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A map of all the SXSW Interactive 2012 campuses

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One of the biggest challenges of navigating South by Southwest Interactive last year was actual navigation: knowing where panels were being held and planning ahead to give yourself enough time to walk, bike or shuttle there.

Though the official SXSW site offers a list of the venues, you’ll find above a map the American-Statesman created. Click on it for a larger version and use it for reference this year. We’ll be linking to it often as the festival approaches and it will run in print as well the week of the festival.

How will you be getting around SXSWi? Let us know in the comments. We could really use the tips.

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Latest comments

I can't believe SXSW does not provide an interactive map to venues - so 1990's!

They should use something like this:

http://floorplanmapper.com/mobile-floor-plans/
... read the full comment by MapsRus | Comment on A map of all the SXSW Interactive 2012 campuses Read A map of all the SXSW Interactive 2012 campuses

I will be making sure to watch for that in the future. Will you be adding many more writing critiques in the future? Is there a place on the web where we might be reading more of your wisdom?

... read the full comment by Omar Gallaga | Comment on Microsoft Store coming to Austin, finally Read Microsoft Store coming to Austin, finally

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TEDxAustin to stream live online Saturday


Above: one of the best talks from TEDxAustin 2011, featuring Gilbert Tuhabonye.

TEDxAustin, a licensed conference of TED, returns for its third year on Saturday. The Austin Music Hall event is closed for registration, but if you want to see the programming, it’ll be available as a free live stream on Saturday on the TEDxAustin website. The event runs from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. You can read more about the live stream here.

Last year’s event was held before an audience of about 550 and most of the talks were pretty inspiring. This year’s theme is “Beyond Measure” and as is TEDxAustin tradition, the speaker’s list is secret until the event happens.

We’ll be writing our thoughts on the event in a blog post Monday. If you attend, feel free to share your own thoughts (or links to your own blog post) in the comments.

Edited to add, Saturday morning: A full list of speakers has been posted.

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10 conversation starters you can have handy for SXSW Interactive

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Attendees at SXSW Interactive 2011. Photo by Jay Janner / AMERICAN-STATESMAN

South by Southwest Interactive — the gigantic tech culture festival that has gone from spring break for geeks to spring break for anyone who uses a smart phone or Twitter — is a month away.

Starting March 9, downtown will be transformed into the epicenter of Wi-Fi-draining devices with screens, entrepreneurs hoping to strike it Facebook-rich and old-school hippie-techies complaining about everyone else.

It’ll be fun!

If you plan to attend the fest or at least lurk around the edges of it, you may be wondering what people will be talking about. Contrary to pop-culture portrayals, the tech-savvy are pretty social, especially when there’s lots of alcohol and karaoke around. We’ve come up with a list of 10 conversation-starters.

1. “So, when do you think this whole tech bubble’s gonna burst?” Perhaps you’re not afraid to be blunt or spoil the party. A tech crash reminiscent of the dot-com bust is one of the greatest fears of many attendees. It’s also the topic of the panel “Internet Bubble the Sequel: 1999 All Over Again?” And there are panels about “The Power of Fear in Networked Publics” and whether social media is ruining the way we communicate. It turns out terror can be a real motivator for tech innovation!

2. “My mind is getting a great workout, but boy, could I go for some yoga and a 10k run after all this is over!” The myth of the sedentary, unhealthy geek is due for a Jillian Michaels-style working over. An abundance of panels focus on health and fitness, from “Fit Together: How Fitness Goes High Tech + Social” to a panel featuring rapper Paul Wall and Quincy Jones III called “Feel Rich: Health is the New Wealth.” Popular speaker Jane McGonigal will talk about her new fitness game “SuperBetter,” created as the result of a brain injury she suffered. And there’ll be daily yoga sessions at the fest. Namaste!

3. “After SOPA, geeks can change anything with a good web protest!” The battle over piracy legislation between tech companies and online advocates that erupted recently will be much-discussed, with panels such as “American Copyright: Will Government Go Too Far?,” “Why Doesn’t Congress Grok the Internet?” and “Content As a Means for Social Change.” featuring Twitter co-founder Biz Stone.

