Northern Voice – One of my favorite times of the Year

Northern Voice 2010
So here is the longer story, before anyone really knew about ‘social media’ and when SEO was a slur for a company’s chief executive, a bunch of folks started a ‘blogging’ conference. It started a Robson square in downtown Vancouver and eventually moved to to the University of British Columbia. I’ve been to most (missed last year) and they are amazing. Started using just about everything from WordPress to Twitter in Feburary (when the conference has normally been held).
The regular attendees include both the Vancouver technorati (literally) – Darren Barefoot, Boris Mann, some of the best ‘Edtech’ people I know Darcy Norman, Brian Lamb; and social media mavens like Chris Pirillo, Robert Schoble. Keynotes have included Anil Dash, Dave Sifry, and Matt Mullenweg.
One day is a formal conference schedule, the other is a ‘Bar Camp’ style self organizing sessions on topics of collective interest.
The conference is intentionally kept small to facilitate the group collaboration vibe. In my mind it competes with the likes of SXSW and Gnomedex. Its in Vancouver and its a relatively cheap ticket ($45/day or $70 for both days).
With tools like Second Life, Flock, and Hootsuite coming from many of the people that attend this conference, it has as much online ‘street cred’ as you are like to find this side of San Jose – well maybe Burlingame.
@Northernvoice (twitter)
Flickr pics from NorthernVoice