While I couldn’t be at Casecamp 7 recently, I saw an accordion as the still image for the video report from Rahaf Harfoush on Foush Reports on CaseCamp7 » ThomasPurves.com.

Let’s see, unconference in Toronto, dealing with tech … well it has to be Joey deVilla.

Yep, of course it was.

Great video.  Man I wish I could make it to more events like this.  Vancouver seems so, so far away sometimes.

As I arrived in Vancouver on Wednesday, I got an email from Keith of CoverItLive giving me a heads up on some new features that are now live…and these features rock!

If you’re a CIL user you might have received the email from Keith, but if you didn’t here are the new features:

New Features:

• Quick Launch:  If you are covering breaking news or just need to start live blogging ASAP, Quick Launch (in the My Account section) let’s you launch a live blog immediately.  Just paste the Viewer Window on your blog and start.
• Panelist/Producer (multi-authored live blogging):  A much requested feature, “Can I have more than one author on my live blog?”.  Now, it’s as simple as sending an email to your Panelists (people who will ONLY write commentary) or Producers (people who can do everything you can do including approve reader comments and launch multimedia).  Very useful for live blogs with big readership or for running a Q&A session.
• ‘Always Allow’ Reader Comments:  Another popular request was to allow some reader comments to automatically publish without moderation.  Great for trusted readers or new readers who have great insights to share with everyone else.  This takes some of the burden off the writer of the live blog.  A maximum of 10 readers can be classified as ‘Always Allow’ per live blog (because more than that, and the live blog will become unwatchable for all of the disjointed commentary).
• Standby Mode:  Instead of launching several different live blogs to cover multi-day or long events, users can now put their live blog into Standby Mode.  This lets them take long breaks and disconnect, then come back any time within 48 hours to continue.  While in Standby, their readers can catch up on what has happened so far.  A great feature for conference attendees or ‘all day sports’ live blogs.  When you combine this feature with the new Panelist feature, round the clock coverage becomes simple.  Standby Mode will also automatically activate if a user has been disconnected for 30 consecutive minutes.
• Edit Completed Live Blogs:  Great for fixing typos or deleting unwanted entries.  Go to My Account/Completed Live Blogs and clean up your completed live blog.  All changes are immediately published in your Instant Replay.
• Download Completed Live Blogs:  For those who would rather store their live blogs locally, go to My Account/Completed Live Blogs and download your live blog for posting on your site.
• Syndication:  Although CoveritLive live blogs could always be syndicated to other sites and blogs, we have never really talked about this feature.  If you have other sites willing to ‘carry’ your live blog, simply give them the embed code (the code you paste on your site) to paste on theirs.  This lets them keep their readers on their own site while opening up your live blog to a wider audience.  Imagine sharing live blogs across a blog network or across multiple newspaper sites.

Chatting with folks at SXSW about CIL–I never pass up a chance to talk it up–some folks didn’t know that you could download the code and others wanted to be able to edit the post later.  Well the editing is there.  The download is there.  The multi-author capabilities, wow, that adds a whole new aspect to live blogging.  Imagine having a group of people live blog the same session or panel.  Talk about a range of perspectives!  I think I have to try this at my next conference.

CoverItLive just keeps raising the bar, imho, for live blogging.  Also in the email from Keith is some techie facts that their pure AJAX interface is now augmented with some HTTP streaming so they can handle hundreds of thousands of connections to your live blog (oh I wish I were that popular).

There are hints at the end of the email that they are working on ways to integrate CIL with popular apps and blogging platforms.  I’m hoping for a WP and WLW plugin to make the Quick Launch even quicker.

One of the misconceptions that I think people have about CIL and live blogging is that you have to write short bits, stream of consciousness blogging.  Totally not true.  I mix it up when I blog with stream of consciousness and more thoughtful things.

At SXSW blogging the online advertising panel, I found another really cool part of CIL…questions for the panel/speaker from readers!   Sam Harrelson asked several questions through CIL that I was able to ask for him, and type back the answers.

Keith was keeping the future plans close to his vest, but I’m sure I can drag something out of him soon enough.

What are you waiting for to try CIL?