4. “We need to get involved with some real-world protests, too!” One of the best panels I saw at 2011’s fest was about social media’s impact on the Arab Spring movement. There’ll be lots more panels on that topic, as well as sessions about stateside hot-button issues like, “Occupying Media: 24 Hour Protest People,” “Internet Power: After Cyber-Optimism and Pessimism” and the very timely “Stand with Planned Parenthood: A Crisis Response.”

5. “You know what’s gonna be big this year? Second-screen TV watching.” It’s never easy to predict what technology will have the most buzz at the fest, but there are enough panels around the trend of second, third, even fifth screens, that it’s worth keeping an eye on. “Second screen” could mean using a device with a screen (like an iPad or smart phone) while watching TV or having a screen in your car. Panels like “Integrating Brands into Social Television,” “3 Screen Minimum: Convergence of TV & Social Media” and “Why Your Car Will Be the 5th Screen in Your Life” will explore the trend.

6. “Did you see (name of celebrity) on that panel today?” It won’t be hard to spot stars at Interactive. Look for “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” creator Joss Whedon, Tom Colicchio and Andy Cohen on a panel about TV’s “Top Chef,” actor Rainn Wilson, filmmaker and podcaster Kevin Smith, Segway inventor Dean Kamen, director Morgan Spurlock, actress Lisa Kudrow, Gawker’s Nick Denton and food celebrity Anthony Bourdain.

7. “I sure am hungry. Any food events going on at this thing?” In addition to lots of panels related to food trucks, food quality and regional cuisine, there’s also a Bacon Takedown cooking contest, a Taco Experiment competition and food blogger meetups. Food writer Addie Broyles has the details on her blog Relish Austin.

8. “Hey, nice canvas bag! Who designed it?” This year’s SXSW Interactive goodie bag, given to all registrants, was designed by Yiying Lu, who created Twitter’s iconic “Fail Whale” graphic. It features a cartoon mouse holding a tablet and it’s absolutely adorable.

9. “So many emails and status updates! I am so overloaded and could use a break!” It’s not just you. Lots of people feel overwhelmed by the amount of data we’re exposed to every day. Panels like “The Cloud as Skynet: Conquering Digital Overload,” “Digital Detox: Revealing Life Unplugged” and “Tech Detox: Can You Survive a Day Without Technology?” will offer tips and commiseration.

10. “I wonder if techies will affect in the 2012 elections.” Politics isn’t always a huge topic at SXSW, but this year it’s everywhere, from panels about tech in government (“Do People Really Want Participatory Government?,” “The Human Cost of Failed Government Technology,” “Sunspots: The Promise and Pitfalls of Gov 2.0”) to panels addressing the presidential race (“How Social Media Imperils Political Parties,” “Big Data: Powering the Race for the White House” and “Socializing the Presidency: Digital Politics 2012,” among others).

Other things to talk about: The Interactive Hall of Fame award, presented to web design pioneer Jeffrey Zeldman, is new this year. The Interactive Awards will be hosted by comics Jenny Slate (“Marcel the Shell With Shoes On”) and Gabe Liedman. There’s a proliferation of panels about sports and sportswriting. The ScreenBurn video-gaming track of the conference has been rebooted and relocated to Palmer Events Center. You can job hunt at the official SXSW Tech Career Expo, watch start-ups compete at the Accelerator event and hang out at the new Startup Village area. If all else fails, you can whine about how many campuses there are for the fest (14) and how much walking you’ve doing to get from place to place.

Let’s hope the real-world conversations are as lively and interesting as the ones that’ll surely be happening online during SXSW Interactive.

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Microsoft Store coming to Austin, finally


Image via Microsoft Store site

As reported in today’s American-Statesman, Microsoft is finally bringing its retail store experience to Austin with a location at The Domain to be opened at some point in the future (most likely after South by Southwest).

It’s the second Texas location after the one in Houston at The Galleria.

We’ve been talking about what these stores might be like since 2009 when we wrote a (slightly snarky) piece on what the experience at these stores may be like. Bear in mind, this was in the Windows Vista era; things have improved considerably since Windows 7 came to be.

