If you don’t know, I am one of the co-founders of Podcamp Halifax along with Ryan Deschamps and Jon McGinley.  This year we also added Bessy Nikolaou from Time+Space Media to our organizational team (and a fantastic help she has been BTW).  Podcamps are an open format, community-learning event covering all things Internet related. They started years ago from small tech gatherings and now are a registered foundation that occur all over the world.

This year’s event was killer.  We have over 350 registered with a wait list.  On the day it was -10C and we still had 275 people show up.  Due to great sponsorship support from organizations like Rogers, Hover.com, HRCAP, The Hub Halifax and all our other generous sponsors we were able to have hot coffee and snacks as well as gaving away two ipads and a Blackberry Torch (seen below with Rogers representative Melanie).

We even managed to have the first great social media networking meetup in RL (real life) at the The Hub Halifax on the Saturday night before.  You can see all of the action from the photos taken by Michelle Doucette (also one of our sponsors) by clicking HERE.

All in all, it was a fantastic third annual event with incredible energy and potential for bigger things next year. See below for the chatter from the day or do a search on Twitter for the hashtag #podcampHFX to see everything form the day.

Youtube is new! Again! It’s all different!

Okay well maybe it is not that all different but it has changed it’s look, interface(s) integration and pretty much has done this without any fanfare. This is what I’ve always love about Youtube. It’s like little presents from your favourite friend and it’s not even your birthday.

Now this may not mean much to the everyday googler/youtuber but I’m a fan. It is sleek and more intuitive. With all the connected social media out there as well I think that it also is easier to share, shout, rate and vote. There is a great breakdown here on the details from Mashable.com.

What I like is the queue functionality to uploads. It’s a backend feature when you are uploading your videos. You can multiple upload several videos without having to babysit each one. You add all the keywords, titles and category details and away you go. Now you still will want to go back and geo-locate the video (if you want that functionality).

Since we are onto Geo-locating, this reminds me that this is a great function for tourism operators. When you do a Google Map search around most sites in the world you can select the videos button from the drop-down menu that will show all videos that have been geo-tagged near that location. Simply roll over your mouse to one and it pops up. For marketing this is dead simple and built-in to your Youtube upload anyways.

Don’t forget it. It is another tool to build your SEO and interactive way for your audience / clients / guests / anyone to find you.

I *heart* Youtube .

It is a very exciting gathering due in large part to it’s open agenda. The flavor of this year’s talks have a thread of a social media backlash. Not so much as a negativity to it but rather a acceptance and how users should use it and get going. But we shall only see what really happens when the day unfolds.

I am going to do a primer/micro-workshop on using video and if the space is still open I’m going to host a talk on branded entertainment and paid versus free content.  I now have over  year of information on our Surfdonkey show to talk about to help other start their own shows and leverage on new models of branded entertainment.

For those who do not know about Podcamps, they are an open gatherings on the topic of all things web related. But the agenda is set by the attendees (this could even be you) to present a topic and engage an audience to develop a conversation on that topic. There are set time-slots available that anyone, ANYONE, can do a talk on anything web related (blogging, video streaming, design, e-commerce, Facebooking, Twitter how-tos, etc.). You can even host a topic on some you just want to learn more about by facilitating a conversation. Either way it is meant to be for the newbie and the heavy user alike.  I would like to see the proverbial pot stirred up a bit so antagonists please move to the front.

You should come too. What else is going on in the dead of January on a Sunday. Trust me, you will not be disappointed.

See you there.

We are now a Charter Member of Nova Scotia Come to Life.  It is a fantastic organization that is exactly in-line with what I believe we can do here in this province.  I have always said, believed in and had it as a philosophy that we can do anything on a world-class level right from our own backyards.  The Nova Scotia Come to Life program recognizes this and waves that flag.

With my specialty for video on the web, this enables me to put that philosophy into action.  I no longer have only a local market but also a worldwide audience to access.  This translates into creating our own in-house productions as well as the marketing benefits for our clients that reach to every corner of the web.  It makes for a very exciting future while maintaining the things I value about Nova Scotia.

Look out for more to come.

SXSW, the mecca of creative and artistic innovation had a panel submission option recently and I put in my own called “DIY Digital Showrunning: How To Create An Online Video Show”.  It was accepted into the panel submission forum (with the other 2210 entries) and now is part of a voting process which will help the option of it being picked for official selection.

The great thing about what I’m doing with SurfDonkey and Bad Dad (and the other shows I have previously started or have in development) is that each one is an evolving case study.  It is constantly changing and I learn and modify with each release.  The other great thing is that it captures the creative spirt that was instilled in me from NSCAD.  Just get out and do it.  Make art. Make work!

So you can help.

Here’s how:

Register at the SXSW Panel Picker then go to my DIY Digital Showrunning panel topic and vote me a thumbs up.

I’ve learned a ton of things about online video and believe that with the right tools and direction others can find their own story and create their own show.  You can too. Just drop me a note by clicking this text and we can talk…after you vote me up of course.