I have a huge giveaway today. Huge. Freaking enormous. I’m really excited about it.
As part of my media partnership with O’Reilly Tools of Change, I’ve been given a conference code good for free registration for the 2010 Tools of Change in Publishing Conference, being held February 23 through 24, 2010 in New York City. The conference registration online is $1,245.00 US (See? I told you it was rather huge) and if you try to pay at the door, it’s $1345.00. Conference registration includes:
Access to:
* all sessions (Tuesday – Wednesday)
* all keynote presentations
* Exhibit Hall
* all on-site networking events
* all Roundtable sessions
* Lunch (Tuesday – Wednesday)
Tools of Change in Publishing was brain candy of the finest order for me last year, and I’m hopping excited to be on the agenda this year as well. If you’re interested in digital publishing, curious about the technology and the software being developed to meet the demands of a changing industry, from the publishing of digital books to the reading thereof, this is, to put it in gross understatement, a big opportunity.
In addition to the schedule of events, there are also project demonstrations, vendor product showcases, and a bar scene of such magnificent awesome it might rival the bar at RWA Nationals.
One amazing thing about the ToC website: when you register, you enter a conference-specific network where you can flag people you’d like to meet, customize your schedule, and generally squeeze every last opportunity for interaction and learning out of the conference itself. You get the entirety of the conference, as well as the chance to customize your own map through the sessions and activites. The opportunity for connection is unreal.
Disclaimers and assorted whatnot: This giveaway is ONLY for the coupon code which will create a free registration for one (1) (una) person. It does not include hotel, airfare, incidentals, or any other costs associated with attending the conference, including but not limited to new shoes. I also cannot make any reservations for you. You get the code which will comp your registration, valued at $1245.00 US. I’m happy to answer questions, however, as I’m pretty familiar with Manhattan, and this conference in particular.
This coupon code was provided to me by O’Reilly as part of my media sponsorship of the 2010 Tools of Change in Publishing. I’m not being compensated for this giveaway. I do, however, smell like Teen Spirit. No animals were harmed in the making of this giveway. Handle with care. Alternate side of the street parking has been suspended. Objects may shift while in flight.
For more information about the conference, including travel details and hotel reservations, check out the Tools of Change 2010 Hotel and Travel page. Again, this giveaway is for the conference registration only.
What do you have to do to win? Easy: leave a comment, and tell me why you want to go. What session would you want to attend? What speaker would you be hopping over chairs to hear? (You so do not have to name mine – really. I know you want to hear Arianna Huffington or one of the other keynotes. I will select one comment at random to win the coupon code.
The comments will be open for 48 hours, or two full spins of the earth. Winner announced on Friday. Ready, set, be a tool – of change!
My favorite indulgence is to snuggle down in my bed with a hot romance novel and read it from cover to cover.
Awesome! Me me me! Choose me randomly!
This sounds fantastic, Sarah. Thanks for the giveaway. My very first ebook is coming out on February 19, so the timing is such that my head would surely rupture from all the information it’ll try to absorb on top of all the leftover excitement.
“Creating a Practical Social Media Strategy for Authors, Customers, and Colleagues: A Case Study” sounds particularly interesting to me, as I’ve been floundering around on the interwebs for a year now, trying to figure out what works and what doesn’t when it comes to creating as un-annoying a web presence as I can. Actually everything sounded interesting… I wish my husband could go, as he’s an Open Source software developer and he’d totally nerd out on dreams of merging our two professions through the magic of technology. Hmmm…
Erotica + Technology = Erology?
No, maybe not. Too close to something else pertaining to the nether bits. And Technologica sounds too much like an early 80s German electro band.
Wow—there’s a lot to love in that schedule. Please enter me in the drawing. I’m particularly interested in the sessions for authors (social media strategy, building author pages, etc.), the sessions on e-textbook use, and of course Sarah and Jane’s session!
I would absolutely LOVE to go. Holy buckets of chest hair, yes!
I’d be interested in attending Chris Brogan’s workshop “Book Promotion Off the Cuff.” As a midlist author, I’d love to educate myself in some new ways of promoting my books.
