attended the contextual web

This was not quite what I expected, I was hoping that this would be more about data portability, but it ended up just being an iPhone orgy. I did however realize that I was in the non-iPhone possessing sxsw minority.

attended ExpressionEngine 2.0 Sneak Peak

This was awesome. I am and have been a big fan of Ellislab, not because of ExpressionEngine, but because of CodeIgniter. Learning about ExpressionEngine was very interesting, especially when they announced that ExpressionEngine 2.0 has been rewritten to run on top of CodeIgniter. This is very pleasant news. This has gotten me all atwitter about the possibilities of a cms running on-top of my most favoritest PHP framework. Also everyone was very nice, and I desired to be friends with them. This panel was something I talked about throughout the rest of my trip.

attended 10 Things We’ve Learned at 37signals

This was another highpoint. CEO Jason Fried is an excellent speaker. Everything he said made sense, and he answered all questions asked were answered very well. At one point Anil Dash of six apart asked a question that seemed like more of an insult than anything.

attended Behind the Scenes at the Onion News Network

This was pretty fun, it being the Onion and all (which had quite a presence in Austin). I was hoping that it was going to be more about the site backend, and not the actual production of the show / a bunch of clips I have already seen.

went to the Google Party

Wacky google action, got lots of saucy google swag, including pens, flashing plastic pins, and the best thing I have to keep a secret, because it is a present for my buddy Wes. The bar was kinda downtowny and lame, but I also got to meet Dustin Diaz, and tell him that I love him. His girlfriend liked my hair, and took a picture of us.

went to the EllisLab party at Moonshine Grill

This was a wonderful event. Tons of bad ass food, free shirts (I nabbed a bunch and wear them all the time). The highlight of this was definitely hanging out with and talking to Derek Allard. Derek is a development beast, and is responsible for alot of the awesomeness in and around ExpressionEngine and CodeIgniter. You should go to his site, it is awesome.

went to the frog design / SXSW Interactive Opening Party

This was a hell of a thing. There seemed to be thousands of people spread throughout a very large area, lots of loud techno music and so forth. The beer line was long, and the beer was green. I think we only managed to stay there for about an hour.

went to the 16 Bit: SXSWi’s Opening Night Afterparty

This was an amazing party, with an equally amazing line to get in. There was a band / freakshow, which eventually turned into silly 80’s music that made me feel like I was playing Vice City. It was good stuff all around, lots of cool excited people and lots of free drinks.

Towards the end of the party, I met Matt Mullenweg. I have always been amazed by Wordpress, and generally the stuff he gets into. I got to spend some time talking to him about the future of Wordpress, and vented a little bit about the problems I have had with WordpressMU, chiefly the forced support of the no-www.org agenda. I am not even going to link to it because of how much arrogant bullshit I think it is. It should be noted that normal Wordpress does not enforce this. When I was done going off about that, I launched into a drunken rant about how awesome CodeIgniter and ExpressionEngine were going to get. We were talking until the bar closed, and were yelled at to leave by a scruffy bouncer, and then continued to talk outside until his girlfriend got pissed. Anyhow, Matt was awesome, and much funnier than I expected.

ended up at Kerbey Lane Cafe

We stood outside of Scoot Inn (where the last party was) bullshitting with people for about an hour and suddenly found ourselves among the last few there. Me and Cliff (big bad boss) ended up going to breakfast with two complete strangers. One was a local Austin lady who was recently single (which she repeatedly and proudly exclaimed) and a gentleman who, to me, was the epitome of the apple fanboy. I was later informed that I may have been too rough on him regarding this, but I was drunk and he was a friendly stranger.

I don’t remember what I ate (aside from sweet potato fries), and I don’t remember the stranger’s names. If you are one of the strangers: please excuse me, and leave a comment to say hi.

The flights were a pain as usual, my feet hurt from walking too much, but thats all fine because now I am in the Austin Convention Center, registered for sxsw interactive, and am waiting for the first panel I am going to.

Austin has been cool so far, but it is also cold, which is rather confusing to me. I went from Ohio to Texas during winter, and the tempature difference was two degrees. It is also windy as hell. It is supposed to be nicer tomorrow.

I will update this post later today after the panels and the parties.

attended Dustin Diaz’s book reading

This was only 20 minutes long, and was most meant to promote the book in question. Nothing was said that isn’t fairly common Javascript knowledge, however it was still amusing and worth attending.

He did some of his talking through DomoKun, and told one of the only people who asked a question that their question was stupid, and then answered them.

attended How to Rawk SXSW: The Basics

A look at how to enjoy sxsw from some of the veterans. Rather nerdy and meta all around. This was fun, but I do not think I believe the general message, which was “it is easy to make friends with internet superstars, they want your friendship!”. There are about 7000 people here, and I get the feeling that about 6000 are here for the first time.

attended Mix at Six

This was a pretty cool meet-up, where I met alot of really cool people, including Greg of HUGE, and Simon and Kate of Portable Film Festival.

Went to Ego’s

Ego’s was sweet. Ended up there after mix at six with the previously mentioned Greg, Simon and Kate. It was a Texas honky tonk with some ridiculous classy music. I also met a delightful madman who may or may not have been the drummer for the Butthole Surfers.

I’ll be adding more pictures when I get the chance.

I just found out today that me and my big bad boss are off to sxsw next week, courtesy of our employer, 2Checkout. I can not help but be inexcusably excited.

I plan on attending talks by some of my heroes: Dustin Diaz, Jeffrey Zeldman, Dave Shea, Matt Mullenweg, Rick Ellis, and John Resig.

If you are going, leave a comment, I would love to meet up.