Anticipation!

So, I'm pretty excited about next week; I get to run off to New York to go to O'Reilly Media's Tools of Change for Publishing conference, which will run from February 9-11. I'm footing the bill myself, which is somewhat painful, but fortunately I have a good friend with a spare bedroom in Brooklyn (as hard as that is to believe), so at least I won't have to pay extortionate hotel rates. The conference looks like it should be a blast: some of my favorite authors/editors will be there giving talks, as will plenty of notables in the publishing community. There should be plenty of opportunity to try to figure out where our industry is going, and also to meet some neat people. Who knows, maybe I'll even be eble to get some leads on some post-graduation work!

There are a ton of courses available at the conference, and I still haven't entirely figured out what I'm going to be taking; some of them are no-brainers, but others--well, sometimes it's tough to figure out which is the one I most want. So far, it's looking like:

Introduction to XML for Publishers: Without a doubt. This one is key for me, since one of the things that I want to do in my time as Digital Content Manager is get Ooligan using XML.

XML in Practice: Formats, Tools, and Techniques: This is part two of the previous class.

The next morning, I'll be listening to Bob Stein, mostly just to pass some time. Don't tell him that though, okay?

Then comes Literature as a (Web) Service, which is right up my alley.

Cory Doctorow is next, and that should be great--he's a fantastic author and has some really interesting things to say about intellectual property.

The course on the Google book search program is pretty much mandatory for me, particularly as it's being given by a guy from Google who heads the Boston Book Search team.

After that, it's still more fun with Google, this time from a bit more of a publisher's perspective.

And then there's lunch.

For the next section, I'm a little torn between going to the course on The Rise of Ebooks or the one on Adobe's Digital Publishing tools. I'm leaning towards the former, as I'm worried the latter will mostly just be an infomercial, but we'll see.

There's a talk on how publishers can take advantage of mobile phones, then one that explores what the future will look like for publishers, and then the serious part of the day winds down with a reception. After that there are some informal roundtables and demos, and then it's back to bed in Brooklyn.

The final day starts with a selection of keynotes, and then faces me with another choice: a Survey of Current E-Readers or Unleashing the Power of the Unbound Book? I lean towards the latter, as the former seems more utilitarian than inspirational. Plus, I'm of the opinion that dedicated ebook readers will not be around for too long, anyway, which means the stuff I would learn would be more short-term than not.

Lessons from a Book's Simultaneous Publication in Print and on the Web is a hugely long title, but should still be a pretty interesting talk, so I'll be checking that out.

My next choice is between a talk about retaining traditional publishing values in ebooks and one about wikibooks that anyone can edit. This one is a bit of a stumper; maybe I'll flip a coin.

The final few classes are on success stories and failures in digital publishing, what you do with a site with massive readership, and a talk from the guy who started NaNoWriMo.

So yeah, that should be a pretty crazy few days. I'll post some updates from the conference about the awesome stuff I learn, so stay tuned!