I’d also like to attend Kirsten Hamstra’s workshop “Creating a Practical Social Media Strategy for Authors, Customers, and Colleagues: A Case Study”. Social Media is such a fun way of interacting with readers that I’d like to hear some successful strategies.
But then, there’s just the best one of all: “Test Driving the Digital Reading Experience.” 😉 One thing I’ll admit is that ever since I bought an e-reader, I have bought far more books. I do think electronic sales will eventually outpace print sales. It will be interesting to watch!
This sounds like such a blast! I would love an excuse to come to NYC for a few days.
I think whomever has the most O’Reilly books on their shelves should get to go. Me, me, me! I bet I’m the only one here with O’Reilly’s first edition “Sed and Awk” book. They are the best, the absolute best, publishers out there when it comes to tech manuals.
On a serious note, it would be a wonderful opportunity to attend such an event. I work in a state university setting so $$ for conferences, travel, training and what not are limited.I think the biggest difficulty would be picking which seminars to attend. “Ebook contracts: Critical Terms and Lessons learned” , “Who needs you, Big Publishing?” – these two caught my eye immediately, but every hour looks packed with informational stuff.
I admit, I read this and drooled a [s]lot[/s] little with the thought of seeing and hearing all these amazing people listed on the TOC website. I’m coming out of lurkdom here to try my hand; attending this conference would be amazing!
Combining my tech geek self with my dorkish love of books and my nerdy love for businesses setups/organizational structures – oh baby. How could I not want to go? *discreetly wipes away more drool*
Which session? I want to go to all of them! I’m really interested in Nilofer Merchant’s workshop. I’d also love to get in on the sessions offered by Neera Khosla, Kassia Krozer, and Angela James.
What speaker would you be hopping over chairs to hear? – … Besides those I listed above, I’d be hopping over chairs and leaping over people to hear Ramy Habeeb (1001 Arabian Rights sound amazing).
Seriously, congrats to whoever wins the pass. Thanks for sharing such a great opportunity, Sarah!
Ooooh! Please pick me randomly!
I’m a city librarian, and our city has suspended all travel due to the recession, which means no conferences. I could swing the airfare and hotel if I won the drawing. And I would love to humbly represent my profession in the world of ebooks, where sometimes I think no one is thinking of the libraries *sob*.
It all sounds good. But the chance to meet the Smart Bitches in person – yowza!
I’ll throw my hat in the ring! I’ve been working on a research project about this very thing for a few months now, and would love to expand my knowledge! The Impact of P2P File Distribution on Paid Content Sales looks incredibly interesting, but so does Rewriting Journalism, Open Source Models, Software, and Workflows. It might help me out with my next freelance piece!
Also, of course, I’d love to see you talk, and actually ask you some questions face to face instead of faceless to faceless. 😛
Thanks for giving us this opportunity, Sarah! I should stop being amazed at how awesome SBs are.
My word today is foreign88 – how does it know that I’m a foreigner? Creepy.
Oh my goodness—I would be so thrilled to be able to attend. I’m starting a master’s program in fiction writing this year, and this conference would be *perfect* to start things off right. As an aspiring novelist, I can’t imagine how many learning (and networking!) opportunities I’d have—-and I’d never be able to afford it myself.
Please oh please pick me randomly!
I’d like to go myself, but I’m wondering if I can nominate someone else. A member of my board (mobileread), Nate, really wants to go but can’t afford the registration. We were trying to raise money to get him to go but unfortunately we are all poor from buying our cool gadgets. He attends most conferences, including CES this year (and I believe he was at the Kindle 2 announcement). He does a wonderful job reporting on our site, and has been doing the ebook thing since the beginning. I’ve met him personally, and he’s a very nice guy with enough ebook devices to start a museum.
You can check out his blog at http://natesebooknews.com I’m n.ot sure if he’s what your looking for to go, since he’s not involved in the romance community, but he’s always respectful and his reporting is clear and concise.
Sooooo…vote for Nate! PS- I’m not telling him I’ve mentioned him here unless you want me to.
