The Media Talent Bank from Birmingham City University was an online directory for people working in the media industry that, well, hasn’t quite met its expectations, shall we say. As someone who sees something like this emerge every few months with the best of intentions before quietly fading away this doesn’t really surprise me, but this isn’t really the place to go into that. The point is it’s sitting there not really working so, as I understand it, a bunch of 3rd year students have been given it to play with as their final project.

I had a chat with Jamie Futers, one of the bunch, who told me they’d decided to put on a series of events and workshops for those about to graduate from media courses at BCU. My take of this being if the Media Talent Bank wasn’t the right model, what should the students be doing to get the talents and interests noticed by the right people?

I agreed to do a talk (which turned out to be the only talk) and take part in some workshop discussions with the students and other folk who’ve done interesting things with the social web from a variety of backgrounds – Nicky Getgood, Alison Smith, Kate Hughes and Simon Partington.

Jamie asked me to cover the following areas in my talk:

1. The different social media tools – uses/limitations
2. What social media brings to creative individuals and the opportunities it can bring
3. Birmingham’s social media scene – contacts and networks
4. Personal social media success, how it worked for you etc..
5. Balance of personal and business
6. Being interesting

I pretty much ignored the first one. The second was pretty much the theme for the talk. The third was answered with “there is no scene, there are many scenes and networks.” The fourth was a brief talk through my blogging history. The fifth made for a nice look at my different online personas and how they relate to the “real” me. And the sixth was my big concluding point.

I’d been thinking recently about “being interesting”. It’s probably the surefire way to success in this lark. If people think you’re interesting then they’re more likely to follow and interact with you. If they think you’re boring then they’re not. The problem is “interesting” is incredibly relative, especially when we’re dealing with the granular nature of online activity. The conclusion I came to is you have no control over whether you’re interesting or not. All you can hope for is that someone out there thinks you are.

What you do have control over, however, is how interested you are and how you show that interest. And, I believe, interested people are inherently interesting to those interested in the same things. So be demonstrably interested. That’s probably the best advice I can give anyone.

Above all I should say I really enjoyed this talk. Partly it was because it just worked and I didn’t fluff anything major but mainly, I think, it was because I had a huge stage to run around on. I would appear to have become the sort of person who’s comfortable on a huge stage. Hmm.

Thanks to Jamie and team for organising the event and framing it so well. Watch these kids. They’re onto something.

Appendix

Andrew Dubber graciously let me have the recording he made. Sadly I was too far away from the mic during the Q&A but the talk itself is in these three mp3s (each aprox 5mb).

Me and my blogs
Download audio file (mtbworkshop_1_allaboutpete.mp3)

Some other examples
Download audio file (mtbworkshop_2_someotherpeople.mp3)

Musings on social media
Download audio file (mtbworkshop_3_socialmediamusings.mp3)

Laura Hogan posted her notes online and they’re shockingly close to what I intended to get across, which is nice to see.

The group was using the #mtbworkshop hashtag but since Twitter has a goldfish memory I’ve taken a screen grab.

I’m happy to say there are 12 names filling all 12 slots so it looks like it’s going to happen, probably on Tuesday, February 23rd though that’ll be confirmed soon.

The precise agenda will depend on the sort of people who sign up but I’m expecting to do a brief but fairly comprehensive presentation of the options available that strike a good balance between cheap, easy and effective before moving on to a series of one-to-one sessions through the day. The aim will be for each person to have a functioning internet presence for their business and a good idea of what they’re going to do with it.

The Exchange caters for self-employed workers who would normally work at home with a slight bias towards the creative sector so I’ll be pitching the presentation in that area. That said, it should be useful for anyone who feels they need to be online but hasn’t got the budget or need for a bespoke website.

It’s actually a perfect fit. The Exchange is for people who are outgrowing working in their kitchen but aren’t ready to take out a lease on an office just yet. The same applied to websites. When you’re wildly successful I’ll send you to Made or Substrakt (or one of the other great web design companies in Brum) but right now you probably only need to spend a few quid on a domain and a bit of web space. Or maybe you don’t need to spend anything at all.

There will be a fee but it won’t be huge – I’ll pick a sum I think is fair and divide it by the number of people attending. £15 – £20 a head seems right at the moment but don’t hold me to that. In return you’ll get a fun and informative talk and at least 15 minutes one to one with me. Which seems about right.

Karin at the Exchange is sorting all this out so if you’re Moseley-based and are interested, get in touch with her.

