Reflections on BarCamp Nashville 2008

The Virtual CFO blog was born on June 17, 2006 at the urging of Bill Seaver of MicroExplosion Media. I had mentioned to Bill that I wanted to create an electronic newsletter for the entrepreneurial public accounting firm I was opening. Bill recommended that I start a blog instead. He took the time to explain to me the advantages of Web 2.0, which is why I decided to give blogging a try. For almost two and a half years, this blog has been very valuable asset for me and my practice.

A few weeks ago, Bill blogged about the session he and Steve Horton would be presenting at BarCamp Nashville 2008. I read Bill’s post, but really didn’t think much about it until my wife asked if I would be attending. I studied the BarCamp Nashville website and decided to go. I’m glad I did and I had a great time at the conference.

One of the things I liked about BarCamp was that each session was only 25 minutes long. This meant that the speakers had to be concise and to the point. The limited time frame kept the sessions from dragging on. Surprisingly, all of the speakers kept my attention from 9:00 am until the event was over at 3:55 pm. I was tired at the end of the day, but it was a good kind of tired.

I was impressed with the depth of the content the speakers covered in the short period of time they had to make their presentations. I took eleven pages of notes during the day and I walked away from all but one of the twelve sessions I attended with something practical that I could use with my blog or my company's online presence. (The one session that I didn’t was Matt Reed's wonderful presentation entitled “Inebriator: Rise of the Machines”. I just can’t think of a way I can use remotely controlled robots in my public accounting practice. And as a financial guy, I feel that $200 is a little steep for a robot beer pourer when I can do it myself for free <grin>)

The other aspect of BarCamp I liked was networking with other attendees. I enjoyed meeting and talking to others about their view of blogging, Web 2.0, and online marketing.

I will definitely be attending BarCamp Nashville 2009.

Comments

[Bill Seaver - MicroExplosion Media]

Scot,
Glad you were able to make it out to Barcamp Nashville. Thanks for being social media's only accountant (and mine as well.)