Seminar Series

Here [are the slides for our panel](/media/bbs_seminar_la_experts.pdf) with me, Anil, Janet, and Steve.

There were a fair number of images coming out from the Essentials of Business Blogging seminar yesterday.

As always, Mie was moblogging everything in sight from her adorable cell phone (which I now want).

Also, we had someone in the audience posting photos to Flickr. My favorite: “Steve Broback loses his [expletive deleted] on the Blog Experts panel.”

I wish I’d brought my camera - stupid forgetful me - so I could have joined the fun. I did however bring our .mp3 recorder and will put together a podcast from all the wonderful things people said at the event.

The final session in our Essentials of Business Blogging seminar yesterday was Anil Dash’s talk about the future of the Web.

“The post is the atomic unit of blogs,” he told us at the outset, “it’s the piece from which everything can be built.” And when Anil says post, he’s doesn’t just mean the block of text you’re reading right now. He’s talking about podcasts, and the photos that Mie takes with her phone and puts up on the blog as well.

In a nutshell, Anil’s talk revolved around that atomic unit, and the many different ways that future technologies and innovations will allow it to be categorized, filtered, sorted and re-communicated across the Web.

So what does the future look like in Anil’s mind? Basically, you’ll have a number of streams of information (feeds) coming in: blogs that matter to you, e-mails, general news feed, etc. And they’re all automatically filtered for just what’s relevant for you. Then, you’ll be able to choose who you want to share each piece of information with, and what formats they can get them in.

Because blogging will become so simple and versatile, organizations will be able to easily make it work with their existing practices. It will help break down the stigma of introducing new ideas into the workplace.

But while technology and innovation are cool, I thought the most important thing Anil talked about was defeating the fear. There’s a real fear among businesses people that the bloggers will say something bad about you, that you can screw up and fail and really harm your company in the blogosphere. And that fear is perpetuated in great part because there are some pundits who attack businesses when they make mistakes or don’t “get it” as fast as they would like.

But the reality - Anil tells us - is that the blogosphere very inviting to businesses. They love that businesses are using the same communications tools that they use to relate to the world. What’s more, there is no religion or dogma of blogging, no right or wrong way. “Don’t be so afraid of the changes,” he said at last, “that you lose the opportunity to take advantage of something so powerful.”

Update 3/17/06 at 5:18 p.m. I think this new Skype/Movable Type functionality is exactly the kind of technological integration Anil was talking about. How cool!

I’ve been wandering around between sessions chatting people up. Our attendees run the gamut from technophobes to chief technology officers. Everyone has said that they’ve learning a great deal and having a lot of fun.

It sure feels great to be getting the California love.

At the moment, Byron, Steve & Anil are doing a panel with questions and answers about what it takes to succeed in the blogosphere. Up next is Anil’s talk about the future of the Web. We are all quivering in anticipation.

As promised, here are the [slides from our presentation](/media/publish_and_prosper_sample.pdf) on blog tools. We got through about 1/2 of the slides and please go ahead and ask questions. I’m happy to answer them.

Byron is onstage right now talking about the critical features and tools that business bloggers need to know about to make good blogging decisions. Right now, he’s covering the basics of what a podcast is, how they work, and how they add value both in terms of content and additional traffic and interest.

Outside in the hall, I’ve been chatting up participants about their blogs and their goals. We have a truly interesting bunch of attendees with us today. One gentleman, Mr. Harold Nevin of Translation Services showed me his blog. Looking through it, you can see that the content is already excellent. He’s clearly passionate about his subject matter. And posting well is half the battle.

I told him that after lunch, we’d be doing a session called Posting isn’t Enough that covers how to engage with the blogosphere to generate more traffic and inbound links.

Before he left to go into Byron’s session, we talked a little bit about how commenting works to create and maintain awareness and how on blogs you don’t just “trade links.” I explained that generating inbound links and traffic is a much more organic process that involves facilitating the conversation between yourself and other bloggers, and between your readers.

I love watching and talking to people as they’re learning about blogging. The excitement and interest in the room is palpable, and it’s a packed house. What a day!

Today, in between my sessions, I’ll blog about our [seminar](/seminars/). We’ve got a good crowd showing up with much to discuss, teach, and demonstrate. Tagging is always a challenge to show and I hope that goes well. It’s important, as so many tagging apps are being bought by Yahoo!, but also that it’s a very useful technology, just not one that’s immediately recognizable.

My bags are packed, my to do list is (mostly) checked off and I’m just waiting for Steve to come pick me up to go to the airport. (We at the Blog Business Summit proudly carpool whenever possible.)

Essentials of Business Blogging is the first event I’ve been intimately involved with at the Blog Business Summit. Let me tell you, it’s a lot of work. We’ve bent over backwards to create a great and informative day for our attendees - and we’re all very excited to see the event go forward.

We hope to see you there.

The special Blog Business Summit seminar rate offered by the Westin LAX for the Essentials of Business Blogging seminar is $169 per night. Attendees who would like to reserve rooms, will need to e-mail Allison Fox at allison dot fox at westin dot com with their information. She will be happy to get them into the system. She will need your name, check in and out dates, and a credit card to guarantee.

Six Apart has posted about our upcoming seminar which will take place in Los Angeles on March 16, 2006.

Six Apart VP and influential business blogger Anil Dash will be joining us to talk about his vision for the future of the blogosphere and the Web in general.

Thanks to everyone for their tremendous patience. RegOnline is functional once again.

Register now for what promises to be a fantastic seminar in Los Angeles on March 16, 2006.

We’ve just gotten word that RegOnline- our registration service for our upcoming seminar in LA - is down. The kind people there say they expect it to be up by 8pm tonight.

But if - like me - you are so swamped that if you don’t register right this second, it’s liable to be buried under your mountains of work, then allow me to remind you. E-mail me and I will let you know when RegOnline is back up and functioning. I will even give you a handy link that will take you right to the registration page.

Sorry for the technical difficulties, folks!

Everyone over here at the Blog Business Summit is getting geared up for our Essentials of Business Blogging seminar - which we’ll be bringing to Los Angeles on March 16, 2006.

I’m particularly excited that Anil Dash of Six Apart will be delivering the seminar’s closing address. As one of the first influential bloggers, Anil is uniquely qualified to discuss the future of the blogosphere and the Web. I absolutely can’t wait to hear what he has to say.

Sometime in the near future, I’ll be sitting down with Anil for a sneak preview podcast interview for our weekly podcast series, The Blog Business Summit Report.

And speaking of podcasting, I’m excited to report that I’ll be podcasting from the event - interviewing all the exciting speakers and experts who will be presenting, like Janet Johnson of Marqi who is back by popular demand!

Los Angeles may be an amazing city, but it hasn’t seen anything yet. Register today.

Slides from the Management & Strategy Panel [have been posted](/seminars/slides/bbs_mgmt_stratpanel.pdf).

[Blogtronix](http://blogtronix.com/) was here today and demo’d their .NET blogging engine to Steve and me and others. It’s impressive for businesses looking for a .NET, enterprise solution.

As Steve just said on stage, tell us about your blogs, if you’d like. Leave a comment here.

Here are the slides from our [Getting Started Session](/seminars/slides/bbs_seminar_getting_started.pdf) (PDF)

[Marqui](http://www.marqui.com/) is presenting on the blogosphere and their new blog engine.

Scoble’s on stage, furiously typing, and I bet [he's about to post](http://radio.weblogs.com/0001011/) about his session at the [Seminar](/seminars/)