The subject is Social Media and Globalisation, more specifically “examin[ing] lifestyle changes implied by new technological tools such as the personal computer, ipod and mobile phone, as well as looking at changes in behaviour resulting from the use of them.”

Now I have no idea what that means or how it connects to social media and globalisation and thus no idea what I’m going to talk about but I’ve got a few months to prepare so it should be okay.

Things are still pretty busy at ASH-10 Towers and I’ve been saying no to a lot of stuff lately, which is a nice position to be in but does mean I’m not saying yes to the interesting things. One thing that slipped through the net is Toby Barnes’ Post Digital event which he’s holding to launch Mudlark in Birmingham. Since it’s taking place in the same building as my office and since he only wants me to talk for 20 minutes without any prep, figured I’d say yes.

Plus when your brief is “to do a really short talk, discussing your thoughts on a post digital place, a place beyond websites, a place in a conversational space with people not brands” and you have no idea what that really means (I mean, I know what the words mean and the discrete concepts but as a whole?) then figuring that out on stage with no preparation, well, that sounds like a lot of fun.

Although looking at some of the people I’m sharing a stage with I think I might do a bit of prep. Some good names there.

It takes place at Fazeley Studios in Digbeth, Birmingham on Friday May 22nd, 10am – 4pm. Details and free tickets here.

I’ll be talking alongside Chris Unitt and we’ve been asked to recount our experiences at SXSW Interactive. As with most of these informal things I’m planing on winging it rather than give a formal presentation, taking the stuff I learned from people I met in Austin who are organising things in their cities and applying it to what the BCSMC is looking to achieve. No idea what Chris’ll be doing but since he’s running the Birmingham SMC I’m guessing he’ll cover how that works.

I’m looking forward to being at this for the beginning, seeing how it takes shape. These sort of communities are best defined by what the members want rather than by some pre-prepared model, so while there should be lessons they can learn from what Jo and Chris developed in Birmingham the exciting part will be seeing how they take these and others from elsewhere and add their own unique spin on them.

If you were reading me last year you’ll remember I blogged a lot, often straight from the conference floor. I’ll probably be doing that again, making my note-taking as public as possible so others might benefit from it, so be prepared for a mini-deluge on this blog. I’ll also be using Twitter extensively throughout the week so if you’re following me there please feel free to unfollow for the duration. I seriously won’t be offended.

If you’re going to SXSWi then hopefully we’ll meet up! My plan is to meet and learn from as many interesting people as possible and while I expect this to happen randomly it doesn’t hurt to accelerate the serendipity, as Stef likes to say.

There are a significant number of people going from the West Mids this year. They’re all listed on the SXSWM wiki which also has tips and advice for folks going.

Overlapping with the Brummies is a bunch of Bristolian creatives, based around iShed, who come under the umbrella of The Umbrella Group.

I’ve listed the panels and parties I’m thinking of going on on my Sched.org schedule.

Here’s my official SXSW profile which I still need to flesh out.

But, to be honest, the best way to connect with me directly is going to be through Twitter. If you want to get my attention and I’m not following you, send an @reply.

Right, tomorrow is travel day and then it all starts Friday!

One of the (many) things I want to do this year is regularly get out of the Birmingham Bubble and get a bit of perspective. A year ago it would seem absurd to say there’s far too much going on here but, frankly, there is. And while that’s utterly fantastic it does mean one is less and less able to keep tabs on what folks are doing in the rest of the country. So I’m looking to spend a few days each month in other cities starting with the easy option, London.

Sure, it’s my intention to also do Manchester, Bristol, Liverpool, etc but London also has another draw in that I lived there circa 2000-2003 so have some contacts; friends I need to see and sofas I can crash on. There’s also the fact that London can be terribly insular (I should know, I was terribly insular when I lived and worked in Zone 1) so if you want to get anything from the place you gotta go in.

I’m looking at going down on Wednesday 18th and staying ’til Sunday 22nd. The only fixed thing is Tuttle on Friday morning and while I’m looking to take things fairly easy and use the time to recharge before diving back into the heady maelstrom that is Birmingham I’m well up for meeting with interesting folks. Drop me a line if you fancy a cuppa. I suspect my primary base will be Whitechappel.

First up on Wednesday evening is the third Social Media Surgery for Voluntary Groups organised by Nick Booth where folks who know something about this blogging lark are encouraged to give their knowledge to those who help others. Usually this is very simple stuff such as showing them how to set up a blog on WordPress, upload a video to YouTube or track a subject using Google News so the chances are if you’re reading this you could come and take part, even if it’s just to explain how you use this stuff. And if you’re from a voluntary group in Birmingham please come along. We’re ready to help you.

