afterSXSW - the a-ha! notes

Since I'm planning on presenting at work this week, I figured I'd do my SXSWi 2008 notes here so I have reference when I'm making my decks tomorrow. I make decks, people. Sexy!

I call them A-Ha! Notes because my mind was on fire for the full five days and I would often see the phrase "A-HA!" pop up in big bold letters in my head during a panel or conversation. I even dreamed in 140 character bursts while I was in Austin. I shit you not. If you weren't there, why not? I'm sure you'll be there next year. I'll buy you a slice at The Onion and introduce you to all my internet famous friends. It'll be fun.

The Big Picture Stuff

• Offline interaction enhances online relationships exponentially (and vice-versa). This has been true for my tech circle for longer than a minute but tools like twitter serve to showcase this fact. Also, it is increasingly true that young folks don't make distinctions between online and offline activity and are probably tired of us old folks asking about it. It's proof we're lame and not cool.
• It's okay to be internet famous. In the knowledge based economy, there's true (not imagined or unimportant or morally undesirable) value in being known and in the know. Having tech geek cultural cache allows you to transform the conversation. I need to get over my own privacy issues and get back out there.
• The perception of Disney as an "old media" company is problematic. I'll never have access to the best folks in the field if I'm not talking about the cool stuff we're doing at disney.com.
• What we think we know about how people use the web and our products and what really is happening is probably very off. We don't do enough real world observing. We don't think enough about our guests. We don't think enough about the "rich internet experiences" we are providing or the feeling our guests leave with when they come in and leave our sites.
• I love my peoples. All of 'em.

Panel: What Teens Want

• Ads everywhere gets an immediate negative response. Pop-ups are the big culprit but overt marketing is also a big problem. Kids come to a site for the content and anything that hinders there access to the content (interstitials, overlays, pauses in the experience) is a bad thing.
• Repetition of ads is a big no-no.
• Ads that encourage sign-up are viewed negatively, especially if the sign-up only leads to marketing being directed to their email accounts.
• That said, contextually relevant advertising is something kids don't mind and may actually want. The big example - on nba.com, a kid wants to see ads for the newest nikes and not miller lite.
• Social network fatigue is real. For college-bound kids, myspace is losing its relevance. There needs to be purpose to the social network or else kids lose interest quickly. With myspace, in particular, the lack of net safety and the need to "manage" your account is problematic. Facebook is used for both schoolwork and personal relationships.
• E-mail is dead. Kids use email for "business" purposes - talking to teachers, family members, signing up for things that require an online identity.
• Text messaging and face-to-face interaction are the communication tools of choice. We have to remember that kids see their friendship circle all day at school and through after-school activities. Socially adept kids (read: most kids) aren't looking for more ways to interact, necessarily. They have the tools and access already.
• These girls are all about the casual games, particularly retro games like tetris and pac-man. The Boys liked runescape and console games.
• Avatar creation was not a big thing for these kids. They had done it before but didn't find much value afterwards. All the girls had, at least, started a zwinky.
  
• Music was a big focus for all the teens and their online interests - purevolume and mixmatters were both mentioned. The boys also focused on aggregators of content like digg and ebaumsworld. The girls were a bit more fashion and shopping centric - seventeen, hipster blogs, and goodreads were name-checked.
• They all watched more video on their TVs than on their computers but almost none of them watched shows on-time. Time-shifting was huge. The only things mentioned as "must watch on time" were sporting events, wrestling and Idol. Besides youtube, obvs, veoh was the online video location of choice. That said, they all had connections with Disney - younger kids watching Hannah Montana and Suite Life on Disney.com (particularly if they thought something was exclusive or if word of mouth at school was that a particular episode was very good) and they older kids - boys and girls - were watching Kyle XY and Wildfire on ABC Family and abcfamily.com.

Panel: The Female Takedown of Casual Gaming

• Puzzle/Card Games dominate for female players followed by board and word games.
• Playfirst.com and Dinerdash.com are seeing some success with the free to try, pay to play models.
• The "free games" with ad support or additional features at cost seems to be working as well.
• Achievements and Collectibles are big with the female audience, particularly in games where parents and kids play together (Moms tend to get very engaged with games that encourage collection and do so "on behalf" of their kids).
• Moms often find community with other moms through these games. Finding ways to encourage that behavior without turning off kids may be a sweet spot for growing more immersive gaming in the pre-school/elementary age space.
• Game Making is a very young male scene but the voice of women in game play and features is growing.
• Kongregate is finding success with user generated casual games. The tools, however, need to be simple and allow for a very low point of entry.
• The research about gender based player behavior is that girls are generally playing to relieve stress and pass the time.
• Guitar Hero and Rock Band and other games that encourage social gameplay are bringing in a lot of new gamers of all genders and ages.
• Collaboration is a really important game play feature for female gamers.
• The big question you should be asking yourself when creating a game is "What is the guest left with after they've played?" - if you can answer that, you've probably jumped from a good game to a great game.

Panel: Where Are The Black Tech Bloggers?

• For the first time since I've been coming to SXSW, I felt like there was a distinct diversity of viewpoints of the black folks in attendance. It was the first time I didn't know or know of everyone who was there before I got there. It was the first time, I didn't feel the need to know everybody there. It was the first time I disagreed vehemently with viewpoints put out there by other Black people speaking at this panel.
• This is progress.
• The challenge of being "the negro tour guide" for a big company may limit the number of candidates of color applying and looking to work for a company like Disney.
• Also, the inclination to be entrepreneurial and self-employed may overwhelm the desire to work for others in the tech space.
• There is definitely reason to be concerned with the lack of black faces in the room determining feature sets and product plans.
• We are definitely not all on the same page with regards to where we are in the race conversation in America right now. There's a compelling belief by young people that we are moving towards post-racialism faster than some of us would like to think.
• Also, what Tiffany said.
  

Panel: Lessons Learned at 37 Signals - just read what Read Write Web posted. My big A-Has here was the "make tiny decisions" and "watch out for red flags" and "make it matter".

Final Thoughts

Once again, I left SXSW re-invigorated and inspired and  with renewed passion for what I do. I loves me the internet y'all and I'm always so happy I get to take my spring break with it, every year.

I've also got some secret plans in the works but I'm going to actually keep them secret this time instead of blabbing about them before I actually do them.