I'll be at this year's Business of Software Conference on 21-22 May. Will you?

This will be my third visit to this annual conference organised by Mark Littlewood. And it's always been a cracker - chock full of great content, good food, interesting conversations and actionable insights. This year we're at the Barbican and I'm really looking forward to hanging out with everyone again. It makes a change to be at someone else's event and not organising it!

If you fancy a speaker slot, then there's still just about time to apply for one a spot in the lightning talks session. Read on for details on how to apply, more about the conference and a discounted ticket offer (I've been given a few discounted tickets).

So what's this all about then?

Why would you want to come? Because you want to spend time learning how great software  companies are built at a conference where the attendees are not the product.

What is it? A single-track conference to help you build great software and a profitable business. In depth talks, curated content. Zero sales/sponsor pitches or panels. If you're looking for coding sessions, this one isn't for you.

This year's theme: How to make product, culture, innovation, strategy, marketing and sales drive sustainable, profitable, growth.

Sessions and Case Studies
• Wade Foster, Zapier: A High Growth, Remote Working, Profitable Company
• Bruce McCarthy, BPMA: Why Product Culture Beats Execution Culture
• Tom Adeyoola, Metail: Why Your ‘Brilliant’ Technology Fails to have Impact
• Tendayi Viki, Benneli Jacobs: Clever Ideas are not Enough for Innovation
• Alison Coward, Bracket Designing High-Performing Teams
• Carl Ryden, PrecisionLender: Iron Man Suits vs Robots – Product Strategy and AI
• Tim Barker, DataSift: “The Best of Times, the Worst of Times.” Every CEO Ever
• Laura Roeder, MeetEdgar: Building Business Against Well-Funded Competition
• Jane Austin, Moo: 10 Ways to Make Design Irrelevant to Your Business
• Nilan Peiris, Transferwise: Building a High-growth Startup Sustainably
• Stephen Allott, NED: Rules and Tools for Scaling Software Sales
• Bill Janeway, Warburg Pincus: The Fall and Rise of Enterprise Software
• Plus, Lightning Talks, Lunchtime Table Talks and the legendary hallway track.

I'm particularly looking forward to hearing about product culture from Bruce, Laura's session on building a business against well-funded competitors and the fall and rise of enterprise software from Bill.

Schedule – You can view more details on timing, speakers and session content here.

Sunday 20th May, Pre-event drinks and laid-back mingling.

Monday 21st May
• 08.00: Registration, coffee, tea, networking
• 09.00-18.00: Conference Keynotes Commence
• 18:30: Drinks, Networking Join us and our speakers for an evening to meet new
contacts and make new friends.

Tuesday 22nd May
• 08.00: Registration, coffee, tea, networking
• 09.00: Conference Keynotes Commence
• 17.30: Conference close

Who Comes? A potent mix of Founders, CEOs, CMOs, CTOs, COOs, CPOs and emerging leaders in scale-up and grown-up software companies, a few people from innovative corporates who want to embrace change, some smart investors. The common thread - people interested in getting better at what they do and learning new ideas that will impact their businesses and careers.

Fancy speaking at the conference? Well, it's too late to join one of the main sessions, but applications are still being accepted for a spot during the lightning sessions. If you'd like to put yourself forward for one of those spots, you can find out how to do that here

FAQs and background to the conference here. Also, here's the full schedule and link to the speakers.
Hope to see some of you there.

And lucky for you, I have a few discounted tickets available with my special registration link where you get 20% off the April rate of £795 + Fees/VAT (The price goes up nearer the date). If you're prompted for a code, please use TechnoKitten. Not only that, there's a guarantee of quality. BoS offers you a full refund of the ticket price, if at the end of the conference you decide you did not get value out of it. You have nothing to lose!

Sunday Snippets

It's Sunday and I have snippets to share:

Want to speak at a conference? Then check out Mark Littlewood's top tips for a successful speaking application.

Google is on a mission to rid the web of annoying ads. They have a division called 'Sustainable Ads' and have put this post together to inform journalists of what's happening.

LinkedIn has a feature to allow bosses to spy on employees. You can read about that here.. I can't say I'm surprised but it does raise questions around privacy, especially when someone is looking to change jobs or is going through a difficult personal issues.

The gender gap rumbles on with women in IT being paid 15% less than their male counterparts according to a new diversity report from BCS and this article from Digit. You can download the report here (PDF).

Algorithms aren't going away soon and something I've been thinking about is the impact they have on our lives - often unwittingly. I wrote last month about what you do when your boss is an algorithm. This week, I came across an article reminding us that biased algorithms are everywhere and no-one seems to care.

And if you're doing the table planning for your Christmas party, you may want to take this into consideration. It's 21st Century dining etiquette!



Day 10/25 Blogmas

What are we going to do about the theatre and the performing arts?

That's the question posed by director, Phelim McDermott, and it will be the question asked in January's annual D&D (Devoted & Disgruntled) open space event. This year, it's being held at the New Diorama Theatre in London on 20-22 January 2018 (that's all day Saturday and Sunday and a half-day on Monday - drop in and out as you please). It's the unconventional convention for everyone who loves, makes and lives theatre and the performing arts.

Who is D&D for? It's for theatre lovers and people passionate about the performing arts. You might work in the theatre, you might not. You might be a teacher or a technician; an administrator or an audience member, all are welcome. A key principle of Open Space is whoever comes are the right people. In fact Open Space works best with a range of people and diverse points of view, so if you want to be there, you ARE the right person to attend.

The weekend event uses the open space format. If you've never done that before, I recommend you give it a go. I think it's a great way to learn, listen and participate. If you've been to a barcamp or unconference before, those are both broadly similar but there's something about open space that I think works even better and allows for all kinds of topics and expertise to emerge and it completely alleviates the need for any kind of Powerpoint slides!

I went along to one of these D&D open space sessions about 3 years ago. The question was something around what an Institute of Improvisation might deliver. It was my first experience of open space and I had no idea what to expect. I also wasn't sure what I could or couldn't contribute since my forays into improvisation were fairly minimal. I was soon won over by the energy and conversations happening all over the building we were in. I'd arrived tired and depleted at the beginning of the session and left more tired, yet energised having had a chance to exercise my brain in a completely different way.

That session then led to myself and Lloyd Davis running various open space sessions covering topics related to artificial intelligence, blockchain and other technologies in relation to the future of work. And very interesting it was too and is something I'd very much like to do again.

