assange, although they will be appearing via video conference.
Related to these talks is a conversation (also virtual) with Glenn Greenwald, the former Guardian reporter who broke the Snowden story, who is now with the Pierre Omidyar project First Look Media.
I’m interested in what Chelsea Clinton has to say about “Harnessing the Power of Tech and Data for Development.” Of course, I am very excited for students to hear from Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web. But I am also looking forward to Twitter founder Biz Stone, Blake Mycoskie of TOMS and Randi Zuckerberg on “Are We All Producers Now?” And it’s always a fun time when Gary Vaynerchuk is involved.
I also have the following on my schedule, although I heard them speak at Stanford earlier this week:
The New Digital Age, featuring Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen of Google.
Here are some others that I hope to attend in my various interest areas. There are lots more, and I’m double/triple booked in some timeframes. But these all look really interesting.
Web Design
- WTF RWD: Agreeing to Disagree – featuring Texas Tribune’s Amanda Krauss and Hawk Thompson of Razorfish.
- Your Next UX Skill: Prototyping with HTML and CSS
- Tablet First Design: Holistic Ubiquitious UX
- Build Responsively: Modern Responsive Web Design
Social Media
- 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon – Kevin Bacon is actually on this panel.
Mobile
Data
Journalism
- Fact-checking Goes Global – featuring Knight Fellow Martin Kotynek and Bill Adair of Duke University
- Algorithms, Journalism and Democracy
- Journalism Revolution 2.0
- Non-Profit Journalism: Monetize Mission, Not Memes
- Why Didn’t a Tech Journalist Break PRISM?
A Few Music Panels
- The Seven Hottest Topics in Music Web Tech 2014 – this one is on the last day of Interactive. The rest below happen during the Music portion of the festival. Music actually has some really interesting looking digital-related panels.
- Your Data and Your Life
- A Billion Tiny Screens: Future of Social Visual
- Come on, Get Appy
- Did the Internet Kill the Album Review?
- Direct to Fan: Showing the Love Brings the Love
- Fighting For Their Rights: A Discussion on The Beastie Boys, Fair Use, and Copyright – featuring my friend Rhett Miller of Old 97’s.
- Platforms vs. Publishers: A Big New Theory
- Using Music to Sell Other Stuff
- What Comes First: The Music or the Platform?
- Your Friends Have Bad Taste: Fixing Social Music
- YouTube – New Breeding Ground for Music’s Future
Being away from Austin, spending the year at Stanford, I feel a little disconnected from SXSW this time around. I’ve never felt less prepared. But I am so excited to dive in, learn some new things and meet great people. And watch my students thrive in this environment.
Happy SX! Here we go.