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Who is talking about 2gether08

After scanning the Twitter feed from Summize, running a search on Technorati and Google, and following up other links, I’ve put together these blog posts about 2gether08. That’s as well as all items on our main site, and posts on the Crowdvine networking site, which I haven’t listed here. If I’ve missed you or something you have seen, drop a comment please.

Jemima Kiss wrote a series of posts on her Guardian blog: about the opening session with Bill Thompson, Matthew Taylor, Umair Haque and John Naish; on Andy Bell’s session where he urged people to develop “generous” web projects; on Is politics big enough for the web; and about Unchained and the ice-cream experiment.

Jemima also interviewed Blake Chandlee at 2gethr08 and asked him about Facebook’s attitude to data ownership, how the platform can be used for social activism and whether the site can really maintain its exponential growth. You can listen to the interview here.

Earlier this year Social Innovation Camp brought together social innovators and technology specialists who could help them develop their projects over two days … then urged people to take up their organising ideas. In Steal this Camp, from their session at 2gether08, they offer nine lessons.

Tom Taylor ran a five minute teaching session as part of the School of Everything’s series at on eight ways to orientate yourself anywhere: navigation hacks.

Tim Davies reports on his youth work 2.0 session at where participants discussed, among other things, young user led workshops, media creation by young people, and training for young people to build their own software.

Justgiving, the website where people raise money, offered seven lessons to avoid digital divorce: listen to your users (x2), expect criticism, be open and honest (x2), don’t expect to please everyone, and enable.

Darragh Doyle brought us some pole dancing pics which may have been loosely linked to Web 2.0 the musical.

Oli Barrett, in The Daily Networker, says he had an enjoyable two days, and “If 2Gether was a company, I’d want to work there”.

Mark Earls reflects on speaking and listening at 2gether08. Key insight from JP Rangaswami on Cluetrain plus 10 - It’s all about the people and not the technology.

Johnnie Moore thought 2gether08 had a lot of the elements that made Reboot a success: “a good venue that feels down-to-earth; lots of tracks to choose from, scope for doing a few things on-the-fly; a bit of social network technology but nothing too fancy; and a cafe area in which to schmooze.”

Nick Temple, from the School for Social Entrepreneurs, writing here and here says he enjoyed 2gether08, got mixed feedback from a mixed crowd for a session, adding “networking was great, even if the social media-meets-social good crowd is a relatively small and incestuous one.” He observes: “The techies and geeks and philosophers seem to have plenty to ponder / debate / discuss; the (social) entrepreneurs seem to have less in terms of action-focused stuff or content that can help move their organisation forward….beyond the networking, which is where most value from these things come, as ever.” Video here of Nick and Cliff Prior mapping the social entrepreneur landscape.

Charlie Beckett, author of the book Supermedia on networked journalism, was interviewed at 2gethr08. He says best sparks came from the workshops, and offers a few randowm thoughts: Why are politicians the only people without a support group? What is the Online equivalent of a street protest? How do you listen online? What’s entrepreneurial about social enterprise when it doesn’t make a profit?

Russell Davies explains a little of what went into his presentation at 2gether08: includes long photos, clouds, and maneki neko. Have to wait for the webcast video for the whole thing.

Robin Hamman offers notes of his contribution to the panel session “Inside Out - How Social Technologies are Influencing Work”. Robin recounts that when he worked at the BBC (until very recently) he found that he was better able to reach people within the organisation by using external tools like Facebook than by using the intranet. His advice for the future: ” … if I was trying to bring people working in an organisation together online, I’d use a mix of tools - I’d have discussions, blogs, wiki’s or whatever is appropriate behind the firewall but, in the same space, I’d also aggregate and editorialise the activities of staff that take place outside the firewall”.

Steve Dale shot some video of Cabinet Office Minister Tom Watson launching the the ‘Show us a better way‘ website. Dave Briggs picks up the story, as do Paul Bradshaw and Tim Davies, who were at 2gether08.

Christian Heilmann, writing about a geek meets people who want to change the world on Yahoo Developer Network, says “the main social issue I subscribed to solving at the event and the nearer future is try to make the gap between the geeks and the people with great ideas a little smaller”.

Dave Briggs recounts the session he ran at 2gether08, using the social media game to help people decide what technology tools and approaches were appropriate for two scenarios: an online umbrella community for local low carbon networks, and one looking at supporting respite carers online.

Tim Davies explains how he took advantage of the Think Public design clinic to develop his pitch to a 2gether08 judging session on the value and needs of detached youth work. Asks for further help to scale up his ideas.

Simon Berry posts the presentation he made in his workshop on the Coca-Cola campaign. He wants the company to use Coke distribution channels for simple medicines. More here Simon’s interview with the BBC.

Alan Patrick says he was able to participate virtually in 2gether08 through the webcasts, Twitter feeds, and friends there.

Emma Mulqueeny offers a round-up of contracts that she made, and sessions attended: “The festival atmosphere really works: great minds, superb minds, are communing with those who are passionate about stuff (not that one cannot exist without the other but you know what I mean). The air is electric, everyone is levelled, everyone is open and some really cool bumph (cannot say ’stuff’ again) is happening. Goodness knows if any of it will result in anything, hopefully it will - there is an awful lot of ‘OMG if only I knew you earlier’ going on”.

Roland Harwood at NESTA Connect: I really enjoyed 2gether08 last week. A festival focussed on exploring the positive social potential of technology. The buzz was palpable and it was great to be involved and participate. Steve Moore has an uncanning knack for collecting interesting people and bringing them together. I don’t know how he does it and I suspect he probably doesn’t either but we can learn a lot from simply bringing together a smart and passionate group of people, and creating the space for them to collaborate.

Ben Matthews finds a lot of people are Twitterers at 2gether08. He also shows us on YouTube how to make a frog from a business card.

Now needs to pull photos 2gether I guess.

Update: they are here

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