I'm thinking of heading down to this event. I've been to 89 shows or concerts this year alone, so I have a point of view of what's happening and some thoughts on what could happen and I'm interested to hear what practitioners are up to in an age of continuing austerity and an impending Brexit. It will also be interesting to stretch my brain in a different way and hang out with a different kind of crowd.

The video below will explain a little more about what's happening, and there's more information and a link to get your tickets on the Devoted & Disgruntled website. See you there?


Phelim McDermott invites you to D&D 13 from Improbable on Vimeo.
A captioned video invitation to Devoted & Disgruntled 13 from Improbable's co-Artistic Director, Phelim McDermott.

Day 2/25 Blogmas #DandD13

Talking about App Promotion…

It’s a common theme. Everyone’s talking about apps these days. And that’s why my friend, James Cooper, is organising The App Promotion Summit in London next month.  I’ll be chairing a session talking about how to succeed on the various App Stores and joining me on the panel will be Maureen Scott from Ether Books, Ouriel Ohanen from Appsfire and Stefan Bielau from Zapstreak. I’m not sure how much we’ll cover in the half hour session, but feel free to suggest questions.

Whether you’re an independent developer or making apps for big brands, you’ll get something from the event I’m sure. There are sessions looking at buying, planning and managing mobile advertising, metrics, social app discovery, cross promotion, PR, global opportunities, partnerships and more.

Early bird price £250 + VAT are still available this week until 14th June and then they go up to £350 + VAT each. As a speaker, I have a few discount codes available which will give you a further 20% off the list price. If you’d like one of those, please get in touch. First come, first served.

My speaker interview is here.

Hope to see some of you there.

Three simple actions to redress the balance

I’m going to keep this one brief. I’m bored of writing about this old chestnut. I expect you’re bored of reading about it, but the whole issue of the lack of representation of women at tech conferences has reared its ugly head again. I guess I’m partly responsible so that’s one of the reasons for writing about it, yet again.

I happened to mention on my Facebook page that I liked the look of the upcoming Edge conference but was disappointed to see no female speakers listed at all at the time of posting. Not an unreasonable comment – especially given my history in talking about the subject for many years and being a seasoned event organiser. That generated some debate, some interesting links and some feedback and comments from friends and friends of friends. You can read it here https://www.facebook.com/helenkeegan/posts/314598241984232?comment_id=1594410 

Following being name-checked in a few tweets, I read a stern criticism of the Edge Conference speaker line-up here where the (male) writer considers it inexcusable that there are no female speakers listed and the unwillingness of the producer to comment on the process. I think the term ‘inexcusable’ is strong. I doubt it was deliberate, but getting more women involved just wasn’t a priority for the organiser. It usually isn’t. In fact, they’ve often not thought about it at all. That’s part of the problem.

Meanwhile, I’m reminded that CES is happening in Las Vegas and I watch this telling video from the BBC on the topic of scantily clad booth babes from the 2012 event and ponder if anything much will have changed. I feel it’s unlikely and shared my thoughts here. And it seems from this year’s Voco campaign to drive traffic to its stand, nothing much has changed at all. You can read about the campaign to boycott Voco here. Their campaign just makes me feel queasy.

I also read about The Atlantic’s idea about boycotting all male panels ‘Men: You can fix this. Refuse to participate unless there are women on stage with you.’ And a friend points me to this useful infographic explaining how women contribute to the entrepreneurial scene.

And finally, I stumble across this blog post and words fail me.

So why am I bothered about all of this?

Technology is a huge part of all of our futures and I want to make sure that female voices are heard so that we play a part in building that future, so that we have a stake in it. So that we can make the future a better place.

Mixed gender teams do better. That’s what the research tells us, over and over. You’re better off with an average ability mixed gender team than a high ability single sex team if you want to be more profitable, more productive, happier. My conclusion is that mixed panels and mixed line-ups will mean a better conference, a more productive networking event and more knowledge sharing. And more women in tech will mean we’ll have created a better future for ourselves.

And my hunch is that if we can get more women to participate, then we’ll get more of everybody to participate. This will make it better for everyone.

Maybe I’m naive. Maybe I’m idealistic. But I don’t think this is too much to ask. It also isn’t down to one group of people to fix this. We all have a part to play.

There are three simple things that, I believe, will help make the situation better. (I’ve talked about them on Facebook as well)

1. Conference and event organisers need to be more mindful about getting more female speakers involved and make a concerted effort on this. Different people need to be approached in different ways. Try new ways to get more women involved.

2. Women need to step up and get involved. Be counted. The more you do this, the easier it gets. Get on with it. [Need some tips on how to be a good speaker? There’s some great advice here.]

3. Men need to defer to their female colleagues once in a while. When you're asked to speak, why not suggest a female colleague instead so they can get the experience and exposure? Your company still gets the kudos. The knowledge is still shared.

In doing these three things, there will be a knock-on effect that more people will get involved from all aspects of our society and from all backgrounds. This is a good thing and I don't think it's too much to ask.

And finally. I know that getting more women into tech needs to be tackled in our schools as well. I fully support that. The two are not mutually exclusive. Every little action counts.

I sincerely hope, that this is the first and last time I feel compelled to blog about this in 2013. But it’s not up to me. It’s up to all of you out there to do your bit too. Are you in?

Chestnut photo used under Creative Commons License. Photo by PracticalOwl.

Brand Perfect Tour hits San Francisco

I’m very pleased to tell you that I will shortly be heading to San Francisco, on of my favourite cities to visit, and while I’m there, I will be one of the facilitators at the Brand Perfect Tour event on 8 May 2012. I was involved in the London event last year and this time, we’re in search of seamless brand experiences on mobile. The event is aimed at brands, retailers, media owners, agencies and developers. And whether you’re a veteran or a newbie to this world of mobile marketing, you’re sure to get something out of it. With a mix of keynotes, discussion and hands-on exercises, there’s plenty to get your teeth into.

We’ll be talking with major brands, agencies and expert developers about where opportunity in the mobile channel really lies:

• How should a brand view the mobile channel in their marketing mix?
• What are the challenges and rewards?
• What are the success stories that show the way forward?
• How do you plan and implement a mobile strategy to reach the mass market that’s on-brand?
• What are the technologies involved and what can brand owners expect to be able to deliver?

Then put it all together by working in cross-disciplinary teams with your peers covering the business, design and development elements of creating a mobile experience based on a real brand brief. You'll not only have plenty of great ideas by the end of the day; you'll have made a lot of new friends tool.

The event is free for brands, retailers and media owners to attend.

