I’ll be in Austin on Friday for the South By Southwest Interactive conference. It’s my first time at the conference but Microsoft has a great presence at SXSW again this year.
Microsoft’s own danah boyd, an expert in social networking research, will be the opening keynote speaker on Saturday.
Chris Pendleton of Bing Maps will present a panel on Augmenting Maps with Reality on Sunday. Bing Maps has a lot of great new features and you’ll want to see how these are being used.
I also found out that one of our program managers from the adCenter group, a recent graduate, will be presenting at SXSW about student entrepreneurship. Hung Truoung submitted his panel idea, “Student Startups” and was selected for SXSW. It’s an example of the bright talent we have coming on.
Other Microsoft activities at SXSW:
Saturday
Bing sponsored TWiST party (“This Week in Startup” or TWiST is an internet radio show hosted by Jason Calacanis of Mahalo and TechCrunch) 3-7 p.m.
Sunday
Bing Blogger’s Lounge Tweetup (attended by tier-one bloggers with disproportionate voices in social media). 4-6 p.m.
Salute to Our Troops -- Microsoft and SXSW will host wounded Warriors and their guests from the Warrior and Family Support Center at Brooke Army Medical Center (BAMC) to participate in a day long trip to SXSW.
Monday
BizSpark Accelerator -- Accelerator is a tech startup pitch event that will showcase 4 startups in each of 5 categories. Pitches will be to an open audience and panel of expert judges
Tuesday
Deep Focus sponsored session “Microsoft Bing: Behind the Scenes of The Decision Engine” (Aaron Lilly, Microsoft, Lynn Girotto, Bing/Microsoft; Stefan Weitz, Bing/Microsoft)
The Future of the Digital Living Room – Ron Pessner of Xbox will discuss how interactive entertainment can be.
BizSpark Accelerator continued.
Ongoing
Bing Photo for Good (located in Blogger’s Lounge. Operated during Lounge hours). Each photo taken in Bing booth goes towards “Save the Children” efforts on behalf of children in Haiti; Checkin4Charity partnership.
Bing booth in Expo Hall (operated during Expo Hall hours)
Microsoft Silverlight Interactive Lounge -- highlighting Silverlight by turning the space into a digital living room showcasing multiple technologies outside the panel rooms.
Windows Phone Blogger Lounge