Most conferences I’ve been to in the past would be over by now, quite frankly.
But there’s still a day (plus change) remaining on the SXSWi schedule for 2013. As promised, we’ve checked out a few of the sights and sounds and reported back in, a little the worse for wear…
THE PLACE TO BE
We’ve just piled out of an afternoon Q&A session with Dennis Crowley of Foursquare, a company which is no stranger to SXSW.
Dennis was grilled by writer and entrepreneur Anil Dash about how the company has developed since 2009. One of the things he was keen to stress was the sheer amount of data Foursquare now has from check-ins and linked apps such as Instagram.
As an indication, he pointed out this example of how Foursquare check-ins in New York ebbed and flowed during Hurricane Sandy.
Foursquare Check-ins in NYC During Hurricane Sandy from Foursquare on Vimeo.
He said:
“Every single city looks like this every single day using Foursquare dots. People are out there crawling the world, telling us about the places that are interesting and places that are no longer interesting.”
So what’s getting him excited? He brought up the concept of your phone buzzing away in your pocket and suggesting interesting things nearby, an idea explored in Foursquare Radar. Dennis is also keen to get more into personalisation, and that applies to both points of interest and offers that might be more tailored to you.
“Maybe not everyone should get the same deal. If you’re a great customer, you get one deal, if you’re a lapsed customer, you might get another deal.”
He also believes the data in Foursquare has the ability to create a more-living, flowing social map, much like the Marauder’s Map in the Harry Potter series.
“There’s enough data in Foursquare that we should be able to make that map and give it to everyone in this room.”
SOUTHBITES
There are a shedload of food places dotted all over Austin. We’ve stopped twice for burgers and cheesesteak at Wholly Cow, which is a great place for great meat. But you can also pick up some tasty stuff from the food vans dotted around the streets, ranging from BBQ pork sandwiches to unusual ice creams…and even baskets of “spicy Cuban fries” (WARNING: Contains EVERYTHING).
RUN FOR YOUR LIFE
The thunderstorm that hit Austin on Saturday night cleared a nice hole in the murk lurking over the city. Sunday was a beautiful day, so I took a few hours out to go running along Austin riverside. To be honest, I hate running. It’s boring as hell. But I got a few miles done by plugging in the Zombies Run game, which shoves audio through your headphones that tells you you’re being chased by zombies.
Adrian Hon of Six to Start was at both Thinking Digital and GameHorizon last year, and he popped up here at 5pm yesterday to discuss fitness gaming.
BOARDING
Here’s me on a ZBoard. It’s a weight-sensing force-based skateboard built in Modesto, California that drives forward if you lean on the front pad, and back when you step on the back one. It’s got a top speed of about 17 mph. I just about managed not to fall off it, driving at basically no speed at all in a Hilton corridor. And I look as cool as a tightrope-walking Yucca plant.
CAN NEWCASTLE DO A SCIENCE HACK?
I bounced (yes, bounced) into a talk on Saturday morning by Ariel Waldman, temptingly titled “The Hackers Guide to the Galaxy”.
Ariel is the “global instigator” of Science Hack Day, which brings together scientists, designers, technologists and imaginative people.
“I think black holes are the hackers of the universe. They take things and mash them up and create new things. It’s about mashing things up and creating new things that might be bigger ideas and collaborations in the future.”
So what interesting things have come out of hack days? Firstly, there’s a mask called Syneseizure, which simulates the condition of synesthesia (which causes senses to get mixed up). Hackers slapped vibrating speakers onto a gimp mask and wired it up to an arduino and a webcam. It enabled people to “feel sight”, since the mask reacted to lighter and darker parts of the room by making the speakers vibrate.
There was also a DNAquiri, a cocktail made from extracted strawberry DNA. Oh, and a typeface called ISOdrag that was created so that each letter had equal wind-drag.
“To me, hacking is about playing with things and not really caring where they’re going. It’s playing with particle physics data even though you don’t know anything about particle physics.”
Ariel says the Science Hack Day has received a small amount of funding from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation which could enable interested organisers to visit the Hack Day in San Francisco to see how to organise their own event. There are already hack days taking place around the world (including one in London next week). Could Newcastle have one too someday?
PAAAAAARTY
There are parties all over the place at the moment, hosted by everyone from Foursquare and Mashable to Vyclone and General Assembly. Quite a few people got caught out by that Saturday deluge, but 6th Street is an absolutely heaving mass of activity by the time the sun goes down.
As a big fan of real and craft ale, I’ve also rounded off the night more than once at Craft Pride Austin, a fantastic wood-caked pub on Rainey Street that stocks beers from a very large amount of Texas breweries. Awesome.
OBLIGATORY GEEK MOMENT
I stood about a yard or two away for what seemed like a decade, wondering if it would be lame to say something. But, yes, after wandering across the bridge to the Long Centre an hour and a half early so I wouldn’t miss it, I rounded off my trip to hear Neil Gaiman by leaping in for the obligatory fan shot.
I’ve been a fan of Neil’s work since he created a fantastic graphic novel series called Sandman, and he’s since turned his hands to all sorts of literary creations from American Gods to Coraline and Doctor Who. Neil was in conversation with Chuck Lorre, who’s responsible for sitcoms such as Two and a Half Men and The Big Bang Theory.
Hugh Garry put together a good Storify of the conversation here, but here’s what stuck out for me.
* Both writers have stressed that while they respect and enjoy their audiences, they don’t invite them to change the story.
“Fans are these wonderful people that keep you fed, but you’re doomed the moment you turn to someone who likes your stuff and say ‘What do you want?’. Fans want the same thing they had last time, because they liked it.” (Neil Gaiman)
* Chuck says The Big Bang Theory wasn’t originally designed to be a comedy “about nerds”…
“It was applied after we did it. The driver was always to write a series about brilliant characters who were completely inept at handling the minutiae of life.” (Chuck Lorre)
* Chuck says the secret to a sitcom is “sustaining the original concept while incrementally changing it”.
“Things happen, nothing changes. The characters do grow, but it’s done in such as way that it’s not alienating. You have to create a character you love and whose relationship you’re fascinated by, and the only thing you can do at that point is hope that people agree with you.
“Use the seven deadly sins. They’re universal issues. If the characters have reality at all, they have flaws and it’s their ability to deal with these flaws that tell the story. Stories are not in these big physical moves. They’re in dialogue.” (Chuck Lorre)
* “The key to writing is feeling terrible, and when you feel terrible, not quitting.” (Chuck Lorre)
* Neil believes there is a huge benefit to giving things away to fans:
“I used to be terribly protective and fire off grumpy letters to people who put my stuff on the web. Then I found out I was being pirated in Russia. I got really upset, and then I realised my sales we’re going up. They were buying better and prettier editions. I persuaded my editor to give stuff away. We put American Gods on the web for free for a month, and in that month my sales went up 300%.” (Neil Gaiman)
* He also says that the increase of digital copies, such as books on Kindles, has increased the desire for better presentation.
“A decade ago it was hard to sell a hardback, and now people want these beautiful things of worth. People are starting to appreciate the beauty and uniqueness of objects more. I was given an 1850s guide to London, and I go through it and love the type and the sheer physicality of it.” (Neil Gaiman)
As you may know, Newcastle had its own representative at SXSW. Paul Smith of Ignite100 joined The Next Web’s Martin Bryant on stage to discuss startup communities around the world. I’ll be blogging on that shortly.
Have a good day, wherever you are.