If you're an agency or developer and you bring a brand buddy with you, then you both attend for free.

If you're a journalist or blogger and would like to cover the event, please get in touch with me for a press pass. I have a few available. Otherwise, the ticket price is USD395

Registration is required: http://www.brandperfect-tour.com/events/next-stop-on-the-tour/

Spread the word and see you there! You’ll also find Brand Perfect Tour on Facebook, the event is also listed on Facebook and LinkedIn to make it easy for you to add to your calendar and share with friends and colleagues. And you can follow the twitter action here.

Oh, and there are some super pictures from the London event in November for you below from photographer Paul Clarke. And you can view some of the London presentations here.

Created with flickr slideshow.

Mobile Retail Summit–London 26 Jan 2012

Some of you may have seen me tweet about this already, but the lovely people at Mobile Marketing Magazine are putting on a one-day summit looking at all aspects of mobile retail. This is most certainly a hot topic and mainstream retailers are now beginning to see the light and are focussing efforts in m-commerce and m-retail. And it’s working for them. There are some terrific success stories out there.

I’m very happy to be involved in the summit. I’ll be there all day as I’m doing a short history of LBS (that’s location based services), moderating a panel on mobile payments and discussing the future of mobile at the end of the day with friends and colleagues Russell Buckley and Jonathan MacDonald.

The good news about the summit is that it’s free for retail, FMCG and CMG executives to attend. At the time of writing, there are just 30 places left and if you join the session, you’ll be mingling with the likes of John Lewis, Debenhams, Tesco, Oasis, Coca Cola, Amazon and Homebase. And if you’re not in that category, then you can buy a ticket for £595.

Check out the Agenda below, and head for mretailsummit.com to book your place. It should be a good day. Hope to see some of you there.

Agenda

8.15am - 9.00am Registration & Exposition

9.00am - 9.10am Chairman's Introduction. David Murphy, Editor, Mobile Marketing Magazine

9.10am - 9.25am Going Mobile - The Big Picture. Nic Newman, MD, Tigerspike

9.25am - 9.35am On Device Stat Attack. Alex Kozloff, Mobile Manager, IAB . Alex will reveal research showing the volume of mobile web browsing, how many people are engaged in mCommerce, etc.

9.35am - 9.50am mCommerce in Action. Hugh Ritzema-Carter, UK Commercial Director, YOC. Hugh will represent case studies showing how retailers have successfully deployed mCommerce solutions

9.50am - 10.15am Keynote Address. Sarah Baillie, Mobile Commerce Coordinator, Debenhams. Building a Holistic Mobile Offering Embracing Apps and Mobile Sites

10.15am - 10.30am How to build a mobile site and integrate it with your backend systems. Duncan Hallas, European Director Sales, Netbiscuits

10.30am - 10.45am 10 Rules for Building Mobile Apps. Rupert Ashwell, Head of Client services, UK Golden Gekko

10.45am - 11.15am coffee break, mobile exposition, mobile surgery

11.15am - 11.30am Mobile Search, Mobile App Discoverability Discussion Panel

Guest Moderator: Simon Andrews
Panellists:
Nicholas Cumisky, Sr. Industry Manager, Ad Mob
Emily Gudeman, Account Director, Efficient Frontier
Ramy Yared, MD, Adsmobi
Peter Glaeser, co-founder and CEO SponsorMob.
Andrew Emmerson, Senior Business Analyst, JD Williams

11.30am - 11.40am Multichannel Stat Attack. Matthew Hopkinson, Business Development Director, Local DataCompany. We take a look at how tough it is out there. With falling sales, and consumers shopping less in the recession period, this is a great time to use every tool at your disposal to get people into your shops, and here is how mobile can help retailers do just that

11.40am - 11.55am Mobile CRM. Anamaria Chiuzan, Retail Propositions Manager, Velti
How to build and manage an opted-in mobile CRM database to drive traffic into your retail outlets

11.55am - 12.10pm Using Social Media to Drive Footfall. Matt Gierhart, Head of Social, Ogilvy

12.10pm - 12.25pm A Brief History of Location-based Services. Helen Keegan, Specialist in Mobile Marketing, Advertising & Media. Helen offers a summary of the past 12 years of location-based services, from her work in the early noughties with ZagMe, through to the present day

12.25pm - 12.40pm Using Mobile Advertising to Drive Footfall. Stephen Jenkins, Marketing Director EMEA, Millennial Media

12.40pm - 1.00pm Mobile Advertising Advice Panel.

Moderated by: Russell Buckley, Chief Marketing Officer, Eagle Eye Solutions
Panellists:
Alex Rahamen, CEO of StrikeAd
Paul Childs, Chief Operations Officer, Adfonic
David Fieldhouse, Linking Mobile
Doug Chisholm, Founder and CEO, Rippll

1.00pm - 2.30pm lunch, exposition, mobile surgery, speed networking, mobile pitch panel

2.30pm - 2.40pm In-Store Stat Attack. Alistair Hill, On Device Research

2.40pm - 2.55pm In-Store Price Comparison. How the phone can help you close the sale in store, using on-shelf links to information on the mobile web. Dave Marutiak, Managing Director, Scanbuy

2.55pm - 3.10pm Mobile Couponing and Vouchering. Steve Rothwell - Eagle Eye Solutions
What is the state of play with mobile coupons and vouchers? What are the issues, how are they being overcome, and which retailers are successfully using mobile coupons and vouchers?

3.10pm - 3.30pm Mobile Payments - The Options. Discussion Panel. Overview of what's out there, from NFC to SMS-based mobile payment systems.

Guest Moderator: Helen Keegan, Specialist in Mobile Marketing, Advertising & Media
Panellists:
Ivor Morgan, Head of EMEA Marketing, Venda
John Milliken, MD, Mobile Money Network
Mary Carol Harris, Vice President, Mobile Development at Visa Europe
Iain Herd, PayPal

3.30pm - 4.00pm coffee break, exposition, mobile surgery

4.00pm - 4.15pm Augmented Reality Demos. Matt Mills, Head of Innovation, Autonomy

4.15pm - 4.30pm iPad Kiosks & Queue Busting Solutions. Justin Coward, MD, Global Bay

4.30pm - 4.50pm Google Demos. Amanda Rosenberg, Mobile Business Development Manager, EMEA, Google

4.50pm - 5.15pm Alternative Views on the Mobile Future

Moderated by: David Murphy, Editor, Mobile Marketing Magazine
Panelists:
Russell Buckley, Chief Marketing Officer, Eagle Eye Solutions
Jonathan MacDonald, Co-founder at This Fluid World & Co-Founder at Human Dialogue
Helen Keegan, Specialist in Mobile Marketing, Advertising & Media

5.15pm - 5.25pm Chairman's Closing Remarks. David Murphy, Editor, Mobile Marketing Magazine

5.30pm - 7.00pm networking drinks, exposition, mobile pitch results

BlackBerry DevCon–Special Reader Offer

Just a quick post to let you know that I have a discount code for the upcoming BlackBerry DevCon Europe happening on 7/8 February 2012 in Amsterdam http://www.blackberrydevcon.com/europe. It’s the first time they’ve brought their popular DevCon to Europe (previously, it has only run in Asia and USA) and it promises to be a great event.

