Social Media Week 2009 Round-Up
What do you do when you have a series of tech events coinciding all in one week, all in New York City? You name it Social Media Week and you welcome other events to join the calendar as well. This year, that week was Monday, February 9th through Friday, February 13th,2009.
Though there were a series of panels each day that intrigued me (including: Art & Social Media, The Social Media Communications Summit, Launching a Media Brand from Scratch, and Digital Hip-Hop), a demanding week forced me to partake only in the post-work festivities.
On Tuesday Night, we went to the “I Heart PR Newser” pre-Valentine’s Day soiree at Aspen and cozied up by the fire with a few of our favorite PR friends. Then, I strolled down to the Next New Networks’ “New Network Party” for the launch of their Barely Political sister brand, Barely Digital. There, I ran into (client) Amber Lee Ettinger, AKA The Obama Girl (who is part of the Barely Political family); NY Tech Meetup Organizer (and friend), Nate Westheimer; Huffington Post turned Daily Beast reporter, the lovely (Canadian!) Rachel Sklar; Art of Talk Founder, Miss Charlie Oliver; Gary Sharma of Gary’s Guide AKA “Guy With A Red Tie”; Blogger, Nichelle Stephens; Publicist and avid event-goer, Matthew Caldecutt, among others.
*Jackie Brook (AMP3), Termeh Mazhari (AMP3) & Alyson Campbell (AMP3) @ “I heart PR Newser”
Photo Courtesy of Kelly Samardak of Media Post’s, “Just An Online Minute”
Wednesday night were the much anticipated Shorty Awards, a newly conceived awards show designed to commend the best creators of short content on Twitter, in a series of niche categories. After not securing a press pass to this event (the list was “full”), I watched the live streamed footage from home instead. The show was hosted by none-other-than MC Hammer, and not-surprisingly, Hammer makes a killer MC!
Thursday night, me & The AMP3 Gang got dolled up for Twestival, yes that’s right, a Twitter Festival. All proceeds went to a fantastic organization, Charity:Water, that delivers clean drinking water to underdeveloped countries. In the end, we were collectively responsible for funding 3 more wells in Ethiopia. All of the tweeps were out in full effect, including @UrbanAthlete, @Kibby, @socialmedium, @Andrew_Graham, @Brett, and about 600 more. Eclectic Method finished out the night with an amazing set, mashing up classic TV and film moments (with help of several giant big screens) into the music.
*Jackie & I with two Mashable fans
Photo Courtesy of Kelly Samardak of Media Post’s, “Just An Online Minute”
Unfortunately, I was missing in action on closing night (Friday), but read via Twitter that the DJ was an awesome, interactive one, accepting song requests via SMS text message. Oh the techieness of it all…
Though it’s starting to feel like every week is Social Media Week, I’m already looking forward to the next official one.
[Alyson Campbell for It's All Very PR]
Tags: Alyson Campbell, amp3, AMP3 Public Relations, AMP3pr, Charity Water, It's All Very PR, Next New Networks, Shorty Awards, Social Media Week, Twestival, Twitter