SXSW Interactive Community Blog

Word is that local Nathan Black will be working the door at a couple of SXSW venues: Beerland and Elysium, I think. Look for him! He’s created an Austin Underground lens that participants might find useful. He’s a good guy, and he knows the city.

You arrive in Austin. The hotel picks you up or you cab it and you find yourself Downtown. With no wheels, you can’t go to that BBQ place in Dripping Springs or sample the Mexican restaurants on the East Side. Fret not, Downtown has plenty to offer within walking distance (15 minutes by foot). Alas, the Bitter End burned down last year and will probably not reopen. However, there are plenty of other choices.

Cheaper

Iron Works
100 Red River St
(512) 478-4855

Iron Works is a SXSW or any other convention Downtown tradition for me. They do tasty brisket and ribs, as well as decent sausage. It’s not the Salt Lick, but you will not leave Texas having missed a good Q either. They also do a BBQ turkey plate, but in my opinion, that’s not BBQ.

Progress Coffee
500 San Marcos
(512) 493-0963

As the crow flies, Progress is close to the Convention Center, but considering you must cross under I-35 to get there I hesitate listing it here. However, the combination of friendly service, rockin’ Roast Beef and Brie sandwiches, tasty java, and free Wi-Fi make this a great oasis if you need to get away from the bustle. Tucked in the corner of a large warehouse complex of film production companies and music studios, Progress also has nice décor and better-than-average local coffeehouse art.

I got scooped by other bloggers, but the Taco Shack in the Frost Bank Tower is a personal downtown fave of mine too.

Whole Foods
6^th and Lamar

Not walking distance per se and a grocery store you say? Well, with three themed restaurant stands in the store serving up good value fresh seafood, Italian, and homestyle, it’s worth investigating. This is the mother ship of Whole Foods. Even friends from California were impressed…

Pricier

Roaring Forks
Stephen F. Austin Hotel
701 Congress Ave. (@ Congress)

Lots of tasty new American cuisine to sample here. The last time I went, the Ahi Tuna was pretty darned good.

However, the true secret of the place is that inside the swank Roaring Forks bar, for Happy Hour you can grub down huge and fancy pants bacon cheese burgers and bowls of delicious pork green chile stew for $6. They make a mean drink here too. [Full disclosure: my writing partner bartends here.]

Moonshine
303 Red River

A new Southern fusion (!) restaurant—think chicken fried meets the chipotle pepper. Reports from my frequent downtown dining friend, Brendan: “The biscuits and gravy are particularly good. And even simple chicken tenders with honey-mustard sauce. The brunch is great too.”

Dona Emilia’s
101 San Jacinto Blvd
512-478-2520

Mexican and BBQ. That’s all we seem to do in Austin sometimes. Why not some South American cuisine instead? Try the Tamal Mixto—a nice change for someone who loves Texan and northern Mexican tamales.

Another great vegetarian/meateater option downtown is Thai Passion. It is fresh and yummy Thai food and open until 3 AM! They extended their hours last SXSW, and have kept it up because of the demand for quality late night food. I love it!

If you are in the mood for Mexican, it is a cab ride or drive away from downtown, but Curra’s Grill is well worth it. Great interior Mexican food with veggie tamales, excellent seafood, and enchiladas. Great for vegetarians or omnivores alike.

Really close to the Austin Convention Center and some of the best breakfast tacos in Austin (great quick lunch, too) try the Taco Shack conveniently located in the Frost building on the Brazos Street side. They are only open until 2:30pm weekdays and until 1pm on Saturdays, not open Sunday, so get down there before those early panels and for lunch.

A new place that’s very close to the action is Koriente on 7th and Sabine. Koriente is family-owned, MSG-free, healthy Asian-inspired food. They have an amazing selection of rare teas, some veggie options, yummy bulgogi and melt-in-your mouth Kalbi pot roast.

That’s all for now, but there’s more to come for people looking to get away from the downtown madness and some old Austin standbys to boot!

