South By Southwest Interactive, initial ramblings

Some of the VIA Studio team is currently at SXSW Interactive. It’s been an inspiring few days, with one more left to go. Hopefully there will be some goodness to share when we get back, but as we enjoy a beer on the back porch of our rented house with the AC Entertainment/Forecastle Festival friends I wanted to share our excitement at all that is happening here specifically and in our industry overall.

The last session of today was a discussion between Al Gore and Sean Parker (of Facebook) about how technology is slowly taking back the democratic process. The most recent examples have been SOPA/PIPA, the Rush Limbaugh incident, and the Komen Foundation. Digital media played a huge role in changing the discourse, back to more logical, rational thought based on facts. This is the power of the internet and what we do in our work on a daily basis. Biz Stone, one of the founders of Twitter, made a point that the communication power of the internet, while necessarily capitalistic, is changing the face of marketing, because doing what’s right is also good for business.

It’s nice to come to a conference such as this and connect with peers. It’s even nicer to know that by participating, we’re playing a role that’s not only making us a living, it’s making the world a better place.

If you don’t get overwhelmed with the amount of posts from Twitter, I’d encourage you to peruse the #sxsw hashtag. I’ll try to winnow down any good content that comes out of this insane week and share it here.

See you back in Louisville,

~jason