BurningbirdRecovered from the Wayback Machine.
Interesting. The Ajax Experience no longer has the dubious distinction of have no women in its speaker list. It now has Molly Holzschlag.
Since I know absolutely squat about JavaScript and XMLHttpRequest other than what they do, it’s rather humorous I’d get picked up for such a seriously geeky conference as The Ajax Experience.
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John Dvorak writes on the possibility of a Sun/Apple merger now that Google’s CEO, Eric Schmidt, has joined the Apple Board. I must admit to scratching my head, and going ‘huh’ on that one. Apple + Google = Sun?
If this does occur, I wouldn’t expect the customers to benefit. All three companies are SillyValley-based (a strike against in my book), indifferent to freedom of speech and protection against censorship if it impacts their bottom line, and arrogant to boot. Three wrongs won’t make a right.
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Saturday I slipped out for a couple of hours in the afternoon to go to the first day of the new Metrolink extension. I went later in the day and missed most of the crowds. The LinkFest associated with the opening was pretty quiet, and aside from having to walk a gauntlet of candidates, there wasn’t much going on.
One of the candidates was a very impressive woman named Barbara Fraser who waved a brochure to get my attention when I started to walk past her. She was strong, confident, and engaging. Updated: I originally listed the wrong name and party affiliation, but she is the right person: Barbara Fraser was the candidate, she is Democrat and will get my vote.
The new MetroLink is surprisingly beautiful and graceful. A strong hint of curves all throughout the line, with a lot of raised platforms and tunnels–most with some simple light-based sculpture. I was only able to snap a few photos from Saturday; I’ll try to get more, later, that really do the line justice. Some photos are posted to the side. They’re not FOO Camp or BarCamp, or WorldCamp, or even all that campy–but I was able to sleep in my own bed last night.
Speaking of *camps, I have my own variation of a Chumby. I’ll post a photo later in the week, in addition to responding to a couple of other posts from Christine at christie.net including Open Data Standardards Redux.
As for the number of women at FOO camp increasing to a whopping 16.97%, all I have to say is: better, yes. Good. Well done. Much better than other conferences I’ve read on this week. (Couldn’t get much worse than the other conferences I read about this week.)
HOWEVER, not good enough. Next year O’Reilly, you can do better. I know you can.
I can see that Jeneane has been out disrespectin’ the fastigium of weblogging again. Along with Jeneane, there were responses in the MacLeod/Godin interview that puzzled me. For instance:
2. QUESTION: As a cartoonist, I find myself quite surprised that very few of the more prominent bloggers out there are in the “Arts”. It seems we have lots of business thinkers, technologists, entrepreneurs, consultants etc, but why do we have so surprisingly few filmmakers, playwrights, novelists, musicians, painters etc at the top of the pyramid? I have a few theories myself as to why this is, but may I ask what may be your take on it?
ANSWER: They’re coming, for sure. Postsecret is one of the three most popular blogs in the world. I think mainstream artists are rarely the first to embrace a new medium (silkscreening, for example, took a long time to get its Andy Warhol), but they’re coming. It’s going to be a new generation of artists that embrace the nature of the medium, and they’re just getting started.
I don’t know that I would classify Postsecret as art, as I believe Hugh MacLeod was referencing the term. To me, the site is more of a visual aid for Catholic Priests. Regardless, Godin’s response was off on so many levels. Leaving aside the term, “mainstream artist”, and stating as fact that silkscreening needed Andy Warhol to become ‘big’ and this is proof that old artists can’t somehow embrace new techniques or media…well, no, these two pretty much have me stopped.
However, at the moment I just can’t work up the energy to do more than twist an eyebrow up, like Mr. Spock. Twitch. Twitch. Twitchtwitchtwitch… Makes me glad Jeneane is there to beat such hyperbole into the ground. We take turns at this, she and I; that’s why we’re known as the Tag Sisters.
(Tag…get it? You know, like weblogging and ta…oh never mind.)
I was also reminded today to remind you all that I no longer have a gmail account (nor a Flickr account), and if you want to reach me by email, use shelleyp@burningbird.net.
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The first Office 2.0 Conference is organized by IT|Redux, and brings together vendors, investors, industry analysts, and journalists. The goal for the event is to collectively build the foundation for Office 2.0, investigate technical challenges, and showcase practical applications. Most importantly, it will be an opportunity for like-minded people to meet and network with an elite group of visionaries and industry leaders.
What is like-minded for the Office 2.0 conference planners? Here’s a hint: Michael Noir would be an excellent keynote speaker.
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I’m trying a little behind the scenes recruiting to get O’Reilly to put on a scripting, Ajax, and web development conference here in St. Louis. After all, what can we offer:
Location: St. Louis is centrally located for every part of the country. Rarely do you have to fly more than 3 or 4 hours to reach our city. Even if you come from another country, chances are we’re closer than California.
Cost: California is not a cheap place to visit. It’s expensive to host a conference, and hotel rooms are usually pricey. St. Louis is city that’s ready to welcome the world, not bankrupt it.
Facilities: St. Louis has one of three top rated botanical gardens in the world. St. Louis has one of the ten top rated zoos, as well as top five rated art museum. That’s in addition to the Arch, Forest Park, the waterfront, the rivers, and so on. We have a light rail system, conference facilities, plenty of hotels including a terrific one at Union Station, which is actually wrapped around a wonderfully funky shopping center that used to be the main train station here.
Weather: Summers aren’t great in St. Lou, but we make up for that with the weather we have the rest of the year. We have beautiful springs and falls — we can rival New England for fall color. We have so many spring flowers, you’ll think you walked into a florist shop. Only better. As for winter, rarely do we get snow above a couple of inches, and then it usually melts within a day. We’re sunny, and even when it rains, the rain comes in, does its thing, and moves on.
History: Mark Twain, Truman, Lewis and Clark, the westward expansion, Sprit of St. Louis, you name it, and St. Louis and Missouri have been a part of it.
Things to do: Where do I start? I’ve already covered the zoo, Forest Park, the Botanical Garden, and the Art Museum. Then there’s the dozens of parks and trails, Katy trail where people can rent bikes and ride gently along the Missouri river. Tower Grove is this country’s last Victorian walking park, with its pagodas and faux greek ruins. St. Charles for walking, LaClede’s Landing, the old Chain or Rocks Bridge. About an hour away is one of the world’s largest underwater lakes, where you can ride a boat, take a walking tour, OR do a little fresh water diving. There’s Laumeir Sculpture Park, with its outdoor works of art, nestled among trees, deer walking here and there. This is in addition to the Basilica with its world class collection of tiles, or the wonderful Fox Theater, with its ornate moulding and rich red tapestries. This is a city that was once the third largest in the country, and one of the most cosmopolitan. Much of the architecture from that time is still standing, making it an amazing place to explore.
As for night life, honey you ain’t heard the Blues until you’ve heard it in St. Lou. As for food, well, there’s Italian at the Hill, amazing southern food practically everywhere, not to mention world class gourmet restaurants such as Puck’s at the Museum. Then there’s toasted ravioli, gooey cake, and Ted Drewes frozen custard. This is Anheuser-Busch’s corporate headquarters, where you can go visit the horses, and sample the brews.
Did I happen to mention that St. Louis was, I believe, one of the first, if not the first city to have the downtown wired for free wireless?
I don’t know about anyone else, but I for one am getting tired of conferences held only along the coasts.
Arch 2.0. It works.