The idea

Last year at SXSW, the social media “elite” complained that the content was not there. Of course that was nonsense. The people complaining did not go to the panels, talks or keynotes for the most part. The ones that did go only went to their friends’ panels. People like Burr Settles, Margot Bloomstein, Gregory Ng and Chris Messina absolutely knocked the cover off of the ball last year. They inspired everyone who came to see them and they validated the existence of SXSW as a cutting edge technology conference.

In response to the comments, I submitted a “Panel About Nothing (You Don’t Care About)”. The panel was designed to

• solve the phantom problem exposed by the social media elite
• eliminate the need to look into a crystal ball and decide what would be relevant months in advance of a panel
• create a panel that the audience in attendance would care about
• provoke conversation about and inform people about the important technology events of the day

The panel, in spite of having the commitment of CC Chapman, Jay Cuthrel and Jenn Van Grove was a victim of the very method that would supply the content to the panel: crowdsourcing. The allen & gerritsen team took the idea and changed it from a panel to a show. We pitched it to a megasponsor and will debut Tech Interruption at SXSW at the PepsiCo stage. Thank you PepsiCo! The show will run daily at approximately 5:30PM and we have some amazing guests and co-hosts lined up.

We need you

Let’s cut to the chase. We are looking for great tech to talk about, but we are also listening. When you have something you want us to talk about, tweet it to the hashtag #techi. We will look at the tweets and we will try to get your topic onto the show Old Spice style.

During and after the show, tweet your thoughts on the points we make during the show to the same hashtag, #techi. We will respond to you and we hope you will also respond to others in the conversation.

Come see us at the PepsiCo Stage at 5:30 daily during SXSW interactive and keep watching for an announcement about when we will be shooting the show on a weekly basis. If you would like to be a guest on the show, please send an email to schneidermike at a dash g dot com. Also watch techinterruption.com for the site to go live any day now!

Our crystal ball is broken, but we know that come SXSW, we will have valuable insight about mobile and social communications technology. The audience wants panels that are provocative, yet relevant. They need something that sets them up for a great SXSW by starting conversations about the topics they most care about. Our goal is to create thought starters about the most important issues of the day. Bring to light how perhaps people may be currently screwing it all up and how to fix it should they care. Have the audience leave with several takeaways and viewpoints on each issue.

How will we know what to talk about?

We will pick the most popular topics from the crowd, add some of our own and ask for suggestions from the SXSW panel picker team. Are there rules? Discussion will take place “Pardon the Interruption” style. Speakers on the panel will be given a set amount of time to talk about each topic and buzzed when it’s time to move on. At least one speaker must give counterpoint or divergent viewpoint. Is we are successful, Audience participation is vivid. People feel energized about SXSW feel encouraged to seek out more content. People seek deeper answers by attending other panels to take the problems we cannot solve to more pointed, focused groups. The panel is referenced in other panels.

The panelists:

• Jenn Van Grove of Mashable
• CC Chapman
• Jay Cuthrell
• Me

Please take a moment to click here and vote for our panel http://bit.ly/nothingsxsw

Uncovering Social Media Data You Can Count On

With stakeholders throughout the enterprise taking a role in the ownership of conversations in social spaces, each wants to know the impact of a relationship on demand creation, customer retention and support efficiency. This panel addresses how to make the numbers meaningful for sales, marketing, customer service and product teams.

Click here to vote for Uncovering Social Media Data You Can Count On

Extending B2B Acquisition Strategies Using Micromedia

Let’s discuss the importance of proper brand personification in micromedia spaces. We will talk integration of micromedia as a channel in a communications plan and alignment of messaging with strategic objectives. We will cover clear statement of objectives, managing multiple objectives, integration with CRM and community initiatives and attribution of a sale to micromedia. The overlay will be the balancing act of how much sales vs. thought leadership vs. customer service vs. your laundry list of others.

Click here to vote for Extending B2B Acquisition Strategies Using Micromedia

DataRock

What would this post be without a little DataRock?