Oh, wow. This conference sounds amazing. Ariana Huffington? Yes! Digital publishing of government documents for easy public access? YES! Session with one of you guys from Smart Bitches? Hell yes!
Also, I’m a college-student wannabe-novelist, I’ve never been to New York, and I’m desperate to know more about the publishing world in general, especially its future in relation to the internet and multimedia.
Pick me and earn my eternal gratitude, love and devotion. Oh wait, you’ve already earned some of that just for what you’ve done to that asshat Bill Napoli, and Amazon after they pulled that “Amazon Rank” B.S. because Google bombing is some of the coolest internet-media guerrilla warfare I’ve ever heard of. Well––you’ll get even more of that gratitude and devotion, et cetera.
Oh how I wish!!!
But no way I can afford getting to NY any time soon.
Best of luck to those who can—and may the winner make the MOST of the opportunity!
Holy Change this is huge! Please enter me. This is all so interesting. I’d love to attend you and Jane’s session and hear Angela. I’m also a huge Huffington post fan so to hear Arianna Huffington speak would be amazing.
WOW! What a fantastic gift! This is amazing!
Reading got me started writing. Writing keeps me going for readers. Readers feed me daily with their information, opinions and insights. Insights give me more information for my writing which leads me back to more reading for research for the writing. Whew! Reading . . . writing. . . my life!
GL
Please put me into consideration. Thanks.
I love your site and got here through @younglibrarian on twitter
This sounds fabulous, I’d love to be entered to win! Thank you for the opportunity and keep up the good work and cussin’ 😉
xoxo
I want to attend TOC because some of the brightest minds in the industry will be there and I really believe the saying, “you are what you eat….” At first glance I would like to attend Patry and Kurzweil’s events the most….THANKS FOR THE OPPORTUNITY TO POSSIBLY ATTEND !!!!!
Holy cats—the e-reading experience, textbooks, pricing and sales . . . and a chance to hear people who are exploring rather than cowering in fear. What a great opportunity!
Wow, how fabulous! I’m someone who works for a publisher that is just starting to dip their toe into the epub world (how frustrating is that for me? but the world of academic publishing moves much more slowly).
I’m on the committee tasked with determining policy, procedure, etc for the epub portion of our program. I didn’t get to go to CES (I cried!) so this represents another opportunity for me to brush up on what’s happening around the epublishing world and get some insight into what’s coming down the road. I’m also the social media point person for the company (gee, I wonder why?).
Not that I have a long list of sessions I’d like to attend, but yeah. I’d have some decisions to make and prioritizing to do.
Practical Ebook Formatting: Limitations and Optimizations
Ebook Contracts: Critical Terms and Lessons Learned from Both Sides of the Table
Rich Media Roundup: Promising Projects, Emerging Standards
The Future of Digital Textbooks
Running Two Companies—Taking Book Publishing beyond Publishing Books
Essentials of Digital Books from the Consumer’s Point of View
How Academics and Students Use Ebooks: Evidence from the JISC National Ebooks Observatory Project
Rethinking Copyright for the Digital World
Creating a Practical Social Media Strategy for Authors, Customers, and Colleagues: A Case Study
Extending Your Content to Digital Format: How Your Technology Choices Can Make or Break the Consumers Experience
Optimizing the Book Discovery Experience
Going Beyond Ebooks: One Publisher’s Journey from a Book to Training, Print to Digital
Rethinking The Role and Funding of Academic Book Publishing
What a great contest and a great opportunity for someone! As a librarian, I am very interested in the publishing industry and how the trends and changes in publishing will effect the people I serve on a daily basis and the ways in which they read and how they experience and interact with all the different things they read.
This is an insanely awesome opportunity!
Looking at that scedule I can tell it’s going to be very hard to choose, but I definately want to attend the sessions with Kassia Krozser, Kat Meyer, Angela James and Malle Vallik. These presenations look great and I would love the opportunity to meet them personally instead of just on twitter.
As one of the test drivers, and HUGE lover of my Sony Reader, I would love to be there to hear your presentation on the Test Driving Experience. (No, that’s not just me sucking up) 🙂
As both a book blogger and an aspring writer, it looks like this conference would be a great opportunity!