The BlackBerry® Developer Conference is the showcase for the latest innovations and breakthroughs with the BlackBerry® Development Platform. Thousands of BlackBerry enthusiasts come together to collaborate with platform experts from the community and attend sessions, demonstrations, hands-on labs and keynotes — all focused on developing leading mobile applications, no matter your skill level.

It's an amazing opportunity to connect with BlackBerry experts, get tips and discover ways to build for the BlackBerry platform whether in native or using web standards that allows you to extend your work onto other platforms. You'll walk away ready to reach a community of 70 million subscribers.

There’s an early bird rate (Euro 250) available until Friday 23 December and you can get 50% off that using this blog’s special offer code DSTNS0. And after that, you’ll get 50% off the standard rate (Euro 350) with the same code up until 18 January 2012. In addition, all delegates will receive a BlackBerry Playbook Tablet. Now that’s not too shabby a deal.

You need reasons to go? Well, here’s a few for you

• Train on the latest developer tools first hand, like BlackBerry WebWorks, APIs, BlackBerry Messenger SDK, BlackBerry 7, and the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet
• See best practices that will ensure a better understanding of the options for connecting to back end infrastructure, deploying apps, and how to use web services to our advantage
• Get up to speed on not just developing apps, but how to come up with multi-endpoint strategies using web technologies
• Be inspired by looking at what other companies are doing and how their approaches could benefit your company
• Learn how to develop Super Apps that do more for staff while they work away from the office
• Connect with the best of the best in the industry — from Research In Motion (RIM) leaders to partners and colleagues — ask questions and see if they've solved challenges you face

Hope to see some of you there.

What’s on in mobile in the next month or two…

We’re definitely in the middle of events season and there are a whole bunch of events coming up in October and November 2011 in the mobile world that I’m attending or involved with in in some way that I thought you might want to know about…
19 to 21 October Like Minds in Exeter – ‘Innovation+Opportunity | How to build brands, businesses and communities for the future’ is the theme for this year’s event which is something close to my heart and close to the hearts of the clients I work with. Although this is not a mobile event per se, I think it will be of interest to mobile start-ups and SMEs. The three day event looks to be a good mix of keynote speakers, immersive sessions and chances to meet and network. And it’s rather refreshingly being held outside of London. You can find out more and book your tickets here: http://wearelikeminds.com/events/exeter. And before you ask, no I don’t have a cheeky discount code for you!
24 October – AppFusion ‘How to work with the Big Names’ takes a look at how to work with big name celebrities and brands as a mobile developer and entrepreneur. Organised by the lovely Jason Dunne, it’s free to attend (although you do need to RSVP as places are limited) and starts at 7pm at Club Bond on Kingly Street. More information and sign up here: http://www.meetup.com/AppFusion/events/35435792/?a=ce1.2p_grp&rv=ce1.2p
27 October – the BrandPerfect Tour – Adventures in Mobile hits Berlin. This is organised by Julie Strawson and her team at Monotype Imaging, alongside event partners Fjord, Y&R Brands, University of Reading and RIT and is aimed at brands, agencies (digital, above the line, sales promotion, direct marketing et al), developers and designers to get their heads round what a mobile strategy looks like in the iPhone era. Speakers include Romy Kraus, Sergio Falletti, Aral Balkan and more. It’s not free to attend but I believe it’s good value for money because of the combination of conference style and learning workshop which means you should get more out of the day than your average conference. There are still some free tickets available for press and bloggers. Please get in touch with me if you’d like to be considered for one of those. Otherwise you can buy your ticket here.
31 October – it’s the final of the ICT KTN / UKTI competition to win a free place to exhibit at Mobile World congress 2012. You’ll see pitches from the shortlisted candidates and they’ll get a grilling from the judges. Winners will be announced on the night. Free to attend but RSVP is required here.
3 November – Effective Mobile Marketing Awards Dinner. I’m a big fan of Mobile Marketing Magazine and they’re behind the annual EMMAs awards and this is one of my highlights of the year. I’m lucky enough to be involved in this as a judge for the second year in a row and it was a tough task this year. There were so many good entries, it was a close call in some of the categories. I know it’s going to be a good night out – I’m privy to some of the plans. It’s being held at the rather wonderful Delfina on Bermondsey Street (I had lunch there today and it was smashing). But if you want to join the fun, you’ll have to get your ticket. There aren’t many left so best be quick if you want to participate.
7 November – I’m headed for the Shoreditch Roundabout and the techhub lunchtime mobile meet-up. I’m not sure what I’ll be speaking about yet, but it should be a fun session and it’s free to attend (at least as far as I know). You’ll also find that BlueVia are doing their office hours that morning too so you can get a double-whammy of mobile goodness. If you’re not familiar with the techhub vibe, this is a good chance for you to see how it all works and to see what’s on offer for tech start-ups of all descriptions. I recommend you give it a look. Registration isn’t open at the time of writing, but when it is, you’ll find it here.
9 November – I’m moderating a panel at the Mobile Squared Roadshow. ‘What’s the Mobile Squared Roadshow when it’s at home?’ I hear you ask. Well it’s a whole day of mobile marketing conferencing and networking. You get to hear from a wide variety of speakers looking at everything from the mobile consumer to the potential of augmented reality. And what’s more, it’s free to attend. Yes, that’s right. It’s free to attend. For a whole day. So sign up, come on down and join the conversation.
11 November – After something more developer and entrepreneur focussed and covering all things web and mobile? Then the Power of One event is for you. And what’s more, there’s one speaker’s slot available for a tech start-up to talk about what they’re up to. There’s no need for a business plan, there’s a short form to fill in. If you win, you’ll get 20 minutes of prime time to pitch your business to an audience of 300 including investors and key influencers. Not only that, everyone who submits an idea to pitch will get a discount code (and it’s a significant discount) for a ticket. Not that they’re expensive at £99 + VAT in the first place and I’ve spotted a cheeky discount code promoted on twitter – use the promo code BLUEVIA to get a 50% discount. More information and buy your tickets here.
And it doesn’t stop there…
15 November, you’ll find me at the London edition of the BrandPerfect Tour. I’ll be speaking and moderating a panel looking at ‘to iphone or not to iphone, what is the strategy?’ (I paraphrase here, but you get the gist). Other toptastic speakers on the day include old friends Ilicco Elia – ex Reuters and now head of mobile at LBi, Stephen Pinches from the FT and the inimitable Romy Kraus. It’s being held at the rather lovely Century Club on Shaftesbury Avenue. No free tickets or cheeky discount codes, but it’ll be a great day with that mix of workshop meets seminar meets conference with some networking and banter thrown in for good measure. Again, there are some free press and blogger tickets available. Please get in touch with me if you’d like to apply for one of these.
The Europas hit London on 17 November. This will be a big bash to celebrate European tech start-ups and will probably end up being the start of the Christmas party season. It should be lots of fun and jam-packed with tech entrepreneurs, investors, pundits and various hangers on. I know last year’s party was a blast. Prices start at £90 + VAT for tech entrepreneurs and you can get them here.
The following week may well find me in Oslo and possibly Amsterdam speaking at a couple of conferences, but I’ll let you know about that once they’re confirmed. And then maybe I’ll go into hibernation for a couple of weeks!

