Sunshocked

Or something like that. I speak of Vloggercon, which went down only a few blocks from my house last weekend. I felt a little sorry for those that flew in from Amsterdam or wherever, but it’s their fault for not living in San Francisco.

While I didn’t actually attend Vloggercon itself, I did manage to make it to a number of after-parties, which we all know is where the serious education happens. The first night, I caught up with Josh Wolf, whom I first met looking for an apartment in SF. His roommate said I was “ungrounded” and couldn’t move in. A few years later, it seems Josh is under subpoena by the Federal Grand Jury for not surrendering his footage of a protest to the FBI. Before I left he said, “hey we should hang out again sometime—and before Thursday, since I might be going to jail.” Now who’s ungrounded?

A tech convention is incomplete without a visit to fave techie hangout House of Shields. I spent most of the evening chatting with Style Goddess Erica Falke. She mentioned that there’s an incredible feeling of camaraderie and revolution at tech conferences lately, and I totally agreed. The spirit at SXSWi 2006 was downright Das Kapital-esque. Talk of business strategies and “monetizing” were almost laughed out of the room, in favor of supporting the emerging global democracy and tearing down techno-hierarchies. It tasted like one big manifesto smoothie. And I do so like manifestos.

In short, I now have high expectations of these citizen journalists. The Fourth Estate is sleeping on the job and long in need of “the kicking in of a rotten door”, to borrow a quote from the late, great John Kenneth Galbraith. Go get ‘em vloggers.