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TECHNOLOGY PARTNER
SXSW Interactive is proud to announce that Heather Armstrong of Dooce.com and Jason Kottke of kottke.org will serve as the keynote conversation on Sunday afternoon, March 12. Their conversation will run from 2:00-2:45 pm and is open to SXSW Interactive, Gold and Platinum registrants
One of the foremost identity bloggers with a vast following of dedicated readers, Armstrong is the witty voice behind dooce.com. On this site, she writes about a variety of very personal topics including her infant daughter, her relationship with her husband and her struggles with depression. She is indirectly responsible for the verb "dooced," which refers to being fired from your day job because of what you have written on your blog. Armstrong lives and works in Salt Lake City.
Meanwhile, Kottke runs the immensely-popular kottke.org. As he notes on this site, "I like to play around with hypertext, design, photography, media, text & programming, and this site is the result. Kottke-org is updated near-daily and recently became my full-time concern, supported almost entirely by financial support from you, the readers." Kottke founded his blog in March of 1998; two years later, he was profiled in the New Yorker. After starting his high-tech career in San Francisco, he now calls New York City home.
Both Armstrong and Kottke fall into the category of "pro bloggers," meaning that they are people who trying make a living via their websites. At the 2006 SXSW Interactive Festival, they will talk about the challenges of full-time blogging, as well as the different styles and strategies they bring to their craft.
» SUNDAY, MARCH 12 ? 2:00-3:00 ? ROOM 18 ABCD
Craig Newmark founded Craigslist in 1995, as a way to tell friends about cool events in and around San Francisco. The site -- which easily connects people who have something with people who want something -- has experienced massive growth over the last ten years. It now serves more than 170 cities in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Europe, Asia, Africa and New Zealand. Despite the power of this global community, Newmark's overall approach has changed very little. As he told Wired magazine in a September 2004 interview, "I'm pretty happy with nerd values: Get yourself a comfortable living, then do a little something to change the world." Named the "2005 Webby Person of the Year", Newmark retains a simple motto for his site: "Give people a break."
For SXSW, he will be interviewed by Jimmy Wales of Wikipedia. Wales and Newmark will explore how a simple interface and an easy-going zen attitude have helped Craigslist make life better for millions of users, forever changing our approach to classified ads. Photo at left by Gene X Hwang of Orange Photography.
» MONDAY, MARCH 13 ? 2:00-3:00 ? ROOM 18 ABCD
What happens when you employ video game technology to produce narrative, episodic content? The technical name for this relatively new form is machinima and one of the early masters of this form is Burnie Burns.
Burns' company, Rooster Teeth Productions, produces the incredibly popular Red vs. Blue series, which spoofs the hit game Halo. This Austin-based production team has recently added two new shows to its online portfolio: The Strangerhood (which pokes fun at The Sims) and PANICS (which pokes fun at the entire shoot-up game genre). The three series make for an impressive lineup -- at the Machinima Film Festival in November, "Red vs. Blue" won the Best Independent Machinima Award, while "PANICS" won Best Writing and "Strangerhood" won Best Editing.
According to "Xbox Auteurs" a lengthy profile (NYT reg. required) of Burns that appeared in the New York Times Magazine this August, "Video-game aficionados have been creating 'machinima' since the late 90's. 'Red vs. Blue'' is the first to break out of the underground . . . More than just a cheap way to make an animated movie, machinima allows game players to comment directly on the pop culture they so devotedly consume. Much like 'fan fiction' (homespun tales featuring popular TV characters) or 'mash-ups' (music fans blending two songs to create a new hybrid), machinima is a fan-created art form. It's what you get when gamers stop blasting aliens for a second and start messing with the narrative."
At SXSW Interactive, Burns will discuss how do-it-yourself, inexpensive film-making and decentralized distribution chains are revolutionizing traditional models of content and revenue. Look for lots of insights plus several entertaining surprises at his March 14 keynote.
» TUESDAY, MARCH 14 ? 2:00-3:00 ? ROOM 18 ABCD