It takes place at the BSVC 138 Digbeth, B5 6DR, (next to Digbeth Cold Storage and Readers World – map) from 5.30 to 7pm and afterwards we’ll no doubt go for a pint. Please sign up here so we can anticipate numbers.

Then on Thursday Nikki Pugh and Charlie Pinder are organising BARG, “a gathering of folks who’d like to discuss social games and playful things with an aim to either designing their own or just getting involved in playing some interesting stuff.” This takes place in the back room of the Lamp Tavern (map) from 7pm. I’ve been watching Nikki with interest since she ran the Emergent Game last summer as she’s one of the few in the region really investigating the space between art and social media tools. Just hearing her talk about this stuff sends my thoughts into overdrive and she’s looking to mix it up with more brains. I suspect some very interesting projects will emerge from this.

Finally Friday morning sees the monthly Social Media Cafe, a gathering of folks in the region who work in this area. I really like these as it gives me a sense that we’re all part of an industry and complement the BrumBloggers meets, which are great but have a more social agenda. This is about the business of what we do and the place to bring your projects and big ideas. It’s at Coffee Lounge on Navigation Street (opposite the rear entrance of New St Station – map) from 10am. Drinks are free thanks to the sponsor (this month it’s the Opera Developers Network.

Hope to see you at one of them!

Due to capacity issues there were only 200 places for Amplified so a load of people can’t come along but judging by those who are going there shouldn’t be a shortage of reportage as, by their nature, they can’t help sharing. There’s already a fantastic amount of stuff on the Amplified blog and wiki and much more will doubtless follow. But more importantly Amplified is intended to be the start of something and while the first one is taking place in London I believe it’s going to be a traveling circus, dropping down at cities across the country to maximise the variety of input.

Eventually, of course, it’ll settle somewhere and I’d love that somewhere to be Birmingham. I know we’ve got the people on the ground to make it work here. Whether we’ve got the civic leadership with the capacity to understand the importance of this is another matter. But one step at a time, starting with a trip to NESTA on Thursday.

However I’m having to knock mine on the head for now. I’m busy for the next couple of Thursdays and then I’m out of the country until mid January (more on this later!) so in that time I’m going to rethink the surgery concept and re-launch it in February. I’d like to involve more people for a start – Chris Unitt has been around for a few of them and his presence was really positive offering another perspective and helping me deal with the days when far too many people turned up. I’m also aware of this minimal publicity thing. Imagine if we actually started advertising this?

So hold fire on coming to Rooty’s on a Thursday afternoon for now, unless you just want a nice cuppa tea and free wifi. It’s a lovely little spot for meeting and working and Rod, who works there, is an absolute star.

Be good!

Here’s the flyer:

As part of Blog Action Day 2008, where the theme is Poverty, a few of us Birmingham social media types are running a social media surgery for voluntary and community groups on October 15th from 5.30 – 7.30pm. Nick Booth, whose idea it was, has the details. As does Jon Bounds, whose idea it also was.

From my reading this will be an opportunity for those involved in making Birmingham a better place to find out how social media tools such as blogging can help them achieve their aims. I imagine we’ll be setting people up with blogs, demystifying a few concepts and generally empowering folks to do good deeds more effectively.

The surgery takes place at BVSC at 138 Digbeth, B5 6DR (map) and there’ll be wifi and refreshments.

Thanks to Nick for sorting this out. Hope to see you there!

Last Thursday I was feeling a little more sparky and, thanks to a borrowed ethernet cable in the office I usually work in, found myself in Rootys again sucking the wifi. Also in the cafe were Mark Badger, Clare Edwards, Anthony Hughes and the shockingly blogless Lara Rantaraja. In other words a nice cross-section of people I learn from, help out and work with on various things. This told me something quite important.

Mondays suck. Thursdays are where it’s at.

From now on the Social Media Surgery will take place on Thursdays. Same time – 4-6pm, same location – Rooty’s in the Custard Factory, and same drill. If you want help with anything connected to blogging and social media in general, be it figuring out your blogging strategy, a problem with your WordPress installation or the perennial “what the hell is Twitter for anyway”, pop along and I’ll do my best.

And if you’re the sort of person who thinks you can help others negotiate this crazy new world and you happen to be free on a Thursday afternoon do feel free to come along. This isn’t an exclusive thing and my answer is never going to be the only right one.

See you on Thursday!

