This blog, hosted by graduate students in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Texas State University in San Marcos, will showcase activities at the 2009 South By Southwest Interactive Conference in Austin, TX. I would like to thank the organizers of SXSW for giving us the opportunity to participate and for sponsoring this wonderful event. This year’s conference is shaping up with another amazing lineup including keynotes by Chris Anderson of Wired, Tony Hseih of Zappos.com, Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight.com and James Powderly of Graffiti Research Lab. Four days of panels and activities are scheduled for what promises to be a fun and interesting time!

The students who are blogging this event are members of my Advanced Online Media course and many are part of our New Media concentration at Texas State. This is a great opportunity for them to engage with the theories and concepts we have been discussing, and to interact with the people who are influencing technological and social change.

During the next few weeks, we ‘ll be blogging about our plans for the event. On March 14, we go live at the Convention Center in Austin, so be sure to check in frequently.