Tom and I are heading down to San Diego tomorrow for O’Reilly’s ETech. We’re both speaking, but on separate mornings: Tom’s running a workshop and I’m giving a brief morning keynote. Tom’s taken on the demanding task of doing a three hour(!) workshop and providing a comprehensive review of what we’ve been up to for the last few years, and I’ve really enjoyed seeing a view on our projects as thoughtful as his. I’ve got the easy job; all I have to do is get up on stage and show 15 minutes of the sexy stuff.
This will be my first ETech, so I’m not really sure what to expect. It’s got a reputation as the ultimate nerd-fest, which is a bit intimidating, but means there’ll be alot to learn. I’m optimistic that the O’Reilly people seem to be living up to their reputation as framing “the ideas, projects, and technologies lurking just below the mainstream radar.” moving away from the straight up “Web 2.0” topics which seem to have moved well up above the mainstream radar by now.
My pals Alex Steffen, David Pescovitz, and Justin Hall are all speaking, & I’m curious to see what JC Herz will reference when she talks aboutWeb Visualization: Beyond RSS Lava Lamps, which will provide “a 90-second blipvert overview of the shiny vizporn and kinetic data sculptures to date [and] why they’re not useful” 🙂