Lots of mobile stuff going on… here are a few

Mobile Monday London is going great guns. We have three events lined up in the next few weeks – yes three! On 6 June we’ve organised a debate to get to the bottom of the HTML vs. Apps argument sponsored by the lovely folks at BlackBerry. On 20 June, we’re talking about geolocation in association with UCL and their upcoming iphone dev training programme and on 4 July we’ll be talking about the developer ecosystem and sharing new insights from Vision Mobile and BlueVia. Keep up to date with Mobile Monday London on email (we have a useful discussion group), facebook, linkedin and twitter and keep an eye on our event site http://momolo.org for registration details.

And there’s more…

The BLN Money in Mobile Awards are open for entries until noon on 31 May. This a great opportunity for *any* mobile company – not just a start-up – to get some exposure to new clients, VCs and journalists. This award forms part of the Money in Mobile conference from the nice folks at The BLN (Business Leader’s Network) and the 10 companies chosen will present on the day. It’s free to enter and they’re just after a 100 word entry from you here. You have nothing to lose by entering and everything to gain. So go for it! Oh, and if you’d like to attend the conference as well, there is a rather decent Mobile Monday London discount on offer…details here.

And for mobile start-ups specifically, the annual Vodafone Mobile Clicks competition is up and running again and Mobile Monday London is helping Vodafone run the UK element of the event. We’re after the best mobile start-up in the UK to put forward to the final in Amsterdam in September where you’ll be up against competitors from Turkey, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Holland and Germany. The prize fund is Euro 225,000. There are no strings attached to the prize either – you don’t have to do a deal with Vodafone and no-one is after a % of your business. Again, it’s free to enter so get those thinking caps on and get those entries in. Closing date, midnight CET 12 June. More details on the MoMoLo blog.

Keep your eyes peeled as well for the upcoming EMMAs (which I’m judging again) and the MEF upcoming conference and Meffys Awards ceremony (I was a judge for that too for the third time I think). More on both of those as I get details.

You can still get involved…and be a mobile hero too

In case you hadn’t noticed, it's less than two weeks to go until Heroes of the Mobile Screen http://mobileheroes.net ... and there's still new stuff to announce... I haven’t been this busy with a project since launching ZagMe with Russell Buckley back in 2000. Anyway, I digress… back to Heroes.

So, first up - lovely sponsors who are helping to make all this happen for us. We can now confirm that Blackberry is a gold sponsor and Windows Live and Windows Phone are silver sponsors. WINplc is event sponsor. Smaato is sponsoring the lanyards, Kemp Little LLP is supporting the event and we'll have a few more to announce this week. And not only that, Blackberry has given us a bunch of Mobile World Congress passes to give away to delegates coming to the conference. Keep an eye on the Heroes twitter feed http://twitter.com/hotms and blog http://mobileheroes.net/blog to find out how to get your mitts on those lovely free passes.

Secondly, we have lots of lovely new speakers announced including Hugo Barra from Google, Oded Ran from Microsoft, George Nimeh from Iris, Phil Cox from Silicon Valley Bank, Giles Rhys Jones from Ogilvy, Mark Watts Jones from Orange and still more to be confirmed. Read all about them over at http://mobileheroes.net/speakers

Thirdly. You can still get involved. Well, of course you can buy a ticket (everyone who buys a ticket really makes our day and lots of lovely people have already bought tickets!). But there's also a way you can score a free one... We're still looking for companies who are targeting teens (age 17/18) with their mobile product, service, game, application or device and who want to get some constructive feedback from their teenage audience. Don't worry, it's not scary. Julia Shalet (pictured) is running this session and she knows what she's doing and has briefed the teenagers thoroughly. And she'll also brief the companies we choose thoroughly too so it becomes a useful experience for everyone involved. Anyway, we've had some people apply already, but we want to remind you that there's still time to apply and we really do want to see what you're made of. If you're interested, please email me ( helen [at] mobileheroes [dot] net ) or Dominic ( dominic [at] mobileheroes [dot] net ) to express your interest or to find out more about what's involved.

And finally, there are still some sponsorship opportunities to support the networking party afterwards. If you want to get involved in that, then please talk to me - ( helen [at] mobileheroes [dot] net ).

*Also a big thanks to our media and association partners for their support. Mobile Marketing Association, AIME, Mobile Data Association, IPC Media, Mobile Entertainment Magazine, Mobile Europe, Mobhappy, Mobile Zeitgeist, GoMoNews, Mobile Industry Review, The Really Mobile Project and many many more*

Don't forget to spread the word as well to your clients and colleagues. This isn't just for mobile industry insiders.

See you all on the 7th!

Heroes of the Mobile Screen – 7 Dec 09 at the BFI Southbank, London

Some of you may be wondering what I’ve been up to of late. Well, if you have, then I can reveal to you that I’ve been working on a new conference, Heroes of the Mobile Screen, which is on next month on 7 December at the rather wonderful BFI on London’s Southbank. And I’d love for you to spread the word (like our wonderful media partners), buy tickets and join the conversation.

