Under the covers

Day two of the AlwaysOn conference saw an exhausting program of showcases, panel discussions, keynotes and workshops. The showcases were very interesting with up to six CEO's per session having six minutes to explain their business. The moderators were very strict on time, marching onto stage to stop the presenters after their allotted time. How we could do with that at other events!

With sessions running concurrently it wasn't possible to see everything but I did manage to take in: -

* Panel - are there chinks in Googles armour? - Answer = no!
* Workshop - becoming a power blogger - I'll let you decide
* Showcases - Advertising service providers, Consumer generated media, Technology enablers and Community - 20+ presentations!
* Panel - Keeping the IM generations mindshare - how to build products for the 13-17 year olds

The general themes running through the day were: -

* There are a lot of people trying to crack video both from a search and social media/editing perspective.
* Social media and giving up control to the audience is the new model not just for publishers but for advertisers too
* Lots of great technology on display from web based video search and editing through to complete virtual worlds

I'll be blogging separately on the interesting technologies so watch this space...

Started in NY tonight with Tony Perkins and Bill Cleary doing a double act where they presented video blogs from Davos and San Francisco respectively. These were a bit like "You've been framed" only not as consistently amusing but did set the tone for presentations that are now sure to be laced with video for the rest of the event.

While videos clearly add an element of interest and production not previously encountered in Powerpoint slides, I can't help but think it's cheating a bit to rely too much on them.

They were followed by Peter Hirshberg from Technorati giving a similarly light hearted, video laced presentation about web 2.0 and their new product built in association with Ogilvy.

Not exactly sure what that product is as it wasn't really that clear and no demo was forthcoming.

The main theme, as to be expected was all about how social media is taking over and the need for publishers and advertisers to take an active role in the "conversation". The intro's were obviously designed to be lightweight rather than in depth. Let's hope tomorrow brings a little more substance on what and how publishers and advertisers can engage rather than lots of people simply urging them on.

So here I am, a new startup, looking to grow my business and trying to find the right tools for the job. I've been looking around for some kind of very basic CRM system to keep track of all the people I'm talking to about different projects.

Top of the Google pops is Business Contact Manager from Microsoft which apparently runs inside Outlook (perfect, thats where all my contacts are already) and even better, it's free to use with my copy of Office Small Business Edition.

So off I go to microsoft.com to download it and that's where the problems started. It's impossible to find anything other than Office 2007 on the site, everywhere you click, big jellow boxes shout out at you "BUY ME".

Despite the fact that the whole world is running Office 2003 (or earlier) it's like the those products never existed. Even if you go to those sections, the big yellow boxes are there urging you to upgrade.

After more than an hour of searching I finally managed to locate the download and from that point on it was plain sailing, it's all installed and working fine.

Now I know that Microsoft has to make money and they clearly want us all to upgrade to 2007 but they shouldn't forget the small businesses who are going to be using the old products for the foreseeable future and need to get support on them. We are the next corporations, help us grow....

Next week sees me jetting off to New York for the AlwaysOn Media Conference. Lots of interesting speakers, Steve Rubel and Jeff Jarvis from the bloggers and the likes of Technorati and many names we’ve yet to hear about this side of the pond. Some interesting items on the agenda. Wednesday looks particularly good with two sessions on analytics, next generation search and a session on web services and community.

It will be my first visit to the event which is widely regarded as the leading media/technology show of the year in the US. With all the activity in the tech start-up marketplace, it will be interesting to try to pick the winners from the losers.

I’ll be blogging from the show each evening so watch this space for more details. Ahh, the life of an independent consultant...

I blagged myself an invite to the latest AOP event this week where Suzie Daniels was up on stage with the likes of Yahoo to talk about the social networking experience ZDNet has gained from this part of the site.

The audience were all on-line publishers of one description or another and Suzie talked about the lessons learned so far, the importance of having built a solid platform and the cultural changes that are taking place inside the organisation. There was a very lively Q+A session at the end and It just demonstrated how far ahead the team at ZDNet are with their thinking.

It has prompted several comments across the blogosphere, the most notable, this one at the Guardian.