Web 2.0 expo at the Moscone West

I went to the Web 2.0 expo today with a friend of mine. It kicked off on Wednesday the 31st, and will continue through tomorrow, April 2nd. The co-sponsors are O'Reilly Media and Techweb. I wasn't really sure what to expect from the conference, but it was in my hood and I really wanted to hear a few of the Keynote Speakers. So I decided to stop into today to hear Douglas Rushkoff speak on "How the Web Ate the Economy, and Why This is Good for Everyone" and listen in on a sponsored session on Social Media given by a Senior Marketer at Vignette, an integrated web content management provider. 

Both presos were fairly edifying, although Rushkoff only talked for 20 minutes or so, which sucked since I dragged my sleepy arse out of bed and to Moscone West at the crack of dawn this morning SOLELY because he was speaking so early. And yet I do worship his brain and will probably go and buy Life, Inc. as soon as possible. Yes, I'm a loyalist when it comes to brainiacs.

The Social Media preso from the Vignette peeps was a decent high level overview of what's happening in Social Media, and how to create a kind of sustainable, consistent brand presence by syndicating original content and engaging in the conversations around the content and brand. Yes, we've all heard this before. But no, this didn't annoy me--mainly because with the media industry changing on a daily basis these days, it's comforting to feel that there's at least a one recent media development that may actually endure for a substantial length of time.

The picture accompanying this post was taken in the the Expo Booth area during the Booth Crawl Happy Hour. Exhibitors pulled out crates of stouts and ales while they passed out their company literature and talked shop. The most popular booths at the expo seemed to be representing either enterprise-class social media community experience providers or cloud and utility computing services. I was pretty stoked to FINALLY have a clear understanding of what cloud computing is, and the value it brings to corporations.

A happy ending for me, and a day well spent.