Hawaii Geek Week

Mahalo to all the fascinating speakers, wonderful sponsors, and engaging participants that made Hawaii Geek Week such a success!   From Mactoberfest starting things off, to Podcamp ending the week, it was a great way to get all the Web 2.0 social-networking, photo-taking, blogging geeks together to highlight how technology is really changing our lives in some remarkable ways, right here in Hawaii!

Now, what about next year…?!

Friday and Saturday (24 and 25th) are Podcamp/Wordcamp Hawaii, in the Hawaii Convention Center.   Lots of great sponsors have come together to help make this event really special!   Add to this a great line up of speakers, including Matt Mullenweg, Congressman Neil Abercrombie, and Neenz Faleafine, on a wide variety of topics such as; Using Video to Build Community, Podcasting tips for Musicians & Bands, and Using Social Networks & Managing Privacy, and you’ve got two great days of networking, learning, and fun!

Check out the complete schedule for the event and be sure to register!   There’s even prize giveaways, and a Beach BBQ planned for Saturday night!   See you there…

Wednesday was the Web Weavers Workshop with Lorelle VanFossen, part of Hawaii’s Geek Week.   About 40 students had a great chance to learn the tricks and tips of successful blogging from Lorelle along with the hands-on steps of setting up a free Wordpress blog site.   All of the students received a copy of Lorelle’s book, Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won’t Tell You About Blogging.

A large part of the class was designed to help each student come up with understanding what the purpose of their blog really is, the categories/topics of their sites, and even working on some sample posts.   Along with this was Lorelle’s great tips as a power-blogger, including Firefox add-ons like GreaseMonkey to help speed up blog posting.

If you missed this special Web Weavers Workshop, be sure to subscribe to Lorelle’s web site feeds for lots more great information!  Thanks to HMAUS (Hawaii Macintosh & Apple Users’ Society) for putting this event together!

Saturday the 18th was the start of Hawaii Geek Week with Mactoberfest.   Lorelle VanFossen gave the Keynote on “How Wordpress Has Changed Lives” by giving a voice to millions of people through easy-to-use blogging software. (Lorelle will be teaching a class on blogging and Wordpress on Wednesday.)
Next up was a demonstration by Lorenz Sell of iLovePhotos, a face-recognition software application for Mac to help you tag and share your photos of friends and family.
Then John Dalton gave a demonstration of Studio Artist, allowing the user to “synthesize” images and movies in some really amazing ways.
After lunch, came the “Hawaii Geek Talk” with Burt Lum, Ryan Ozawa, Lorelle VanFossen, Neenz Faleafine, and Bob Lew. Discussions along with Q&A, plus the Door Prize giveaways, made for a very lively conversation!

If you missed it, or want to see what it was like, check out the iPhone to video captures that one of the audience created! (Thanks Edward!)

Don’t forget, there’s more cool Geek Week events coming up this week!

This year’s Hawaii Geek Week kicks off with Mactoberfest, on Saturday, October 18. Governor Linda Lingle will proclaim October 18 through 25 as Hawaii Geek Week. Yeah! A full week of geek.

Here’s an overview of the activities for this week long celebration:

On October 18th, for Mactoberfest, the keynote speaker this year will be noted technology blogger, WordPress evangelist, world traveler and professional photographer, Lorelle VanFossen. In the afternoon she will be joined by the co-hosts of Hawaii’s best radio show about technology, Burt Lum and Ryan Ozawa, of Bytemarks Cafe; Neenz Faleafine from Alltop; and Bob Lew, HMAUS’ long time friend and Apple evangelist. The morning session will include a presentation from Lorenz Sell on iLovePhotos and John Dalton on Studio Artist. Be sure to register for event early!

If you like photography and want to trade clicks with the best let’s do a Photo Walkabout with Lorelle. She’s a professional photographer who specializes in nature subjects. What better locale to do that than in Hawaii! That’ll be Sunday afternoon, October 19, and we’ll end the day relaxing and talking story over dinner somewhere in Honolulu. If you want in, be sure to sign up early!

If you want to really get a handle on your web site, your blog, or how to promote your web site then sign up for the all day hands-on Web Weavers Workshop with Lorelle on Wednesday, October 22. All students will be given a copy of Lorelle’s book “Blogging Tips, What bloggers won’t tell you about blogging.” Read more and register now: Web Weavers Workshop/.

Then, on Friday, October 24, Windward Community College will hold it’s free Tech Conference showcasing UH Community Colleges’ education and training programs, with Workshops and Presentations throughout the morning, along with door prizes and exhibitions!

The week hits a climax with the Hawaii Podcamp on October 24 & 25th . Meet with others at this “unconvention” and learn from others how to set up your blog site, where to host your video files, and where the best Web 2.0 applications are. There are several tracks: WordPress Blogging, Podcasting, Social Media, and Business Uses. FREE! Pre-registration required: www.podcamphawaii.com.