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2010 SXSW Interactive Memorable Moments

Posted April 12, 2010 By Nick Weynand |

2010 was another great year at the SXSW Interactive conference. Most of our team got a break from the daily grind to attend the annual festivities, which included classes, workshops and roundtables as well as after-hours events.

I asked my team members, “What were the most memorable moments of this year’s conference?” Here are the responses I received:

Nick Weynand (that’s me)

The most memorable moment for me was a session called “Pain Free Design Signoff” by Paul Boag, a Web designer from the UK. During the hour-long session, Paul touched on different aspects of the Web design process and how to improve each one, both for the designer and the client. The most profound thing he said was that roles should be defined clearly at the beginning stages of the project. In his words, “the client’s role is to find problems, the designer’s role is to find solutions.” We’ll use many of Paul’s ideas to improve our own process.

I also attended a memorable session called “Prototyping Web Apps” by Google designers Darren Delaye and Michael Leggett. During the session, the speakers presented several methods that they use to accurately demonstrate Web application interfaces at Google. I picked up some great tips that will help us be more successful demonstrating interface designs to our clients.

And finally, another memorable moment for me was eating Nuclear Tacos. They were a bit spicier this year and I was only able to stomach one of them.

Caroling Lee

My most memorable moment this year had to be the two-part session, “The Right Way to Wireframe”. It was one of the rare opportunities to get an inside look at how people work when it comes to wireframing. Led by Todd Zaki Warfel and Russ Unger, they put together some time-lapsed videos of their wireframing processes from start to finish using a pro-bono project they were doing with a non-profit. Each person approached the process differently, used different tools and had different (both successful) outcomes. In the end, I think the take-away was that there are many different answers to the same question, and that each Information Architect, Project Manager, or User Experience Designer brings something different to each project during this planning phase. Final thought: SKETCH before you do anything!

And I have to say that the second most memorable moment had to be the Mashable party, where Pete Cashmore arrived to a sea of adoring fans on the dance floor. Who knew?

Finally, I would have to say that Kyle’s dancing was the most memorable TradeMark moment. Can’t ever get enough of that…(I have a video if you want).

Kyle Greenan

My most memorable moment was Way Cool Map Scripting. It was really exciting to see different data being pulled in and used in combination with maps. You can create very useful and informative maps just by adding bits of data, from photos at specific locations, to even friends currently in a given area. As more and more companies share their data with APIs the future of map scripting can only get better and even more interactive.

Mike Wisian

I know that we attended an interactive conference, but my favorite panel featured the group, DEVO. The synthtastic band did a panel on how they are using the Web to better market their band, but I quickly discovered much of it was a satire of our field (especially toward social media types). Want a say in Devo’s new album? Take their song study at http://www.clubdevo.com/ and do your part in optimizing the fireball!

Manoj Thomas

My favorite session at the conference this year was one that I didn’t even have on my schedule – “Mapping and Geolocation: Turnkey Approaches You Need to Know”. Joe Stump from SimpleGeo (and formerly Digg) led a great conversation and shared some exciting ideas about location-based technologies. The ability to garner geodata opens up a slew of options for generating user-specific content, but the obvious issues involving the lack of privacy will continue to be a fuel for heated debates.

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