Will you be visiting the store once it opens?

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‘Reckoning’ RPG and ‘Darkness’ sequel top video game releases

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New video games this week:

“Kingdoms of Amular: Reckoning.” — The runaway success of “The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim” shows that there’s a huge market for single-player fantasy games. But will this new game franchise, basedon the talents of author R.A. Salatore, artist Todd McFarlane and “Elder Scrolls” veteran Ken Rolston make for a winning formula? Why not pic up a sword and find out? Rated M for Mature. $60 for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Windows PCs.

“The Darkness II.” — The original “Darkness,” based on the Top Cow comic book series, was an intriguing mix of action gunplay, supernatural powers and a noir storyline. The sequel allows players to dual-wield guns, more challenges using darkness and light in the environments and a four-player cooperative mode. Rated M for Mature. $50-$60 for Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.

Also out this week: “Resident Evil: Revelations” (Nintendo 3DS), “Jak & Daxter Collection” (PS3), “Zumba Fitness Rush” (Xbox 360 Kinect), “Fallout: New Vegas Ultimate Edition” (Xbox 360, PS3, PC), “Jewel Link Chronicles: Mountains of Madness” (Nintendo DS), “Inversion” (Xbox 360, PS3), “Myst” (3DS), “ThinkSMART Chess for Kids” (DS), “Ferrari: The Race Experience” (Nintendo Wii), “Jagged Alliance: Back in Action” (downloadable for PC), “Shank 2” (downloadable for PC, Xbox 360 and PS3), “Smash ‘n’ Survive” (downloadable for PS3), “House of the Dead III” (downloadable for PS3), “The Simpsons Arcade Game” (downloadable for Xbox 360 and PS3), “Gotham City Imposters” (downloadable for PC, Xbox 360 and PS3).

Permalink | Comments (0) | Post your comment Categories: Shopping, Videogames

The Linkdown for Monday, Feb. 6

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The new SXSW Interactive swag bag, designed by Yiying Lu (of Twitter Fail Whale fame). Photo by Shawn O’Keefe, courtesy SXSW Inc.

The Linkdown engaged in some rare business travel last week, but is now caught up enough to provide you with a carefully curated list of events, links and SXSW Interactive news. Hey, wait a minute… this is that list! What a coincidence!

Events:

Internet goodness:

SXSW-related

Got a Linkdown item we should include in a future update? E-mail it to us with “LINKDOWN:” in the subject line.

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A Force-ful recommendation for ‘Old Republic’

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In this week’s Digital Savant column (appearing in Monday’s Austin American-Statesman), I take a closer look at the gigantic, Austin-developed “Star Wars: The Old Republic,” a game that we’ve written about before a lot in this space.

In my review/impressions piece, I talk about my relative inexperience as a player of Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMOs), but how much I’m enjoying the game anyway. (That’s a picture of my character, Maumouchowchow, a Jedi Consular, up at the top of this blog entry.) It’s been a while since I’ve been hooked on a game like this, and I give full credit to BioWare’s ability to make me care about this virtual world and the characters within it.

Have you been playing the game, too? Let us know what you think of it in the comments.

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Austin-developed ‘Zynga Bingo,’ still in closed beta, is already controversial

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Zynga Bingo,” the first game to be released by the social gaming powerhouse’s Austin studio, has a lot riding on it. It will join the company’s long running “Zynga Poker” as part of a new franchise called “Zynga Casino.”

Members of the Austin team traveled to California to be at the company’s San Francisco’s headquarters for the launch of the game last week, when the game was released in closed beta to invitees for testing before it goes wide to the rest of the gaming world.

Like most of Zynga’s game, this Facebook title will allow players to interact with their online friends, boost up the game with power-ups and kill time in an easy-to-play, tough-to-master format.

But before the game has even gone into public release, it’s already attracting attention in ways Zynga can’t be enjoying. It has been accused by a company called Buffalo Studios of plagiarizing the design of a game called “Bingo Blitz.”