Here’s the Digital Birmingham event page and my blog post from last time to give you some idea of where I’m coming from. You’ll notice I’m not referring to this a “workshop” as it didn’t really pan out that way. It turned into more of a 90 minute Q&A with poor Pete being bombarded with some pretty tricky questions. Not that I mind – it was a damn good experience, if a little draining, and feedback was very positive.

Like I said, spaces are limited but if you email digital@servicebirmingham.co.uk they’ll put you on the list.

First stop will be the Tuttle Club, a weekly meetup of social media types held in the Coach and Horses on Greek St, Soho, from 10am – 12pm. Lloyd Davis, who set it all up, came to one of our Brum Bloggers meets a while back so it’s only fair to return the favour and as well as meeting with likeminded folks I’m keen to see how they do stuff there so we might replicate bits here.

Then, other than lunch with me old blogging compatriot Hydragenic (it’s been too long, sir), I’m going to take it easy until the off-peak trains start running again. Check out a gallery or two, spend too much money in Gosh, that sort of thing. Feel free to give me a ring if you fancy a cuppa tea.

While I plan to run these every Monday I’m going to have to miss the next one on July 21st as I have a meeting that can’t be rescheduled but I will be around the Custard Factory during the afternoon so if you’re desperate give me a call. Of course if one of my peers wants to cover for me that’d be super, especially as that’s how I see this project developing, creating a helping space rather than it all being about me.

But as of the 28th and right through to September I’m intending to be there every Monday. I might even do a bit of promotion. Not too much mind!

All levels are welcome. If you’ve got a specific problem with your WordPress installation or are just thinking of signing up to Blogger for the first time I’ll do my best to help out. It’s completely informal and free, though you’re welcome to buy me a cookie if you like.

The long term idea is that others like me will also come along and we can develop some kind of pro-bono drop in academy for social media. In the very long term we might even get a building and create a school. But for now it’s just me on a sofa.

If you don’t know me I look a little like this, though not always as freshly shaved.

Photo by Stef

Obviously if something important comes up then I’ll have to bail but other than the 21st July my diary looks pretty clear for the next month or two.

Look forward to seeing you!

As part of Digital Birmingham’s Get Into Digital month I’m running a couple of blogging workshops on June 26th. Titled Community Blogging they’re aimed at those members of society who just aren’t gonna take it anymore and want to do something about it. Community action groups, single-issue campaigners, youth outreach types, neighbourhood associations, anything where there’s a passionate core of people looking to inform and engage the rest of their community.

The idea is twofold. On the one hand these people and groups can, I feel, really benefit from blogging tools. They have a lot of information which they need to get out there in a structured manner, they can benefit from the commenting and discussion aspects of a blog and they can connect with similar campaigns elsewhere in the world. It’s a bit of a no brainer really that they should be on the internet in a much more efficient and effective way than most of them currently are.

On the other hand part of Digital Birmingham’s mission is to get people using digital tools in the city. When they approached me about doing “something with blogging” we worked through some ideas like getting 10 families across the city to blog their lives for a month but it all seemed a bit short term and tokenistic. Once the project was over what long term effect would it have? But by targeting those people who are more likely to grab hold of blogging and see it for what it can be, those who actually have a use for it, there’s a good chance that they’ll act as potent seeds in their communities and, if you’ll excuse the evangelistic terminology, spread the good word.

It goes back to a notion I picked up from Joey deVilla in March at SXSW when I asked him about how Toronto had gotten such an active social media scene (or words to that effect) with the idea of applying this to Birmingham. He told me they’d gotten the loudest, most passionate people together, empowered and enthused them and let them go off to do what they do best. That’s sort of what I’m thinking about with these courses. It’s about building a vibrant and sustainable online community in Birmingham that both reflects and empowers the people that live here by giving them a voice.

Thursday 29th May sees Stef Lewandowski and myself giving a talk at the Creative Networks monthly event on “Powering your business with Web 2.0″ for want of a better title. We’ll be covering two main areas: Firstly, how creative industry companies can use blogs and social networks to engage with their audiences and customers by providing information and content in a timely manner to enable and track conversations about their events and products. Secondly how they can create or tap into networks within their field to share information and build connections, and why this is a good idea.

The event is free and the talk starts at 7.30pm at the TIC in Millennium Point. There’s networking time before and after, with free food, yes free food from 6pm and drinks after. You can register your interest here but in my experience it’s not necessary so turn up on the night if you forget. If you’re planning on liveblogging WiFi is locked down but I managed to get a 3G signal in there.

Creative Networks have been running events for a number of years with expert speakers from the screen and sound industry. Their web presence does leave something to be desired but the events themselves are rather good. I went to the Soweto Kinch talk last month and it was super.