Ignite Seattle 14 Speaker Line Up

Has it been almost 4 months already? We’ll be posting all the videos from Ignite 13 very soon, but we’re super excited to tell you who is speaking at Ignite Seattle 14, on May 18 at the King Cat Theater!

We have a little surprise for the next Ignite Seattle. Don’t worry, we’re still doing 5 minute lightning talks, but we’ve shortened our line up to feature something special. The only trick is, we can’t tell you what it is, (although we may drop a few hints between now and then).

Without further ado, we present the speakers for Ignite Seattle 14

Ignite Seattle 14 Speaker List

Mehal Shah (mehals) Sociopathic Boardgaming: Fun for everyone.
You like board gaming, but lately the fun has gone out for you. Maybe you have a closet full of board games that never get played anymore. Maybe you have an hyper-competitive jackass attending your board game nights, who you feel ruins the fun for everyone. Maybe you just hate following a bunch of silly rules in your games and the fun goes away after half an hour. Let’s re-examine what makes board gaming great and see how we can modify existing games to make them fun again, and how turning up the hostility is often the best way to turn up the fun.

Sarah Novotny (sarahnovotny) living the OG lifestyle – Original Geek, that is
geeks have lead the most recent evolution of our society and some do it better than others. i’ve been incredibly curious about how geek praxis outside of a professional setting has contributed to geek success and would like to share a few ways i’ve found that geeks harness their obesssions and obsessive natures for fun and profit.

As a young geek i know said “feel free to make fun of me now, i’ll forgive you and maybe even hire you when we’re adults”.

Scott Ruthfield (scottru) How to Go to Kindergarten
When I was a kid, you started Kindergarten down the street, or maybe the Catholic school a few blocks away. Today, though, Seattle parents have an incredibly complex system of both public and private schools – and parents don’t know how to navigate it (or that there’s even anything to navigate).

If you might have a kid entering Kindergarten someday, and you’re the kind of person who builds a 10-column spreadsheet to pick the next flat screen TV, you might want to know how this process works – and how to optimize for your own family.

Nathalie Molina Niño (globalmisfit) Life lessons from a [recovering] Alpha Male
Since launching her first internet dot com at 21, Nathalie’s been neck deep in high-tech, masculine, start up juice. She recently left Seattle, her dream home and a $100M business she helped found in order to chill out, meditate and continue her path as a recovering Alpha Male in relaxing New York City. During her first return to her beloved Seattle as a special guest at SIFF 2011’s opening GALA, hear Nathalie as she comes out publicly about her personal experience as a global business misfit and how it took nearly killing someone for her to realize she needed to rethink how businesses work.

Geoff Smith (lookatlao) How To Shoot Better Food Porn
Why: With the advent of food-focused social media and celebrity chef bloggers—not to mention understaffed magazines—food photography is everywhere. Everybody is taking photos of what they eat and very few are doing it right.

What: I would like to identify the four major enemies of good food porn and offer simple solutions on how to avoid them. The presentation will show real-world examples of failed attempts at shooting good food porn and the necessary steps and equipment needed—both purchased and improvised—to make your food porn better.

This presentation will be funny and informative and there will be immediate take aways as well as a few hints on how to take things to the next level for those so inclined.

Teresa Valdez Klein (TeteSagehen) The art of subvertising on Facebook
All of us have been conditioned from birth by our families, our friends, and marketers to want (or not want) certain things. And while I’m a big fan of Facebook, I have this theory that it reinforces social conditioning in some pretty insidious ways.

In this talk, I’ll explain how I used Facebook’s self-serve advertising platform to combat the social pressure cooker.

Dominic Holden (dominicholden) The Tunnel

Erica May (ericaannemay) How Social Games about Farms Ruin Your Life
Do you sit at work saving up your virtual currency for a Shetland Pony? Do you create Facebook profiles for your cats, dogs & infants just so that you can ensure your crops are properly hydrated? What has our world become when people actually decorate their virtual barns for Christmas? Did you pre-order Farmville for Dummies on Amazon.com? Let’s take a peak at the illusive look at how virtual farms are ruining your life and pretty much the entire planet one virtual seed packet at a time.

See you there

Mark your calendars – May 18th, 2011, King Cat Theater. Doors open at 7pm, talks start at 8.

Our friend Tom Music has passed away

Tom Music – a great human being and a dear friend of Ignite Seattle – passed away last night.

Tom went into the hospital about a month ago. It looked like things had turned around, but then they took a turn for the worse.

