Social Software Salon @ UBC, February 9th, 2006

Telestudios, Room 0110 2329 West Mall (the University Services Building). 12:30-3:00 PST

If you are not in the Vancouver area, please Skype in to:

brlamb -- Brian's Skype
j_toal -- Jason's Skype
cogdogblog -- Alan Levine's Skype and AIM/iChat (and perhaps Gizmo Project as well)

This Thursday (February 9) we are bringing accomplished educational webloggers who are in town for the event out to UBC. Alan Levine (http://cogdogblog.com∞) from Maricopa Community Colleges and D'Arcy Norman (http://www.darcynorman.net∞) from U of Calgary are net-hardened weblog veterans, widely-recognised innovators and very fun, very nice guys. We've also got my longtime co-conspirator Jason Toal (http://www.sfu.ca/~jtoal/∞) from SFU coming down from the mountain, who has been deeply immersed in experience design and social software since 1997.

Rather than host a formal presentation or panel, we wanted an event that better reflected the spirit of social software. So we will be holding a Social Software Salon, an opportunity for Alan, D'Arcy, Jason and myself to interview our weblog and wiki users, and for them to ask questions of us. These guys are all very well-versed in the social dynamics of blogging, academic and educational uses, and extending the online tool set. Each of them are experienced podcasters, and D'Arcy manages the Educational category of the iPodder directory. They are all enthusiastic wikiers, social bookmarkers, and skilled digital photographers. So they will be interested in what you are doing, and between them can converse on any practical, technical, web design or technocultural question you throw at them.

The Social Software Salon is at Telestudios, Room 0110 - 2329 West Mall (the University Services Building) from 12:30-3:00. The session is a drop-in model. There is no beginning or end, come and go as you like. You may talk, listen in, blog, take pictures, record audio or do something else. There's no requirement to route conversation through the facilitators -- digressions and diversions will be encouraged. Armed guards will ensure things don't get too rowdy. We may stay together as one group, we might split up. I would like to record audio of at least some of the conversations for podcasts, but if that makes you uncomfortable we can turn off the mic. My hope is that we will end up with a collection of audio clips and links that we could turn into a digital snapshot of what social social software is like at UBC and elsewhere in the region right now. I've been watching the use of these tools develop over the past couple years, and there are some amazing stories to tell.

The first 20 or so arrivals will receive an amazing superprize of catered sandwiches and drinks. If you'd like to pre-schedule a short time slot (5-15 min) with our guests, if there's a topic or guest you especially wish to talk with, or if you have any questions about this unorthodox gathering, please drop me an email at: brian.lamb@ubc.ca

If you can't make it to the session, maybe you can join us by Skype or audio chat?

Once again, Telestudios, Room 0110 2329 West Mall (the University Services Building). 12:30-3:00 -- I am certain it's going to be a fun and provocative time, and it will be even better if you join us. Please feel free to forward this invitation to anyone who you believe would be interested.