Archives for June 11th, 2007

Demonstrating how to rip out a man’s heart and show it to him, at Blogres. [Photo by]

There are a lot of summaries of the big blogging conference floating around so I’ll just quickly throw in my thoughts. First, I felt a bit uneasy before my turn at the podium. I arrived at about 10:15 a.m., meaning that the first presentation had already begun. I didn’t want to barge in so I quietly sat and watched the in-house feed. What I saw was a very professional-looking powerpoint presentation. I’ve never made a powerpoint file in my life, so I started feeling a bit anxious about the thing I had brought along. But what really spooked me was the next speaker, who made a few offhanded jokes and was met with silence. As in total silence. Not even a polite “heh” or anything. It was clear that this wasn’t just a tough audience; it was a brutal audience. And I was next.

A few things helped me calm down before I walked in. First, the organizers were great — especially Lea, who was supremely patient with me. (I learned on Wednesday that the deadline to turn in your presentation was Wednesday. I had nothing ready and at the time still didn’t know how to use powerpoint. Thank God for caffeine.) Second, I bumped into Borut, who exudes this it’s-all-good vibe wherever he goes. That helped. And third, I noticed Mare checking in, said hello, and was flattered to hear that he had come to see me. (Thankfully he also wasn’t disappointed, although I absolutely agree that my ending should have had more punch. This is a recurring problem of mine. Not sure what to do about it.)

Overall, I was surprised at how well it went. And I was relieved that I wasn’t met with stony silence, because that would have been just plain awful. I don’t think any of the presentations will be available anywhere, but if they are I will post them here.

Afterwards, I had a chance to briefly meet and greet some good folks like had, Klemen (whose pictures of the event are here), hirkani, and others. I then stepped out for a ménage-à-trois (minus the ménage) with Pengovsky and Poulette. We sat and drank for hours and although we took an oath of secrecy about the contents of our conversation, I will say this: Poulette is as cool and classy as her blog makes you think she is, and Pengovsky is more knowledgeable than the Slovenian wikipedia. It was, in a word, awesome.

We returned to see some more presentations, both of them good: One by Baya and one by Lesjak’s replacement. And that was it. I missed nymphee, unfortunately, and I missed sunshine (we walked right past each other without a glimmer of recognition) and many others.

I wish I knew of a stronger way to end this post but I don’t.

Thanks to everyone who came and thanks to the organizers for having me!