Friends will be gathering this Friday for a vaguely Irish-style wake in Tom’s honor. Jana, Tom’s wife, has details on that over here. She’ll also be posting details there about the pending memorial service for Tom when they firm up.

Again, here’s Tom delivering one of the best Ignite talks we’ve ever hosted.

Mousetrap Car Workshop this Weekend

We’re having our final Mousetrap Car Workshop this weekend. On Sunday night, from about 7 to 11, we’ll be down at Metrix Create:Space building mosuetrap cars. You’re welcome to bring your own supplies, mousetraps, whatever. We will have some construction items on hand. RSVP in the comments or on the Facebook page if you can make it.

In case you can’t get down to Metrix Sunday night, there are some supplies that will be available at Metrix throughout the week – just ask the staff. We’ll also have some kits on hand at Ignite on Thursday. Happy building!

Ignite Seattle 13 – Tonight!

Whew. Ignite Seattle 13 is TONIGHT at 7pm at the King Cat Theater in downtown Seattle. Lots of good submissions, lots of deliberations and debates, but finally, read more for the speaker list for Ignite Seattle 13.

This week is also Global Ignite Week (along with 60+ other Ignites around the world). As a part of GIW, Ignite Seattle is trying to raise money for local education projects via Donor’s Choose. At Ignite we’ll be handing out donation cards that can be applied. Once you get a card you’ll be able to apply the amount to any of these projects (feel free to go there now and check them out).

It’s a bit of a competition between 9 other Ignites. You can see how we are doing compared to everyone else by clicking here.

See you tonight!

Continue reading “Ignite Seattle 13 – Tonight!”

The Next Ignite Challenge

In honor of Global Ignite Week, we’re trying something a little amibitious – mousetrap car races! For the Ignite Challenge, we will be pitting cars against each other to see who can get across the King Cat stage fastest.

Enter as a team or an individual. You are encouraged to build your car ahead of time – heck, you could even bring multiple cars. We’ll be holding two workshop nights at Metrix Create:Space in Capitol Hill – Sunday, January 16th and Sunday, January 30th. Some materials will be provided, but you can bring whatever you want, so long as the mousetrap is the sole source of power. For those that prefer to wait until the last minute, you will also have a chance to build a car at Ignite Seattle on February 10th.

So get cracking! There’s tons of resources on the web, including a fantastic instructables.com how-to. Thirty seconds of Googling should help you find some of the tips and tricks. Remember, we’re building for speed, not distance. Check back on this blog over the next month for updates.

Submit Your Talk for Ignite Seattle 13

Our next Ignite Seattle will be February 10th, 2011 and it will be a part of the 2nd Annual Global Ignite Week. Last year, Global Ignite Week was held in 65 cities on 6 continents and featured over 500 speakers. Submissions are now open and we’d love to have you speak at our next Ignite. Submissions are due by January 10th, although earlier submissions are encouraged!

If you’d like to spread the word about open submissions through Social Media, you can use this bit.ly link: http://bit.ly/5XPH1

We’ve heard some people say they always want to come to the event, but they forget as the date approaches. If this sounds like you, take a second and sign up for our Ignite Seattle Newsletter, and we’ll make sure you don’t forget. 🙂

Ignite Seattle 12 is Tonight!

Tell your friends! Ignite Seattle 12 is tonight! 7pm at the King Cat Theater. It’s $5 at the door, and there’s a bar. Be sure to get there on time, as there’s a great team-based ice-breaker game planned before the talks.

In case you missed the speaker announcement, here are the speakers and their topics (in no particular order):

Scott Berkun (berkun) How to write well, instantly, ever time
There is talk of the death of writing, but writing is everywhere: in email, Facebook, text messages, we write now more than ever. It’s true much of it is bad, but we’ve mostly sucked at writing for as long as we’ve had words. Berkun, author of a popular blog and three bestselling books, will explain all you need to know about writing essays, books, blogs and everything else, in 5 short minutes.

Emily Chen (tenshiemi) Paring Life: Have Less, Live More
Last year I did an end of the year apartment purge of everything I considered junk. When I returned home from Value Village I was shocked by how much stuff I still had. I experienced a flash of inspiration and decided to commit myself to getting rid of something every day for a year. Every item is posted on my blog and free to any requester. I’m now over two hundred days in and I would like to share what I’ve learned along the way and strategies for optimizing your possessions for happier living.

Gregory Heller (gregoryheller) SCRUM Project Management For Wedding Planning
What happens when two people with project management experience decide not to hire a wedding planner and instead run their wedding planning through a modified SCRUM project management process? Certified SCRUM master, Gregory Heller will share his experience and lessons learned. Consider this a geek’s guide to planning the perfect wedding.