It’s the second time the company has been accused of aping someone else’s game design recently; another company called NimbleBit said that Zynga’s game “Tower Heights” bears quite a resemblance to that company’s “Tiny Tower.”

On Venturebeat today, Zynga CEO Mark Pincus fired back about the copycat accusations, saying that gaming companies like his typically build upon the successes of existing games, improving the formula to make better gaming experiences. Venturebeat also printed an email Pincus sent to Zynga employees about the controversy.

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‘Soul Calibur V’ fights back in new sequel

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New video games this week:

“Soul Calibur V.” — Taking place 17 years after the events of “Soul Calibur IV” (we don’t remember what happened either, don’t worry), this fighting game continues the long-running series, which is known for its beautiful visuals, crazy characters and outsized weaponry. The new version includes more ways to personalize your own fighters, more online fighting features and a variety of fighting styles to master. Rated T for Teen. $60-$80 for Standard and Collector’s Edition, for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

Also out this week: “Final Fantasy XIII-2” (PS3), “Puddle” (downloadable for PS3), NeverDead (PS3, Xbox 360), “Bookworm Wordy Wonder Bundle” (PC), “Pro Evolution Soccer 2012” (Nintendo 3DS), “House of 1,000 Doors: Family Secrets” (PC), “BioShock 2” (Mac), “Captain Morgane and the Golden Turtle” (downloadable for PC, PS3, Nintendo Wii and Nintendo DS), “Rhythm Party” (downloadable for Xbox 360.

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Declutter to digital

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Illustration by Don Tate II / AMERICAN-STATESMAN

In case you missed it on Saturday, the American-Statesman ran a story I wrote about people who have made The Great Digital Transition from physical media (books, CDs, DVDs) to digital.

It can be a painful process, fraught with copyright issues and very little money you’ll get back, say, selling your precious, dust-attracting CD collection. Personally, I am way behind on this (my overstuffed home office shelves are a testament to that) and I plan to spend more time decluttering, purging and converting, especially in books and DVDs.

How are you managing the transition? Let us know in the comments.

Also in the American-Statesman, this week’s Digital Savant column was about differences between two hot social networks, Google+ and Pinterest, which also ran here in the blog last week.

Permalink | Comments (0) | Post your comment Categories: Computers, Gadgets, Internet, Movies & DVDs, Shopping

The Linkdown for Friday, Jan. 27

The Linkdown was amused, but mostly disturbed, by the “Simpsons” episode where everybody crashed their cars because they were posting on SpringFace, a social network created by Lisa Simpsons (with help from Nelson and some computer geeks).

Watch that and then check out these important events, links and SXSW Interactive news:

Events:

Internet goodness:

SXSW-related

Got a Linkdown item we should include in a future update? E-mail it to us with “LINKDOWN:” in the subject line.

Permalink | | Categories: Austin, Computers, Internet, SXSW, SXSW 2012, Videogames

Google+ and Pinterest: two very different, fast-growing social networks


Google+

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Pinterest

When you think of online social networks, the names that tend to come up are Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and, perhaps, Tumblr.

Two fast-growing social networks are poised to join that list. Google+, a network launched by search behemoth Google last summer, already has 90 million users and, some estimates suggest, could reach 400 milllion by the end of 2012.

Pinterest, a much more niche network where people can post images of things they like (clothes, products, hairstyles), has had a scorching run the last two months, with about 17 million page views in January as of this writing. The company won’t say publicly how many subscribers it has, but some estimates put it at about 4 million users.

Launched in mid-2010, Pinterest is still invitation-only and had a pretty low profile before exploding in popularity last year.

At first glance, Google+ and Pinterest couldn’t seem more different. Google+ comes at you from a gigantic tech company that seems like it’s trying to catch up to Facebook’s success. It throws a lot at you, from the ability to video chat (a feature called “Hangouts”) to its most significant innovation, “Circles,” which help you put your contacts into groups, making it easier for you to decide who sees the things you share.

Pinterest, on the other hand, puts a strong emphasis on beauty and design through the images that users share on categorized “Pinboards.” It feels focused and already has an identity. According to Google ad data, 80 percent of its users are women; the most popular postings tend to be gorgeously photographed food, stylish outfits and lusted-after items. Much of Pinterest is hopeful; the looks users aspire to replicate, things they’d like to buy someday, recipes they plan to try.