What a great opportunity! I’ve lamented the price of TOC since it’s inception yet the geek in me saves pennies in hopes of one day attending. The Selling in Mobile Markets session jumped out at me right away.
Thanks!
I would very much like to go to listen and learn from the experts. Please enter me.
Hi! Thanks for the opportunity. Why do I want to go?Because I have written a BOOK. Because the editor to whom I have sent the BOOK has not gotten back to me in over a year (sent at his request too!) and I am giving up on “traditional slow as molasses” publishing. I want my book published and out there and I want this conference to show me how to do it. I am seriously pondering independent publishing and believe that e-publishing has vast potential for authors to bypass “slow as molasses” and become a start up businesses on their own. How do I use the e-tools to establish my own brand? How do I jump in the water to create a quality book format and how do I get the book into reader’s hands? I think this conference will help answer these questions. What speaker/event do I most want to see? Well, duh! “Who Needs You Big Publishing?” by Scott Sigler.
I also would love to attend the workshop “Building Author Pages.”
Writing the book seems to be merely half the battle! I need to learn how to use all this wonderful new technology to oevercome my natural reticence in talking about my projects and work. I think this workshop would be a good fit for me but I sincerely congratulate anyone who wins! Good Luck!
Sarah, you are an inspiration to us all!
Thanks for the chance, SBs!
I’d like to go because back in the day I went to many music conferences (and did conference planning for them, too), and have always been fascinated by the digital delivery of entertainment.
I would love to go!
Oh I’d love to go!!
I’m particularly interested in the “Ebook Contracts” and “Selling in Motion” panels. They dovetail into my line of (future) work quite well!
I’d very much like to be the winner for a couple of reasons. I’m a grad student on the verge of becoming employable, and I work in the digital humanities, so networking among these bodies would be incredibly helpful for my career. I’m right on the cusp of a new phase in my life, and I can’t help but think that attending this event would serve as a catalyst.
The sessions I’d most like to attend would be:
“The Future of Digital Textbooks” (I’m really curious about how we can take digital textbooks into classrooms which serve urban college student populations… or if we should. I’m on the fence. I’d love to hear where things are going from both a technological and a social change perspective—and you can’t think well about social change unless you understand the techie bits.)
The conversation with Kurzweil! (OMG!)
“Rethinking the Role and Funding of Academic Book Publishing” (something I have a vested interest in, since I’ve got to get published if I want tenure. I’m hoping that my generation of academics can be a force for positive change when it comes to publishing our material)
Also, Remy Habeeb’s talk! We don’t do enough thinking about digital publishing in languages other than English.
OK, now I’m totally squeeing over this whole darn line-up. Please send me!
You WOULD be my first pick, as I have never had the opportunity to see you in person. However, for a less suck-upy answer, I’d like to see Scott Sigler’s presentation: “Who Needs You Big Publishing.” Heck, I’d buy an audio broadcast of that presentation. Also, the law/tech nerd in me would really like to hear William Patry, “Law is Not a Business Solution.” REALLY like to hear that one.
Please do not choose me, for as much as I’d like to go, I can’t afford the airfare and hotel. But I wanna know this stuff, in an Angry Boner Man kind of way.
Is there or will there be any kind of collection of powerpoint slides/links/videos/etc. that we could read/download/purchase? TED would be a great model.
Writers are notoriously poor, funding has been cut to most libraries, even the publishers are hurting and probably cutting travel/conf. budgets, yet this info. is critical to all of us. A low cost (or dare I suggest…free?) version of the content available afterwards would serve to market the speakers, the conference, etc. to those of us who can’t afford the in-person.
Just a suggestion. Ok, a plea. On my knees, with my skirts becomingly disarranged…
Oh, I would love to go. There are so many amazing workshops. Here are just a few I would love to attend.