The team behind the conference, Isabel Fox, Neil Robertson, Carlo Longino, Dominic Travers and yours truly are also involved in running Mobile Monday London, Swedish Beers Mobile Networking, Future of Mobile, Over The Air, Mobile 2.0 and Tech Media Invest events amongst other things.

The day-long event at BFI Southbank will differ from anything else around (at least that’s what we’re aiming for) and get the stakeholders of mobile involved in discussing the issues affecting them and their customers. Uniquely the event also has teenagers on stage to tell the industry what they want from their mobile, what they expect from their network operators and what’s most important to them in terms of their mobile life.

Heroes of the Mobile Screen is already attracting a number of high calibre ‘heroes’ with speakers and panellists answering the call from around the world, including Kei Shimada, JP Rangaswami and Kevin Marks, Belinda Parmar, Julia Shalet, Doug Richard and Harald Neidhardt are all confirmed. The speakers are listed here and the agenda can be found here.

Heroes of the Mobile Screen opens with a keynote from Kei Shimada sharing his experience of what’s happening in Japan and what we can learn from that here in the West. And continues with four core pillars supporting discussion throughout the day.

The money
What's making money, who's making money and what's being invested in and where the money's going to be in the future? The answers to all the questions we want to ask of successful mobile service providers and VCs.

The impact of social/location
What is the impact of social media and location technology? What do customers want, what are the business models, what are the solutions to privacy issues. Carriers are placing their bets in this area, but will they pay off?

Teenage heroes
Led by digital youth marketing expert Julia Shalet, this is a new format where we invite four companies to pitch their product, service or device live on stage to six teenagers and they tell us what they really think.

Real customers, real applications, real marketing
A double session with the first half covering customers and what they really want on mobile with a focus on women in particular with some new research and insight into what women want from Belinda Parmar of Lady Geek. The second half will cover mobile marketing and advertising, what's working, what's not and what's coming next.

I came up with idea around the event because we realised that most of the events I attend throughout the year all talk around the same subjects, with the same people and bring up the same issues, without resolution. It’s time for us to stop talking to ourselves, look out beyond our industry and make some changes for the better. I believe it’s important to engage our colleagues in marketing, web 2.0 and media as well as more of our mobile colleagues from throughout the value chain. The exciting stuff is going to happen when industries cross over – that’s where the innovation is. In putting the agenda together, we believe we have something that will appeal to a wide audience – whether you’re a director of marketing for an FMCG brand or a web developer toying with the idea of developing apps for android or iphone.  And to do that, we need to share real customer insight that we can use to make ours and others mobile lives better.

Tickets are now available online now for £99 (ex VAT and booking fee) at http://mobileheroes.net . We’ve kept the price deliberately low and it’s subsidised by sponsors who we’ll be able to announce shortly.

If you’re interested in sponsoring the event in some way, please get in touch with me via email.

If you’re interested in pitching your gadget, application or service to our teenagers, please email Dominic Travers to put your name forward.

We are keeping a waiting list for potential speakers and panellists. If you’d like to be considered, please contact me.

So get your tickets now and become a fan on Facebook or follow us on twitter http://twitter.com/hotms too.

Technorati Tags: conference,mobile monday,mobile monday london,events,london,mobile media,mobile marketing,mobile applications,mobile network operators,learning,networking

Everything you need to know about being a presenter or panellist

Well, almost everything you need to know at least. Here are some links to interesting blog posts and articles about being a presenter or panellist which some of you folks out there might find useful, regardless of whether you work in tech or fashion – these tips are all relevant for you.

How to write a successful speaking proposal

http://blog.web2expo.com/2008/04/how-to-write-a-successful-speaking-proposal/

Jeremiah Oywang – how to moderate a panel – a comprehensive guide (this is a *must read*)

http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2008/01/30/how-to-successfully-moderate-a-conference-panel-a-comprehensive-guide/

Benjamin Ellis gives us tips on working more quickly…

http://redcatco.com/blog/productivity/why-dont-you-see-what-you-can-do-in-an-hour/

and how to write a speech in 5 minutes…

http://redcatco.com/blog/communication/how-to-write-a-speech-in-5-minutes/

and finally, a presentation checklist

http://redcatco.com/blog/communication/preparing-to-present-a-check-list-for-presenting-at-a-conference-or-large-event/

Technorati Tags: conference,speaking,speaker,events,panel moderation,writing a speech,presentation

Forum Oxford round-up

Apologies for not posting this up for absolutely ages. Even though it’s from back in April, I think it’s still worth a look.

I was invited to speak at the Forum Oxford annual event at the University of Oxford back in April and a very good day it was too. It’s always great to hang out with Tomi Ahonen anyway but on top of that, there were a great range of speakers and topics covered – probably ones that I wouldn’t normally be exposed to – and it was all the better for that.

Rather than rehashing the event here for you, I’ll share some links from other people who covered the event so you can experience a taste of it for yourself.

Martin Sauter from Wireless Moves gives a comprehensive round-up of the event here.

Jonathan Marks, the roving ForumOxford reporter compiled a series of videos about the event:

· Impressions from Forum Oxford 2009 (including a couple of soundbites from yours truly)

· Interview with Professor William Webb, Head of Research and Development at OFCOM

· Interview with Simon Cavill, Chief Technology Officer / Director of Strategy, Mi-Pay

· Interview with Graham Trickey, Senior Director, GSM Association

If you have still not joined ForumOxford, which is free by the way, click here for details (if prompted, use the enrolment key forumoxford)

Technorati Tags: ForumOxford,mobile,conference,tomi ahonen,ajit jaokar

Technokitten’s upcoming gigs

Despite the credit crunch, there seem to be mobile events and conferences aplenty so I thought I’d let you know about a few where I’ll either be attending or organising or speaking.

Well, it all kicks off with our next Mobile Monday London event in association with DCKTN  ‘Financing your Business in a Credit Crunch on Monday 20 April 09. It’s free to attend and whether you’re a start-up, pre start-up or an established business, there’ll be something there for you. The venue and line-up hasn’t been finalised but rest assured, it’ll be good! More details as they come. Please register on the Mobile Monday London alpha website and RSVP for the event there too.

The following day is Mike Butcher’s Techcrunch Geek ‘n Rolla. It promises to be a great day of inspiration and information for start-up tech businesses. I shall be there showing my support. But this is one event where I won’t be on duty for once. I’ll just be a normal punter.