Guess which of the two social networks people have fallen in love with?

Despite the growth of Google+, I have yet to hear a single person say she loves it. The people I see posting more often there are marketers, photographers, social media experts and a handful of media people like me sharing the same kinds of links and jokes they also post to Twitter and Facebook.

Google+ otherwise feels like a weirdly active ghost town to me, a gigantic party that you show up to only to find that you don’t know anyone there and can’t quite follow the conversations going on around you. It may be that the people who have me in circles (more than 1,500) and the people I have in my circles (about 500) simply aren’t sharing their best posts with me and are targeting what they post to other circles. Is there a whole other alternate Google+ universe that I’m not privy too? Conversations with other Google+ users I know lead me to believe I’m not alone.

Google has put tremendous effort into making Google+ flexible, easy to customize and connected to its popular servies like Gmail and Picasa photos. It gives subscribers a lot of freedom to decide how they want a social network to operate (as opposed to Facebook, which makes big changes that regularly upset its users and still succeeds). But freedom may be working against Google+. I find myself flummoxed by what I’m supposed to do with it, and the killer feature — setting up groups to target my postings — feels like a lot of work. It all feels a little soulless to me, a social network without a clear sense of purpose that is leaving to its users to find interesting ways to use it. For the first few months of Google+’s existence, the major topic of discussion seemed to be Google+ itself, taking social media insularity and navel gazing into previously uncharted territory.

Some people are thriving on it, especially people who are using it for business. Dave Gray, a senior vice president at Austin’s Dachis Group, said (in a Google+ post, of course), said he understands some people are confused by Google+, but, “my confusion pales in comparison to my excitement at exploring this experiment in design for online social interaction.”

Gray said, “Circles solved one of the frustrations I have had with social networks. Some friends and family are not into everything I post on (Facebook) and to them it’s spam. Other friends would like more of some things and less of others. So the initial buzz for me was that I finally had a way to start sorting this stuff out.”

He concludes, “What has fascinated me about G+ is the way that deeply engaged conversations evolve naturally around shared interests, giving me the opportunity to engage with people I know well but that also include people I have never met. Where else do you see conversations like this happening on the web?”

Honestly, I wish I was seeing some of these deep conversations; the comment threads on Google+ don’t feel much different to me than those on Facebook, but perhaps that’s because I have more friends and family I know in “real-life” there. I haven’t seen many people on Google+ who are having the kinds of experience that Gray is having. (The post was written a while back, but Gray said today that his opinions on Google+ still hold.)

Pinterest, in the other hand, seems to have many more users who are incredibly passionate. Austin social media expert Lani Rosales recently posted a great list of 30 suggestions for improving Pinterest (including the ability to post private items and more easily rearrange posts) on the blog AGBeat.com. Some of the people I follow on Pinterest are using it to share their favorite books, solicit ideas for decorating their home or plan weddings.

Much has been made about how its user base is primarily women, prompting a post on the website ReadWriteWeb called “A Guy’s Guide to Pinterest” for mystified men. Two men I know who are heavy social media users and who recently joined Pinterest told me they didn’t get it and weren’t sure what they’d use it for.

Is it the site’s aesthetic, which is neat, bordered by a subtle shade of pink, or the site’s “Pinners” who’ve created a visual language for a beautiful, well-designed life on Pinterest and inspired newer members to follow suit?

I’m not really sure, but I know that the walled Utopia that is Pinterest will probably evolve into something else if its fast growth continues. It’ll change even more quickly if it’s acquired. Earlier this month, the website TechCrunch reported on a persistent Silicon Valley rumor that Google has an interest in acquiring Pinterest, perhaps incorporating it into Google+.

It certainly would make Google+ more interesting, but would Pinterest — a great idea that’s breaking the mold of social networks — survive the culture clash?

Edited to add, Monday, Jan. 30: a shorter version of this piece appeared as a Digital Savant column in today’s American-Statesman.

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