Archive for the ‘Seattle’ Category

(Seattle) Berkun + Wine + You: special event

The ever cool biznik collective is hosting me for a special author event night here in Seattle.

When: Tuesday March 16th, 5:30pm to 8:00pm

Where: Hotel 1000, 1000 1st Avenue, Seattle

You get:

  • A signed copy of Confessions of a Public Speaker
  • an evening of fine wine and appetizers
  • A presentation by yours truly on creativity and persuasion
  • Plenty of socializing and fun before and after
  • All this for $40 ($35 if you are a biznik member)

How to sign up:

You have to RSVP in advance – All the details here.

(Seattle) Cool event: Small and Special

I’m in believer in the philosophy of the small.

Part of why I quit was I wanted to work on things I could get my entire hands around (e.g. books), even if I made less money than I would for continuing to play a small role in the making of big things.  I bet I’d get more pride and pleasure from making things I loved, even if they are only used by a few people, than I would for the thousands of compromises that come with making things used by millions of people.

One of my former bosses at Microsoft, Hillel Cooperman, has not only gone on his own with Jackson Fish, a company that makes hand crafted software (you read that right), but he’s started up a little event for people who share the small and special philosophy.

What: Small and Special – a tiny conference for entrepreneurs and hopefuls

When: June 30th, 2009, 2-6pm

Where: Seattle (Georgetown)

Cost: $25!

You can find Registration details and the excellent speaker list here.

If you’re a small business owner or have thought about starting one, this is a great way to meet many locals who are a few steps ahead of you. Check it out.

What I learned at Seattle Ignite 6

The cool thing about Ignite Seattle, beyond the crazy fun format (5 mins, 20 slides, 15 seconds a slide), is how positive and supportive the vibe is.  Everyone talks about cool things they’ve seen and heard, and there’s a buzz of learning and doing that’s superior to most conferences.  It’s geekish, for sure, but it also surprisingly cross-discipline. There were talks about parenting, libraries, biology, medicine, raising chickens and more.

Perhaps part of the magic is that it’s just one intense night – the fact that’s an evening thing and there’s always a bar at the venue perhaps changes who comes and why. Kudos to @Brady and @BryanZug and the all the folks that volunteered to help out.

Last night I was lucky and got to a talk on how to give an ignite talk, and if the video makes it online I’ll post.

In the meantime here’s what I learned last night (from memory – forgot my notebook):

  • Creativity is fueled by contact with weak social links – you need points of contact that are not your primary circle to stimulate you  (Shelly Farnham)
  • Assuming your users have Alzheimer is a hack for better design thinking (Roy Leban)
  • There are many people with Lego-addiction and Hillel is one of them (Hillel Cooperman)
  • I learned about clipping (drop vowels) and thesauri (vocabulary wins) for twitter (Jason Preston)
  • If you think you’re competent, you probably aren’t  (Ron Burk)
  • Native Americans/?Micronesians  had cool map technology (@kbeegle)
  • All good marriages are creative partnerships (Jen Zug)

Speaking at Ignite Seattle, Wed Night

Ignite is always an awesome time. There is something so fun about the crowd that comes, and then of course there’s all the crazy stuff that happens on stage.

If you’ve never been, the format is 5 minutes per speaker. The catch is the slides are automated: 20 slides, 15 seconds per slide. The results are, shall we say, unpredictable.

It’s this Wed, 7pm at the King Kat Theater in Seattle.

Here’s Wednesday’s awesome lineup:

7PM – Doors Open

7:30 PM – Paper Tower Contest Begins – Build the tallest tower you can out of just 5 sheets of paper and tape (See Details)

8:30 – First Set of Talks
Hillel Cooperman (@hillel) – The Secret Underground World of Lego
Dawn Rutherford (@dawnoftheread) – Public Library Hacking
Roy Leban (@royleban) – Worst Case User Experience: Alzheimer’s
Shelly Farnham (@ShellyShelly) Community Genius: Leveraging Community to Increase your Creative Powers
Dominic Muren (@dmuren) – Humblefacturing a Sustainable Electronic Future
Jen Zug (@jenzug) – The Sanity Hacks of a Stay At Home Mom
Ken Beegle (@kbeegle) – Decoding Sticks and Waves
Maya Bisineer (@thinkmaya) – Geek Girl – A life Story
Scott Berkun (Scottberkun.com)- How and Why to Give an Ignite Talk

9:45 PM – Second Set of Talks
Scotto Moore (Scotto.org)- Intangible Method
Secret Guest Speaker from Ignite Portland
Mike Tykka – The Invention of the Wheel
Jason Preston (@Jasonp107) – Goodbye Tolstoy: How to say anything in 140 characters or less
Chris DiBona (@cdibona) – The Coolness of Telemedicine
Ron Burk – The Psychology of Incompetence
Katherine Hernandez (@ipodtouchgirl) – The Mac Spy
Jamie Gower JamieGower.com) – I Am %0.0002 Cyborg
Beth Goza (@bethgo) – Knitting in Code

Hope to see you there.

(Seattle) Presentation Camp – Tommorow!

Last call for presentation camp – a brand new unconference event for people interested in pitching, presenting and public speaking.

Presentation Camp
At UW communications building (map)
Saturday April 4th 2009, 9am-4:30pm (Full schedule here)

It’s $15 if you register by noon today, $20 later today or at the door.

I’ll be doing a keynote on Why your talk sucks and what to do about it. And if there’s enough interest I’ll be doing a slide critique fun house, where we look at each others slides and help make them better.

Plus I’ll be around all day interviewing people for my next book.

Hope to see you there.

(Seattle) Presentation camp schedule up!

Saturday April 4th Kathy Gill and I are running the first ever Seattle presentation camp, an unconference for people interested in all forms of public speaking, presenting, and pitching ideas.

We’ve posted the core  schedule with some of the sessions that we know will take place, as well as plenty of slots for unconference style sessions (you, as an a attendee, can suggest or run a session yourself).

Presentation Camp Schedule – Sat April 4th

Session include Ignite’s Brady Forest talking about how to speak at major conferences, I’ll be speaking on skills I learned from being on national TV as well as how to get over fears of public speaking, Kathy Gill from UW will be talking about Presentation Zen and Slideshare, and plenty more good stuff.

Registration is just $10, enough to cover the basic costs for the cool rooms we’ve got at the UW for the event.

It’s a new event so we’re open to ideas, volunteers and other contributions.  Get in touch with Kathy or I.

Hope to see you there – and help spread the word if you can.  Facebook event and Upcomming event pages are up.

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Scott's Bestselling Books
  • Confessions of a
    Public Speaker
  • Provocative and funny secrets from a veteran speaker, you'll laugh as you learn.
  • Buy now at Amazon Book Details
  • The Myths of Innovation
  • The classic bestseller on how amazing lessons from the past can help you innovate today.
  • Buy now at Amazon Book Details
  • Making Things Happen
  • The classic and bestselling handbook for any project leader, packed with tactics and stories.
  • Buy now at Amazon Book Details
Photos from Recent Events (view flickr stream)

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