Mandy Sorensen (mandercrosby) Fleas, worms, and other nasty parasites: what they are, and why should you care?
Sure you’ve got a dog or cat at home. Are you sure you don’t also have a small population of nature’s most industrious little buggers hiding in your carpet or in your yard? Odds are, you do and you just don’t know about it. What you should know about the most common creepy crawlies out there.

Phil Thompson – Chemistry of the Cocktail
The chemistry and history of the cocktail, the flip.

Buster Benson (busterbenson) Virtual goods can improve the quality of your real life experiences
I’m building a social game, Health Month (healthmonth.com). As gamification has gained popularity, there has been a lot of discussion about whether or not points/badges/etc cheapen experience, lose value over time, or just simply ruin everything.

Alissa Mortenson (foolissa) Making Collaborative Art that Doesn’t Stuck

Adam Philipp (mypatents) How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Software Patents
Its seems there is nothing more reviled in geekdom than the software patent. It is lambasted from the left and the right from the ivory tower to the grass roots. It seems that it is singlehandedly to blame for the colossal failure of all progress in the field of computer science and stifles innovation and development of all the best products.

Beth Buelow (coachbethb) 5 Reasons Introverts Rock the Business World
The myth: Introverts are shy, socially backward and quite possibly all serial-killers-in-waiting.

The truth: Introverts are among the most famous, wealthy and successful people on the planet.

A five-minute look at what happens when introverts unleash their super-powers in the business world and beyond (and how to tell if YOU might be a member of Club Introvert).

Ellen Kowalczyk (elleliz) Got a minute?
Does your work / life balance look more like work / work / life balance? Feel like you’re constantly behind? Forget and lose track of the important things you meant to do? I’ll share a few ways to get back in control of your time and be more successful and more relaxed at the same time.

James Callan (scarequotes) Five big things grammar nazis get wrong about language
So sometimes you use “it’s” where you should’ve used “its.” Unfortunate? Yes. A sign that the sky is about to collapse all over our precious English language? Contrary to what a persnickety bunch of chicken littles would have you believe, no. Language is an art and a science, and grammar nazis need to be fiercely resisted as they browbeat us all with their ignorance of both.

Joel Grus (joelgrus) How to Be Funny
It’s easy to be popular if you’re rich, or good-looking, or good at sports. But the rest of us have to be funny if we want people to like us. Acclaimed writer, humorist, and data analyst Joel Grus has spent years of research and experimentation uncovering the basic principles of humor. In this 5-minute talk, he’ll teach you how to master these principles and make people laugh.

Karen Cheng (karenxcheng) How to Solve a Song
It’s happened to all of us – you hear a song that you don’t want to like. You try to resist, but you can’t. By the end of the song, you’re tapping your foot and singing along. Why are some songs so irresistibly catchy?

I used to think it was magic. But when I looked closer, I had an epiphany – It’s actually just math. Songs are catchy because they’re scientifically engineered to be that way. I’ll show you how.

Upcoming Tech Events in Seattle

Here are a few upcoming tech events in Seattle. If you’ve got a geek event that you think might interest the Ignite Seattle crowd, let us know!

Tonight!

Seattle Tech Startups
This month’s topic: Monetizing Your Product

  • Chris Hopf, Pricewire.com: Understanding Freemium – How to Create and Grow Paying Customers
  • Tony Wright, RescueTime: Making Money with a Software Startup: In the Trenches.

Next Week

Social Media Club Seattle – August 18th
From the SMC Seattle site

This month’s Social Media Club Seattle meet-up is coming up, and we hope you’ll join us on August 18th in Seattle at the HL2 offices. This month’s SMC Seattle event includes a memorable social media discussion with Brad who tweets from @Starbucks, Elliott who tweets from @AlaskaAir, and Frank who tweets from @ComcastCares. We’ll have an hour-long program and plenty of time for networking and sharing social media best practices.

Great presentations and networking for the social media set.

Gnomedex – August 20-22nd
Chris Pirillo and the Gnomedex crew put on a heck of show every year here in Seattle and this year is no exception. This year’s speakers include two Ignite alumni, Beth Goza and Amber Case (Ignite Portland) as well as Ignite founder, Bre Pettis. Other speakers include Chris Brogan, Drew Olanoff (#BlameDrewsCancer), and Mark Glaser.

Gnomedex is the premiere geek event in Seattle

Tech Calendars

Having trouble keeping up with the latest local events? Here are a few local calendars that can help keep you up to date.