The Slow Marketing Movement: A Social Media Workshop for the Bookish
Publishing is Dead; Long Living Publishing
Running Two Companies—Taking Book Publishing beyond Publishing Books
A Different Model: Building a Digital Publishing House
Test Driving the Digital Reading Experience
and many, many more. It would be a very educational couple of days!
Oooooh, gods. Picture me writhing on the chair reading the schedule. Need.
Open Government Comes to the Department of State: The Office of the Historian’s Digital Publishing Revolution … okay, okay, not what you were expecting? But I was trained as an historian (and my advisor, in undergrad, used to describe himself as a “classic nineteenth-century narrative historian”, which meant, he said “telling stories” … me for telling stories (c.f. Ursula K. LeGuin, The Telling). And then I turned into a geek, and in particular an XML geek, and figuring out how to deliver this stuff in a format that’s not only readable, but that can be preserved for the long term … (oh, did I mention that I earned money in graduate school working in cataloging in the library?).
Kahle’s BookServer looks interesting, too, although I haven’t seen anyone propose the “Books for Life” sort of thing that I think we need to come down to, eventually.
I really wish that there were something in the menu on the e-reader software experience. I’ve got a PRS-700, and have stuck 40GB worth of memory into it (I’m nowhere *close* to filling that up). Even with the limited number that I own, though, finding things is a pain in the ass. C’mon, guys, search may not be a “solved” problem, but it’s not hard, for this environment; cataloging has by now centuries of experience; for presentation there are things like “cover flow” that any reference librarian worth her salt will tell you is going to find more books than any official cataloging ever would. None of this is on my reader. How come? How come there’s no one talking about finding books, once you own them?
There are a lot of other talks I’d like to see, but those are the ones that kind of turn my crank (well, at least one paragraph above is a whinge of mine that there is no presentation on the topic, rather than a mention of a talk … eh. Some of us just can’t be pleased, huh?).
Amy!
I’d like to enter! I’m an academic librarian, and the panels on ebooks, textbooks, copyright, and academic publishing look pretty fricking awesome. I would also lurve to hear Brewster Kahle speak, as I <3 the Internet Archive and its collection of ephemeral films.
Maura
Greetings,
My indulgence most often occurs when I get off work late. I find that a hearty trencher of over time helps to off-set all that calorie guilt. I happily scamper over to my super delicious, well lit, sorta authentic favorite Mexican restaurant for some chips, salsa, and a big fat burrito supreme smothered in what can only be described as divine green sauce that has to have a secret ingredient of crack. Yes, it’s that good. The icing on said crack sauce? A nice used romance novel fresh from the Paper Back Trader (the Mecca of used romance novels) Most recently Ice Blue by Anne Stuart.
That, ladies, is my Best. Indulgence. Ever.
Ooh, ooh, pick me, pick me!
I’ve worked in and around publishing for most of the last (gulp) eighteen years—as a bookseller, literary org administrator, managing editor, book designer, compositor, proofreader, and much, much more! Right now, though, I’m a starving graduate student at ITP, planning to do a thesis on something to do with electronic books. Although TOC offers a generous student discount, it’s reserved for those taking 12 credits or more, which I’m not doing in my last semester, as I have the aforementioned thesis to write.</sob story>
It’s tough to choose from all those events, but I’d definitely go to Joshua Tallent’s “Practical Ebook Formatting: Limitations and Optimizations” on Monday, and I’d love to see Liza Daly’s “Networked, Mobile, & Landlocked: Current Ereaders” on Tuesday. “Future-Proofing Your Content and Workflows,” also on Tuesday, sounds good, as does the plenary session “A Future for Books: BookServer” by Brewster Kahle.
On Wednesday, I would find some way to drag myself out of bed in time for “Form & Function: The Future of Reading Digital” (8:30 a.m.?!), and then I’d be fully awake by the time “Taking the Middle: How Independent Publishers Can Thrive in the Digital Age” and “Understanding the Ebook Consumer: The Results of the BISG Consumer Survey” rolled around.
It’s a torment to have all this going right in my front yard and not be able to attend.
I’m a web developer and travel blogger. I would love to go to the conference to find out what folks are saying about technology and content delivery. As a web developer I’m especially interested in Julie Baher talk about Form and Function.