I’m heading to SXSW in the morning.  But before I do, and before I start my SXSW coverage, oh yes there will be blogging–and pictures!, wanted to mention the recent news about LearnHub:

• LearnHub.com launches - Teach and Learn Online | StartupNorth
• Victoria Start-ups get Press | Techvibes Blog
• LearnHub Launches, looks great » ThomasPurves.com

I gave LearnHub a quick look today–not nearly long enough I think–and read the coverage and I’m pretty interested and intrigued.  You all know that I’m a big advocate of not only life-long learning, but also leveraging technology to make education more accessible to all.  From what I’ve seen so far, it looks like LearnHub has a lot to offer.  Its model, at least on the surface, is similar to OneBigU.  Granted OneBigU focuses on answering specific questions and LearnHub is about courses, but the idea is that people contribute to the learning of all.

Crowdsourcing education–sounds good to me.

I got a cool e-mail from the team at FreshBooks this morning.  Wait, cool email from the company you send invoices through?  Umm, Tris what’s in your coffee, buddy, you might be thinking.  Well first I like to hear from the companies and services I use and support.  Especially when I get tips, tricks and a little behind the scenes information.  The FreshBooks Supper Club, launched today, is a nice little notice.  Couple tips, a customer spotlight (and who doesn’t like that), and a bit of tongue-in-cheek talk about their upcoming road trip:

That being said we at FreshBooks are not quitters. Once we put our mind to something we pretty much run with it… so we have rented us a pretty sweet “large” RV and will be driving from The Future of Web Apps conference (February 29 – March 1, 2008) in Miami, Florida all the way to South by Southwest (March 7–11, 2008) in Austin, Texas with some very clear goals:

Meet as many users as we can, introduce the “south” to FreshBooks and what we offer, eat a Texas-sized donut, eat a country fried steak, get interviewed on a small town “morning show” (I am looking at you WPMI in Mobile, Alabama), pick up a hitchhiker, and of course, we want to be elected POTUS. Source: FreshBooks is hitting the campaign trail!

I’ve done that drive.  Well a lot of it anyway.  Lots of cool stuff to see (I did Virginia to New Mexico when I was in the Scouts).  Guys, let me tell you, Texas is a lot bigger than it looks!  The trek is supposed to be a faux Presidential race, however none of them can run for office–but I can.  Hmm, maybe I could be the FreshBooks nominee for President?

The FreshBooks team has also started tweeting, follow them on Twitter, hmm wonder was a twitter invoice would be.  “Give me money, please” in 140 characters or less.  Yeah sure.  Now do you do that as an @ reply or DM?

I attended the first mesh back in 2006 (still have the t-shirt too!), but missed last year’s mesh.  I don’t think I’ll make the same mistake twice.  The dates were announced on the mesh blog and on the blogs of the organizers Mark, Mathew, Rob, and Stuart.  While the conference itself is sure to be interesting and exciting, I think meshU could be the most fun of the conference…

We’ve been getting bombarded with emails about this year’s conference, with many of those coming from people wanting to block the dates out in their calendars. So without further ado, here they are: mesh 2008 is scheduled for May 21 and 22. Info on ticket prices, keynotes, panelists etc. will be coming soon. So book those dates!

In addition to mesh, we’re also planning a little something extra – something we think (and hope) will meet a growing need in Toronto: the need for practical, down-to-earth information about tools, knowledge and expertise for startups, web designers and developers of all kinds.

What we have in mind is a one-day event – which we’re tentatively calling meshU – that will be filled with small, focused workshops by those who have earned their stripes in the startup game; people who can talk knowledgeably about everything from interface design to using Amazon’s S3 distributed server network.

This one-day event – which is scheduled for May 20th, the day before mesh – will be taking shape over the next few months, and we’re hoping you can help program it by telling us what kind of content you want and/or need. Source: mesh blog » Book those mesh 2008 dates, and get ready for meshU

I’ve found that when I go to conferences there a lots of folks who really want to roll up their sleeves and get into the nitty gritty of the topics.  People who want to improve their skills in all the different facets of social media.  Of course if you know what you what to learn hands-on before the conference then you’re set.

I wonder how many folks might be interested in sessions after the conference to dig into things…Okay maybe not, I’m pretty wiped after a conference.

Regardless, I’m looking forward to mesh08!