And as if that isn’t enough in one week, I’m very pleased to be joining the ForumOxford for their Future Technologies conference on Friday 24 April 09. This one-day conference will explore emerging technologies with an emphasis on Mobile / Web 2.0 innovations. The idea of this day is to facilitate better discussion between the audiences and speakers which is sometimes missing from bigger, more formal events. It’ll be my first time there so I’m very much looking forward to it and it will be lovely to come to Oxford for the day. My presentation is “Media and Marketing in a Mobile 2.0 world - tips and trends in mobile marketing and mobile media”. And I’m in good company with a great line-up covering all aspects of Mobile / web 2.0. The conference is great value for money too at an unbelievable £205 including refreshments, three-course lunch and post-conference drinks and networking. Hopefully see some of you there!

Then in May, I’m off to Denmark to Aalborg. A city I’ve never been to before. I’m going to be speaking at the Media on the Move conference giving a keynote on what’s happening in mobile marketing and media with reference to the travel and tourism industries. The line up looks really interesting and I know the organisers so I know for sure it’ll be a good conference. I just hope some of the other sessions will be in English too. I guess I’ll find out when I get there!

The skipping on to flaming June, I’m on a panel at The Mobile Web Summit and will be covering new thinking about the future of mobile marketing in relation to analytics, CRM and location based services. The conference is on in London at the Jumeirah Carlton Hotel in Knightsbridge and is on the 3rd and 4th of June. Prices start at Euros 399 for tickets. Osney Media’s format is slightly different from other conferences in that it’s very much discussion based around round tables and then that knowledge is shared with the wider group. Definitely worth a look.

Later on in June, I’m a judge for the Sixth Annual Global Messaging Awards. The awards recognise the important role that mobile messaging plays in the mobile industry today, the technology behind it and the varied applications that it is being put to. Mobile messaging can include entries from text or video-based, email or IM-based organisations. The final deadline for submissions is Wednesday 27th May. The shortlist will be announced on 9th June and the finalists at the 2009 Global Messaging Awards gala dinner that will take place on the evening of the 23rd June in Central London. Full details are here http://awards.160characters.org/ And for enquiries about the awards please contact Mike Grenville, mike@160characters.org

The categories for 2009 are:

• Messaging Infrastructure or Platform
• Messaging Application: Business
• Messaging Application: Consumer
• Messaging Application or Service: Public Sector Award
• Messaging Application or Service: Social Use
• Mobile Financial Services Solution
• Innovation in Messaging
• Best new Marketing Campaign using Messaging

I’m also participating in the Global Messaging Conference on 23 and 24 June. I’m one of the judges for the Messaging Innovation Showcase which is on at the end of the first day. I’ll be with Ken Banks and Rob Mosley and we’ll be looking at pitches from companies to see how they’re making mobile messaging relevant to the modern generation.

Developers of innovative messaging applications will have the opportunity to showcase their products to a panel of judges and the conference delegates. Products will be judged on their innovative qualities, usability and potential to drive up messaging revenues.

If you would like to be considered for participation as a presenter in the showcase please submit your proposal to Caroline.Broderick@informa.com by 22nd May 2009

August, I’ll be busy with my own conference.. more on that another time. Watch this space as they say…

    

And then on the 24 to 26th of August, I’m in Scandinavia again, this time at Spa & Resort Strömstad in Sweden for the Dialog Conference which brings together thought leaders covering all aspects of relationship marketing, loyalty and CRM. I’ll be covering mobile marketing, obviously!

And of course, in between times, there will be other Mobile Monday London events and there might even be another conference or two.

Phew, I’m tired just thinking about it all!

Technorati Tags: mobile,conference,events,speaker,mobile monday london,mobile monday,mobile marketing

Are women invisible?

And if so, what can we, the mobile industry, do about it?

I've recently written about the lack of female speakers at Informa's upcoming Mobile Web conference. I've also been alerted that the Mobile Marketing Association's forthcoming conference in Budapest (also run by Informa) lacks female visibility. And then I discovered that the Mobile Web Megatrends conference is also suffering the same problem.

Why so few women speakers, panellists or moderators?

And don't tell me this is representative of the industry because I know it isn't - we have good female representation at Mobile Mondays, more women come to Swedish Beers now (and growing) and the women in the Women in Mobile Data Association are plentiful! I even hear along the grapevine that the MMA has a strong female contingent.

And yes, this is a particular bugbear of mine. But with good reason. So bear with me.

I'm fed up to the back teeth of conference organisers and their sponsors ignoring women in the mobile industry (Informa being a recent obvious culprit, but they are certainly not alone) and coming up with lame excuses as to why women aren't involved. And many of these events are actually organised by women which makes it even worse. Do women still defer to men? Do women need a license to speak up?

I'm not a bra-burning feminist by any stretch of the imagination. But come on, this is the 21st Century and we've had the vote a while now. Women make 80% of buying decisions, women are more prolific on the internet than men, women are driving social networking - why aren't they (we) visible at potentially game-changing events where real decisions are made about all our digital futures, when potentially, it will probably impact most on women's day to day lives than men's.

I don't expect to get to 50/50 but to get to 25% visibility would be a start and not unreasonable I'd have thought. Or am I deluded here?

And don't give me the comment 'well if it's a choice between a man and a woman speaker and the man's the better qualified speaker then we choose the man' because in *most* cases in my 8 year experience of attending mobile conferences and events, there are few 'brilliant' speakers on the circuit at all - male or female - so there isn't usually an issue of having to choose between them. And with different formats, different styles of speakers get a chance to shine and therefore it encourages diversity.

It still feels like women are pretty much invisible and that the mobile industry is still very much a boy's club. [And yes, I know it's not just the mobile industry - I can only tackle one sector at a time!]

So..

1. Do we need to rethink event formats to make them more accessible to women? And if so, what are those formats?

2. How do we boost the confidence of female participants so that they say yes more times than they say no when asked to contribute as a speaker, panellist, moderator, whatever?

3. How do we encourage women to take networking and conferencing at this level seriously and make it a core part of their jobs rather than something they do once in a blue moon?

4. How do we encourage companies to put women forward as speakers as often as, or sometimes instead of the men in their companies?

5. How do women network differently (particularly married women) and how do we incorporate male and female styles of networking at events without resorting to separatism or golf days for the boys and spa days for the girls? (Much as I enjoy a spa, I don't really fancy networking with other women whilst in a dressing gown. Where would I put my business cards, phone and notebook anyway? And it does just confirm existing stereotypes and ridicules them. Why don't we just have a shoe-shopping expedition?!)