Just checked with my husband to make sure the schedule would allow (on the offside chance I could win this thing), and I’ve got the green light, so here goes.
My first print book will be out this month. (I have a story in a print anthology, but this will be the first singular print birth.) I have five e-books currently available.
With a background in public relations (I was spokesperson for the City of Orlando), I’ve been steeped in old media, and over the last year I’ve been dragged (sometimes kicking and screaming but ultimately with great zeal) into the social media lexicon.
Looking over the amazing schedule, and knowing I have to choose 1 session and 1 person, I’ll put my favorites on a wheel and spin.
Okay, Scott Sigler’s “Who Needs You, Big Publishing?” gets the spin for who I’d like to hear, and “The Slow Marketing Movement: A Social Media Workshop for the Bookish” wins for conference session.
One request: Perhaps whoever wins could write a follow-up at SBTB on their experience? That would benefit everyone!
Thanks so much for this fabulous contest!
I’m the senior editor of a photography magazine, and my goal for the year is to bring some of our content into the mobile realm. I looked at the TOC site when you mentioned that you would be a speaker. It’s fantastic, I thought, but knew the budget couldn’t take the registration fee. If reg. was covered, we could manage hotel and airfare.
As previous readers have said, that lineup has so much to offer.
I need the copyright and legal information. I need to know more about app development. I need to learn how to make it pay for itself. I need this whole conference, and I’m ready to do it right.
On a personal level, I’d love to go to all the self-publishing, marketing and future of e-reader sessions. Maybe this is the year I can take my novel from the working version to ready-to-sell.
As a long-time book lover and penny-pinching recent English lit-majoring graduate, I have the requisite desperation, idealism and ambition that make for a promising tool of change myself. I have been yearning from afar and cursing my economic inability to throw myself into the bottom of the NYC-based publishing world ala Judith Jones in Paris (circa 1960s). I now toil in a mundane day job with a nominal editorial title to build my resume (after months of frantically applying to every and any publishing job), and work a restaurant industry job that pays living expenses. In my purported (non-blog surfing) ‘free’ time, I soothe my soul and provide my weary self with intellectual/creative stimulation by working at my beloved unpaid internship of the past two years (a small but brilliant and devoted literary agency focused on women’s commercial fiction, mysteries, romance, and YA fiction).
Before I saw this blog post, I reluctantly decided that, even with a non-profit discount, I couldn’t persuade my guilty, fiscally responsible (read: neurotic) conscience to part with enough money to go to this conference. Although the two marvelous, glorious days full of nerdy book talk and networking (and the promise of that bar!) made me weak at the knees, I couldn’t justify that much money on anything, considering I still have yet to buy a dresser for my first post-dorm flat, nor have I managed to do anything else that ‘grown-ups’ do, like get haircuts or see doctors (aside from my gynecologist) whose waiting rooms don’t have Highlights and lollipops to distract me. If you pick me, I will brave the Chinatown Express and shuttle between friends’ couches (from Brooklyn to Jersey City), and will use the saved hotel money to buy drinks after the roundtable events!
Although there are a million panels that I would love to see (Running Two Companies, Rethinking Copyrights, Essentials of Digital Books from the Consumer’s POV, Ten Secrets, 1,001 Arabian Rights, and especially Taking the Middle- eeee for Melville House, Softskull and Electric Literature!), I am also in it for the experience, and the learning, and the networking. I one day want to be an editor/literary agent, perhaps with a fiction/translational fiction bent or YA/Dark romance combo, and I really would love to keep growing and interacting, planning for the day when all the hard work will help me to be part of the great publishing shake-up.
Please enter me.
Wait. I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.
My publisher just turned me on to this. It brought out my first novel, The Rage of Achilles, in November. As an indie press author I’ve been rolling that big rock up the bigger hill to get placed in chains and otherwise distributed. This would be great for me. And because I’m in New haven this would be almost local.
Did I actually see the phrase “buckets of chest hair” somewhere up there? Hope I’ve got that image out of my head before I’m on my deathbed.
Best
Terry