Stay of Execution

Firehose

Lots and lots going on, here at PopTech.  Other bloggers are covering it better than I can.  I don't like splitting my attention quite this many ways, because the folks onstage are so smart and interesting that I could be fully absorbed by them.  But instead I'm putting out fires -- instant messaging the front desk to send a runner backstage to disconnect the phoneline and re-set it so the folks listening on the streaming audio can pick up the feed.  Checking email and sending questions that come in that way to the teleprompter so that the host can ask the speakers those questions.  Monitoring the chat and addressing issues that come up there, checking the load, updating the conference blog.  All of it is fun, but it's hard not to be scattered. 

The conference this year is pretty international, with questioners from Poland and England standing up to ask questions, and a performer from Zimbabwe who just played music.  An Iranian singer is coming up (she was mildly challenging to me last night, skeptical that Scheherazade was "really" my name, given to me by my parents), and Sun Microsystems has sponsored a group of folks from Africa, who will be having a round table discussion on Sunday about how the ideas of PopTech can impact Africa.  Cool stuff.

I chatted with one of the head retail guys at Target earlier today, and with the exuberant Dina Mehta last night.  Also connected with a couple of librarians from Nebraska who wrote a grant to be here, and a writer for Wired magazine, and an engineer who I've seen here once a year for the last 8 years.  Backstage I just talked to a fellow who lost both of his arms in an accident and who will be onstage with the prosthesis doctor who is working with him to replace them.  Cool, cool stuff.  This is one of the highlights of my year.   

Split Screen

I'm sitting in the Camden Opera House, getting ready for the conference.  My job during the conference is to moderate the real-time chat (encouraging norms like logging in with your real name, and feeding questions that arise in the chat to the conference host, who can ask them in the Q&A session), and to field questions that get emailed to two different email addresses.  Also to add bloggers who are blogging the conference to this page.  Also to keep a couple of speakers happy -- but one hasn't yet arrived, and one is onstage now running through his slides. 

To do all these things I have an IM window open, a chat window open, a WordPress editing window open, and then a fourth Firefox window with 3 tabs for monitoring the attendee portal page, my own email account, and whatever websites I might wish to go to without leaving those other pages.   

Hoo boy -- between the first paragraph and the third I've been interrupted about six times with things that need to be done to the blog, instant message questions, and last minute tests.  Here we go....

Pop!

Later this morning, I'm heading up to Camden for PopTech.  This will be my ninth year at the conference, and probably my last as one of the organizers.  I'll  be moderating the online chat, playing speaker host to Graham Flint and Nicholas Negroponte, and helping the scholarship recipient high school students and teachers take advantage of the conference.  If you'll be there and want to have a cup of tea, let me know.  If you won't be there, but want to listen in, IT Conversations will be streaming the audio -- and you can email us with questions for the speakers for the Q & A session. 

If you're really technosavvy and groovy, you can participate in a virtual reproduction of the conference in the online game Second Life, where we'll be streaming the content.  I don't fully understand that, but I've seen the screenshots from the game and it looks exactly like the opera house where we'll be having the conference.  I think we'll be able to superimpose the speaker and displays into the virtual world.  That kind of thing starts to short-circuit my brain, but if you are more hip than me and want to try it out, email me and I'll put you in touch with the people who can set it up.  (There aren't many spots available for that.) 

Pop!Tech Blogs

A group of bloggers at Pop!Tech are gathered on the Pop!Tech website -- lots of people far better able to do this than me, both in terms of their mental capacity and their situational freedom and bandwidth.  We've got some really exciting stuff going on here -- right now a guy named Thomas Barnett is talking about the U.S. and its next global threat, and how technology and connectivity work, and what the rules will/should be for post-conflict, politically collapsed states.  Incredible. 

Pop!Tech: Behind the Curtain

I'm literally behind a little curtain off the stage, but on the stage right now is Jim Rygiel, the guy who did special effects for the Lord of the Rings.  He's showing us how he made the footage -- seeing the actor who played Gollum in the scens in which Gollum was replaced.  Amazing, totally mesmerizing stuff -- how he made the hobbits shorter and Gandalf taller in the scenes in which they all appeared; how they did the giant battle scene with the elephants.....  Incredible, magic, even when you see how it is done.

He's also talking about how migratory all of this is, and how Hollywood's geographic lock is coming to an end.  (Richard Florida just spoke about the same thing).   

On the Spot

So I am both delighted and terrified at the role I am playing at this year's Pop!Tech.  Through a series of accidents and conversations I didn't anticipate yesterday, I'll end up sitting onstage, next to Bob Metcalfe, sorting through the questions people are sending through web forms and the chat room, and re-phrasing them cogently and pithily into the teleprompter so that Bob can ask them as host.  We were going to have a young volunteer do this, but yesterday we discovered that the teleprompter is mesmerizing and powerful -- when it is going, the moderator can't help but look at it and read it.  So it's important that the questions are carefully phrased and without typos or any ambiguous words, so the moderator won't be confused or tripped up.  It turns out to be a big job, requiring a fair amount of editorial judgment and a lot of responsiveness to Bob as he's on stage.  So the volunteer is going to help me -- I've got two computers and a headset, and people will be talking to me via headset, cell phone, chat email, and a website where questions can be posted.  And I've got to filter all this and type short, sweet questions for Bob.  It's exciting and a little bit scary. 

I generally sit in the third row, right in the middle, and don't do anything but listen to the speakers.  I'm nervous that dividing my attention will mean I don't get as much from the speakers as I ordinarily would -- but on the other hand I will be listening with all my might because I don't want to screw up.  Fun fun fun.  Don't expect I'll be blogging much but lots of people will.

The only bloggable observation so far is that Malcolm Gladwell has great hair.  And Jonathan Coulton is fantastic. 

Flurry

I'm in the flurry of Pop!Tech pre-event things, like packing for the next few days (suits? nah.  jeans? nah.  suede pants?  yes, I think so....).  I'm helping coordinate the backchannel chat that we'll have going at the conference, and I'm making sure speakers and sponsors and scholarship students are happy and well-treated, and I'm coordinating a blogger dinner for about 15 folks tomorrow night, and then of course absorbing dozens of new ideas and meeting dozens of new very smart interesting people.  I don't know how much of this I'll be blogging.  I expect major overwhelm and delight.