Tag Archives: conference

BCBBC08: Some final thoughts.

BarCampBankBCI am elated that BarCampBankBC was pulled off so wonderfully. It was a true pleasure to plan it and host it. But most of all, it was amazing to attend.

I must thank my two incredible partners in crime, Tim McAlpine and Gene Blishen. It was a great experience planning the event with these two. I also want to thank the incredible Brent Dixon who ensured as much of the event was webcast as possible and Morriss Partee for his truly hysterical and humbling Pecha Kucha.

I’ve updated the wiki with all the blogs and photos from the event I can think of. If I missed any, please add them.

In the end, it’s less about any particular thing that was discussed than the nature of the conversations, the quality of discussion, the collaboration, the learning and advising. Two trends that emerged, I think were the future of banking and the ethical nature of banking. I was surprised that the session on social finance was completely full, almost everyone came and it was a lively discussion.

I’m tired, and I may post again as the dust settles for me, but I wanted to get a post out before the day ended. I am grateful to all the people whom I got to see again, all the new people I was fortunate enough to meet and all the people who engaged in the conversation. You make my life a better place.

Thank you to all who attended and contributed. It was a real high!

It’s all about me…

In front of the Mendenhall GlacierTwo cool things happened to me today that I want to tell you about.

The first thing is that I gave my presentation to the Internet Marketing Conference, which is happening today and tomorrow in Vancouver. It was only a 25 minute slot, which is short, but I delivered it in about 15 minutes, so we had time for some good questions. I usually like longer slots to get into more details, but it was fun to give a short, tight presentation instead.

A couple of people blogged it, which is a first for me, I think.

Miss 604 live blogged it, which I appreciate. And one of the sponsors, Techvibes summed it up nicely.

The second thing is that my friend TJ McCue published an interview he did with me. I’ve known TJ for about a year, and we met… um… hey TJ, how did we first meet? Anyway, I admire TJ for his smarts and entrepreneurial spirit. He’s always got something cooking, and it’s usually pretty interesting. He blogs on the Dun & Bradstreet content portal called AllBusiness.com. He ran an article called Why Bother with Blogging or Social Media. It’s a good piece, and may be part one of two.

Enjoy, and thanks for this indulgence…

NOTE: Here’s part two, it’s called Why Bother with Blogging or Social Media, part two

Discount code to attend Finovate.

Finovate 2008Last October I was lucky enough to attend and live blog at the inaugural Finovate conference. Finovate was started by Jim Bruene, who writes both NetBanker and Online Banking Report. No slouch, he.

I loved attending Finovate 2007, and live blogging it gave me a great perspective on what I was seeing. The format is simple: each presenter gets seven minutes to present their solution or product. No PowerPoint, no speeches, just live demos so everyone can see what they do. You can read my blog posts here, here and here

Jim wrote a post on NetBanker the other day giving the details of Finovate 2008 with all the presenters listed. It’s a great lineup!

This year, Finovate 2008 again happens in New York on October 14th at the Crowne Plaza Times Square. The cost is $995 USD, but if any of my readers want to go and are planning to book by the end of August, the Finovate organizers have given me a special promo code to pass along.

The first five people who go to finovate.com, and use the discount code “azaroff55” will get $250 off the $995 conference cost. It’ll definitely be an event worth attending!