As a woman, you might think I qualify to answer these questions. Unfortunately, I don't suffer from a fear or reticence of speaking at events. I don't work for a big company so I don't have a glass ceiling to break through (I've experienced it in the past though), so I don't necessarily understand some of what's going on here and why these problems persist or what to do about them. In many cases, women themselves, are ensuring these problems persist so I'm not laying the blame solely on men here.  It's deeply culturally embedded so I know it's not a simple issue. Therefore, I'm particularly interested to hear others views and perceptions - and that's from men *and* women please!

I do believe this is a problem. And I do think we can change it for the better if we want to and hope that if I keep piping up about it, something positive will happen.

Some further links here too (and it's worth looking at the comments and links to other posts to get the full picture):

http://technokitten.blogspot.com/2008/08/ilovemobileweb-awards-should-be-renamed.html

http://technokitten.blogspot.com/2008/08/ever-wanted-to-know-gender-and-age.html

I also spotted this upcoming group 'Needs Women Speakers' who are naming and shaming conferences who need more female speakers, and there's an accompanying blog post.

And I've started the discussion on the Oxford Forum too in the hope we may make some progress and find a way forward from this.

And Jason Kottke has been talking about diversity at web industry conferences and some of them are suffering the same problem - although many have healthy female coverage, showing that it is possible.

Technorati Tags: conference,diversity,gender,women

ilovemobileweb awards should be renamed

the 'I love mobile web awards but only if you're *not* a woman and only if your site is on a dotmobi URL'.

Informa Telecoms has organised the Mobile Web Europe conference and in its usual inimitable style has failed to recognise the other half of the sky (to quote John and Yoko). It's a 3-day conference covering all aspects of mobile web (and apparently the *only* mobile web event you'll ever need), sponsored by dotMobi and at the time of writing have only THREE women speaking during the whole event so that works out at one woman per day. That really is unacceptable in this day and age. There are plenty women out there worthy of participating at this conference. Informa really must try harder to find them and engage them. I'm not expecting half the panellists or speakers to be women, but I would expect more than a token one a day. Of course the male speakers are interesting and relevant, but to only have one woman per day is ridiculous.

And then there's the ilovemobileweb awards sponsored by dotmobi. In fact, dotmobi is sponsoring the whole thing. There are no female judges listed. (Haven't Informa and dotmobi seen this list of the Top 50 Women in Mobile Content from Mobile Entertainment Magazine? And that's just for starters).

Then this is compounded by only allowing entries if your site is a dotmobi site. So this rules out everything else that is mobile web. It doesn't seem right to me. The mobile web *isn't* all about dotmobi. And no matter how much money you throw at a conference or awards ceremony, being exclusive in an inclusive, connected world is just barmy. A different thing if it was billed as 'the dotMobi awards for dotMobi customers'.

dotMobi or Informa - care to comment?

Blogger's revenge at the Future of Mobile

Well, maybe not quite revenge, but six mobile bloggers (including myself, James Whatley, Vero Pepperell, Andrew Grill, Jemima Kiss and Ewan MacLeod) will be getting six minutes each to rant give their point of view on a hot mobile topic of their choice at the Future of Mobile Conference in London on 17/18 November.

The schedule looks really interesting and I'm very pleased to be invited to participate. There's also a day of workshops which will be of particular interest to the developers amongst you I imagine.

Tickets are available now with a very attractive early bird offer of £100 discount on conference and conference/workshop tickets. And student tickets are just £45 for bona fide full-time students.

Other stuff I've been up to lately

So apart from the uber-festival that is Glastonbury, I've actually been up to plenty other stuff too in the last month or so...

I chaired MoMo London in June on What Mobile means to Media and Marketing. James Cooper and Ben Matthews did great write-ups of the event too which saves me having to do it!

I spoke at a couple of conferences - namely Stuart Whitaker's EDM08: Search in the Mobile Era (where I shared a panel with Russell Buckley of Admob and Mobhappy fame talking about mobile marketing and advertising and also enjoyed Mike Short's wonderful opening keynote) and Being Digital which was fun. It was good to catch up with some friends old and new like Rummble's Andrew Scott, Singtone's Jeff Bloom, Taptu's Steve Ives, Three's Carl Taylor and Techcrunch UK's Mike Butcher, amongst others. What's more, both of these events were at BAFTA which is a top venue. After Being Digital, I spent the afternoon at the rather wonderful One Alfred Place with the equally wonderful Oli Barrett and then I hung out with a bunch of mobilists at Ewan MacLeod's lovely SMSTextNews Unlimited Drinks event.

And as if that wasn't enough, I participated in an in-depth panel discussion at Fleishman Hillard's Digital Influence Index launch at Interbrand's offices and talked about mobile, blogging, social media, digital marketing, customer trends and more besides with Fleming Madsen and James Whatley. The Digital Influence report is worth a read as are the accompanying slides.

Client stuff fills up most of the rest of my time but I do manage to squeeze in Interesting 2008 which was, indeed, very interesting. Lloyd's singing with ukelele was a welcome highlight and I absolutely adored Jim Le Fevre's zoetrope demo. Lloyd Davis also did a rather good write-up of the day, so again, I don't have to!

When I get back from Glastonbury, I return to find that I'm featured in Mobile Entertainment magazine's Top 50 Women in Mobile list and I'm absolutely chuffed to bits with this news and what they say about me:

"If there’s anyone in the world that knows mobile marketing as well as Keegan, we haven’t met them. Great networker too – she organises the very popular London-based Swedish Beers evenings and is a prominent force in the Mobile Mondays organisation too. She even finds time to blog prodigiously."

And to celebrate, I go hang out with my Women in Mobile Data Association pals at the Playphone sponsored meet-up event at the lovely MyHotel in Bloomsbury.

I missed Mobile 2.0 in Barcelona - it was just one event too far with having had such a busy few weeks and a sleepless Glastonbury, but I'm working my way through the resulting materials which make for a good read. But managed to hang out for a bit with the Tuttler's instead and also go for a mobilists dinner courtesy of Carsonified where we obviously put the mobile world to rights! It was good to spend some quality time with Carl Uminski, Andrew Grill, Mike Stead, Whatleydude, Dan Lane, Vic Keegan (no obvious relation!), Simon Rockman, magician Amardeep Dhanjal and the Carsonified crew - Dominic and Keir. A fun night indeed.