RealPlayer SP at Gnomedex: Recap

Last Friday and Saturday was one of the social/tech world’s most coveted conferences, Gnomedex. This was version 9.0, which is pretty impressive for any conference. Founded almost a decade ago by Chris Pirillo, Gnomedex attempts to bring together people from various parts of the tech and social media communities, regardless of whether he thinks they’ll all get along or not. That’s part of the charm of Gnomedex- you never know what you’re going to get, but it’s always going to be awesome.

This year RealPlayer SP had the privilege of being a sponsor and hosted the official Saturday night party. We had a booth set up right next to the main conference hall where we could demo RealPlayer SP and its super cool features. We were also the official video sponsor, which we thought would go along nicely with RealPlayer SP’s social and portable features. And because the speakers at Gnomedex are simply phenomenal,  we thought people would like the idea of being able to download the videos and take them with them on their phones. The videos are almost ready, and when they are we encourage you to watch. These are presentations you do not want to miss.

Never before have I attended a conference that was a single track but spanned so many different interesting topics. Social Media superman Chris Brogan was the first presenter along with his Trust Agents co-author Julien Smith. You can’t watch Chris and Julien and not learn a lot about relationships and the glue that holds them together (or breaks them  apart): trust. The lessons learned from that presentation go well beyond the conference. Our relationships with our partners, customers, and competitors are all based upon trust. It is step one, plain and simple.

Other speakers that were clear crowd favorites were Drew Olanoff of #blamedrewscancer, Bre Pettis, genius behind the Makerbot, Phil Plait, aka the Bad Astronomer, who now has everyone questioning the B.S. in life, the Ignite presenters, and Mark Horvath of Invisiblepeople.tv, a man who puts a story and a face on the homeless epidemic. Both Olanoff and Horvath had the crowd in tears as they each told gut-wrenching stories about the facts of life, which aren’t always pretty. At the same time they both gave us a reason to believe that it can all work out, as long as you try. And if something doesn’t work one day? Just blame it on Drew’s cancer. Seriously. He wants you to do just that.

Pettis is every grown-up kid’s dream. He and his team have created a 3-D printer that’s affordable. He showed us examples of what he’s made: Walt Disney’s head and Darth Vader’s head. Ironic? They print on a special kind of plastic, but he said he likes to test out his designs on frosting. That way if there’s an error, he gets to satisfy his sweet tooth. Sweet! (Bre, can I come demo some errors too?) Finally, Plait brought the crowd back down to earth. Literally. His work is based on science, plain and simple. If there’s proof it’s good. If there’s not, well, you have every right to question what you’re seeing and hearing. Don’t try to tell Plait that no man ever walked on the moon. You will lose the argument.

As a part of our involvement, RealPlayer SP hosted the Saturday night party at the See Sound Lounge. We had reservations about hosting the closing night fete but it turned out to be a pretty happening event. We had around 200 guests, the majority arrived before 8pm and stayed late into the night. They loved the jalapeno-infused tequila (dubbed the RealPlayer Slayer), the temporary tattoos (that ended up on any visible skin possible), but most importantly they loved the conversations. That’s what Gnomedex is all about: the conversations, the people, the relationships, and the community. We even raised almost $400 for Nickelsville by auctioning off dates with Mr. Pirillo and the Cyborg Anthropologist, Amber Case. Who said you can’t have a good time and raise a few bucks all at once?

We got a lot more out of Gnomedex than we ever planned, and hope to be a part of the event in the future. Did you go to Gnomedex? What was your story? Who was your favorite speaker? What made the biggest impression on you?

Other Gnomedex goers blogs (list to grow as I find more posts):

Thinkers and Doers

The Intersection of People and Process

Media Shift

CNN

Microsoft Surface

Tech News World

Bacon is My Enemy