I’ll be at SXSW and happy to chat about this post. Please note that you need to be able to start work in the UK by the end of May.

Our successful AHRC application has created an opportunity for a postdoctoral researcher for a project entitled ‘Interdisciplinary applications of experimental social software to the study of narrative in digital contexts’, led by Professor Sue Thomas. This one year post is jointly based in the Institute of Creative Technologies and the Faculty of Humanities at De Montfort University, Leicester, UK. You will have a major role in the survey and evaluation of collaborative social software tools and their application to people-to-people models of transdisciplinary knowledge-sharing in relation to narratives in a digital context. You will have a PhD (or have recently submitted your doctorate) and you will probably, but not necessarily, have a first degree in a Humanities subject. You will have a proven knowledge of narrative in digital environments and experience of managing web-based collaborative tools. A substantial understanding of the technical aspects of the project, including knowledge of HTML, databases, data collection and analysis skills, are a requirement of the post.

Closing date for applications 17th March 2006. Interviews will take place on Monday 10th April with a preferred start date of 22nd May 2006. Obtain further details and apply online at http://www.jobs-dmu.co.uk/academicmoreinfo.asp?JID=1009

Hi everyone, this is my first trip to SXSW and I’m very excited about it. Some people will know me from my former job as founder and Artistic Director of the trAce Online Writing Centre or as the author of the cyberspace travel memoir Hello World: travels in virtuality. I’m now Professor of New Media at De Montfort University, UK, and manage a small collaborative blog Writing and the Digital Life . I’m also involved with the new Institute of Creative Technologies and we have a very exciting job vacancy at the moment. I’ll post info about this separately.

We’re also launching a new online Master’s this year - Online MA in Creative Writing & New Media . Applications for 2006 entry are being considered now.

Before SXSW I’ll also be at ETech. I’m looking forward to meeting and re-meeting lots of people!

I just whipped up a Squidoo lens about SXSWi to share some of my favorite people, places and things to check out when visiting Austin for SXSW.

If you’ve never participated in the conference before, you might find it useful — the lens includes tons of eating options, retail tourism recommendations, and suggestions of other things to do.

Just a quick note to cordially invite all web developers, web designers, information architects and others interested in XML to our Saturday morning panel entitled “Looking for XML in all the Wrong Places.”

Basically, we’re going to talk about all the bad things that can happen if you’re not careful with XML–in fact, there will probably be no shortage of bad things that we’ve seen happen on projects.

Panelists include:

• Thomas Myer, founder of Triple Dog Dare Media and author of No Nonsense XML Web Development with PHP.
• Simon St. Laurent of O’Reilly and author of (among other things) XML: A Primer and Building XML Applications.
• Giussepe Ferrigno, systems architect with Hart Intercivic.
• Jennifer Linton, XML consultant with ComTech Services (JoAnn Hackos’ crew).

The panel starts at 10:00 am on Saturday March 11, 2006. Hope to see you there!

There is a new Pizza shop on the east side of Austin. It is called East Side Pies. The menu is limited to Pizza, Slices and whole pies, salads, sandwiches, cookies, brownies, pop, coffee, and tea. We will be officially open (CO) , Mar 1st ,2006. Soft opening is comming the week prior. Try our pie, ESP, We Know What You Want!

Michael & Noah

I’m Jake, from CommunityGuy.com. Until very recently, I was the Global Community Relations Specialist for the LEGO Company. My task was to work together with colleagues and adult LEGO enthusiasts to create bridges.

I’ve recently made the move to Slingshot, a Dallas based agency with the task of building an internal practice around this concept of consumer>companywww.communityguy.com. And if you’re interested in general community concepts, drop me at line or leave a comment on the site. I’d love to meet up with any/all of you who are interested in chatting about the ways of community building.

If you added your site to the blogroll post, it’s now available for you to put in your blog. The code to put it on your site is here. If you want your blog on the blogroll, please contact me.