140 Conf Meetup @ Yahoo!
The Twitterazzi talk sharing and caring on the real-time Internet
Social media lets people connect in new ways, and that means more ways to “share and care on the real-time Internet.” That was the theme of the 140 Character Conference’s L.A. Meetup, where Yahoo! hosted more than 200 enthusiastic tweeters at our Burbank offices.
A joint venture between Yahoo!, the 140 Character Conference’s Jeff Pulver (@jeffpulver), Make It Work’s Eric Greenspan (@ericgreenspan), the meetup brought some of the top tweeters together to talk about using social media to build businesses and communities.
Greespan MC’d the proceedings, employing his signature wit and humor, getting laughs throughout the evening. Pulver kicked off the list of speakers, discussing how as a kid he used ham radio to overcome his childhood loneliness, reaching out to other ham enthusiasts across the globe—an effort that required an FCC license and a lot of expensive, specialized equipment. With social media today, however, Pulver notes it’s possible to reach out across the same gulf with nothing more than a PC and a phone jack, no license required.
“When you start to reach out and connect with people your feel their presence no matter where they are” says Pulver. “There’s a soul behind the voice.”
Pulver then set the stage for the evening’s charitable theme by relating an anecdote about how Twitter helped him get help in moving boxes of gear from one place to another. He put an APB out on Twitter and six strangers showed up to help with his move. “If you ask for a favor properly, you can get just about anything,” he says. “If you are willing to let your guard down, amazing things can happen.”
The evening’s speakers included:
Stefanie Michaels (@adventuregirl)—With more than 1.4 million followers on Twitter, Stef talked about her dedication to various charities and how the “twitformation superhighway” has helped her achieve her goals in paying it forward.
Marlooz Veldhuizen (@Marlooz)—Talking about “Love 2.0,” Marlooz talked about her real-time Web experiences, including live streaming a first date. When she lost her laptop at a conference, she reached out on Twitter, raising 1,000 Euros in six hours to help buy a new one. Marlooz live-streamed the 140Conf Meetup. You can view the recorded version here.
Nathan Levinson ( @N8theSk8) and Alf LaMont (@Alflamont)—Nate runs marketing for the Viper Room and Alf for The Comedy Store. Both realized at about the same time that the legendary Sunset Strip—where both nightlife businesses are located—was in danger of losing its luster, especially after the demise of Tower Records’ flagship store. So they turned to social media—and Twitter in particular—to change that, using the medium to collectively get their messages out, enhance customer service, and generally co-operate to create a veritable Sunset Strip renaissance. One example of that is their annual event, #stripcrawl.
Carol Quinn (@3lunches), Debra Cincioni (@momsofamerica) & Beth Frysztak (@BethFrysztak)—You’ve heard of “ladies who lunch?” Well these ladies of the twitteratti put lunch to good use, promoting mentoring and charity using social media, and holding “twitter parties” for good causes.
Evan Lowenstein (@Evanlowenstein)—Postulating that Elvis is still alive to ask the question, “what would Elvis do?” with modern technology and social media, Lowenstein, a popular L.A.-based singer and songwriter, discussed the relationship between artists and their audiences and how social media can help or hinder an artist’s outreach goals. In the media world today, says Lowenstein, artists run the risk of overexposure. The trick, he says, “to limit exposure in real-time but promote and interact on social media.”
Greg Cohn (@gscohn)—Yahoo’s own social media maven, Greg Cohn, Director, Business Dev and Strategy, talked about Yahoo’s efforts on the social media space, including Facebook and other apps on the new Y! home page, Yahoo! mail and Yahoo! IM updates. He also demo’ed our fun new tool for checking your holiday social media mojo, all of which got “oohs” and “ahs” from the assembled twitteratti.
To borrow a couple terms from the crowd, it was a pretty “twitterific” evening, one that was not “twittered away” with useless information.
—Michael Mattis
(Crowd images by RicardoBueno; Yahoo! Onesy image by Eric Greenspan—a gift for little Greenspan, set to alight in this world in April, 2010—via Flickr, CC 2.0)
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Gee, who are those two lovely ladies pictured by the Yahoo Logo? Oh wait, I know…it’s http://www.twitter.com/marshacollier & http://www.twitter.com/staceysoleil
The OG’s of the #Spandex hashtag movement.
What an awesome meetup and we’re indebted to Yahoo! for opening their campus up to us.
-Kudos!
Stacey Soleil
Thanks again Yahoo! for being a fantastic sponsor. The night was fantastic, the snacks you provided were spot on and your digs were perfect!
Thanks to yahoo for hosting and the cupcakes. Eric, Jeff and all the volunteer you guys did a great job.
[...] a blast co-hosting that event with Jeff Pulver and it was a huge success thanks to Yahoo! (great Yahoo blog post here). Since, I’ve been getting ready for the holidays, spending time with my family, and [...]
It was a great night for LATech and the #140conf. Thank you Yahoo!
Thank you Yahoo!