According to the PAX forums, there’s probably at least 250 “New Arcadians” jumping on the Twitter train in anticipation of North America’s largest open gaming convention, the Penny Arcade Expo (PAX), taking place here in Seattle this weekend. I’ve noticed a bit of confusion, so I thought I’d post a few tips for attendees who are new to Twitter:

MASTER THE BASICS, YOUNG PADAWAN

Set your phone up on Twitter before you leave for PAX, and If you’re using Twitter by phone (SMS, specifically) learn the SMS commands. To post a tweet, just text it to 40404. Using me as an example, to be my Twitter friend you’d “tweet” follow firewallender. To publicly mention me in a message or reply to me, you’d say, @firewallender Nice post! To send me a private message, you’d say d firewallender Party’s at the Hyatt at 11! If you’re using text messaging (SMS), this would all be to 40404. Keep in mind the limitations of your text messaging plan, because otherwise, this might hurt a bit.

TRACK LIKE A BOUNTY HUNTER

You don’t need to add everyone who posted in the PAX forum as a friend, just track the term “PAX” and add people you find interesting along the way.

Tracking via SMS

This may or may not work, Twitter likes to turn this feature off. Text track PAX to 40404 to get everyone’s tweets (messages) that mention PAX. Use untrack PAX to turn it back off, so you can eventually sleep again. You probably want to track your own username as well, so you’ll always get replies, i.e., @firewallender Boba Fett? Where?

Tracking via a laptop/from the BYOC LAN party

If you’re using a laptop at PAX, use a program like TweetDeck to track like crazy. You can track multiple terms (but of course, you’ll want to track “PAX”) and you get a separate column for your friends’ tweets, replies to you, and each term you’re tracking. It’s rad.

An example screenshot of my TweetDeck tracking Gnomedex and PAX:

Tracking via the Web (mobile or otherwise) or the iPhone

You can always hit up http://search.twitter.com/search?q=PAX from your mobile browser or your laptop to see what’s up.

If you’re one of the poor saps using an iPhone, I recommend installing an application called Twinkle (you can find it in the iTunes App Store for free). If you post using Twinkle, it knows your location, and allows you to see all other Twinkle posts within a mile (or further, you can set your desired radius). You can also use it to post pictures.

NAMEDROP, YO

Notice that tracking “PAX” only works if “PAX” is in the tweet, so if you want your tweet to get seen, mention “PAX”! You’ll sometimes see #PAX. You can toss the “#” in to turn any term into a “hashtag”. PAX hashtags (#PAX) will show up in anything tracking “PAX”, but additionally they show up at http://hashtags.org/tag/PAX/ IF and only IF your Twitter account already follows @hashtags. Mostly, Hashtags are just messy (sorry, Hashtag guys!).  I wouldn’t worry about them if you can use the other methods mentioned to just track the word.

Alright, kids, that’s all I’ve got for now!  If you have any questions, please leave a comment and include your Twitter username. Welcome to Twitter and please say hi if you see me at PAX!  If you’re grateful for this post, please tweet about it to spread the word (and/or invite me to epic PAX parties).

(CW) out.

… but long from forgotten. I need a t-shirt that says, “I went to Gnomedex 8.0 and all I got was 7 t-shirts… and about 50 amazing experiences.”

Photo by Robert Scoble, I’m near the center in pink.

Starting Wednesday night it was a mashup of meeting wonderful new people from all over the world, and spending time with some of the quality Seattleites that make me so happy to call this place home, despite the current summer downpour.

The talks were quite interesting and not exactly what I was expecting. It was more like TED than I thought it would be, and less technical. Probably my favourite talk was Eve Maler’s talk on feed-based Vendor Relationship Management (VRM). The ability to manage one’s own data in a dynamic and powerful way is something that’s certainly due, Eve had some great thoughts on how it might be accomplished.

There were many touching moments too, emphasizing the theme of “human circuitry”. Beth Kanter challenged us to use social media for good, and we raised enough money to send a Cambodian women to college in 90 minutes. Scott Maxwell, the Mars Rover Driver Team Lead, showed us the view of Earth from Mars. Turns out, Earth is tiny! But, he said, we should not look at it and say, “we’re insignificant” - we should look at it and say, “our problems are insignificant - and we have so much to explore and discover yet.”  Jon Malkin showed us innovative research on a “Vocal Joystick” that would assist those with limited motor skills by allowing them to command a computer or a robot with sounds. Seeing technology add to the human experience in such powerful ways was very moving.

And speaking of moving, another highlight was dancing on stage with Matt Harding: a truly silly but wonderful experience.

I took only about 45 pictures (one seen below), but there’s well over 1,500 up in the Flickr pool. Wow.

New friends: Steve Spalding, Duncan Riley, and Eric Rice at the Edgewater.

It makes me feel like I’m twelve years old, but I can’t help but have that magical mix of excitement for all that I’ve just experienced and the deep sadness that “camp” is over. The community was definitely the shining star of the event - everyone added to the conversation in such a genuine way. I miss my Gnomedex friends already, but at least I can say, we’ll always have Twitter. At least until the Fail Whale strikes again.

~ Cassie

P.S. Yes, there was a presentation on the history of the Lolcat. Yes, I made myself look very silly on YouTube (again) and got 10,000 views (yikes). And yes, we started that ridiculous rumor about the Adobe Yahoo acquisition. Epic.

I suppose I’m a sap, but I love this music video.

Thanks to my friend Sam (via iLike) for passing this along.

UPDATE: If you have iTunes, you can download this and one other Jack Conte song for free from Stanford’s iTunesU page, as well as a bunch of other free tunes by some talented Stanford alumni.

Thanks to the awesome Mr. Chris Pirillo, who I had the pleasure of meeting at Seattle Startup Weekend, I’m going to the Gnomedex 8.0 conference here in rainy Seattle later this month.

My roommate brought a shirt to my attention that I should wear to Gnomedex (mostly because she’s convinced I’m going to a convention that’s literally all about gnomes), and we found a couple of other priceless punny tshirt gems:

“Gnomeland Security”
“To Gnome is to love me”
“Hanging with my Gnomies”

Puns aside, I’m really excited from Gnomedex. I believe I know at least two others going: Andrew Hyde and Bruce Henry, if you are attending please let me know.

Update! Marina Martin is going! Yay!

Well, I can barely move… so that kind of keeps me from biking.  I’ve got some high-tech cyborg replacement skin over my knee, and I think I did twist my ankle.  My knee is periodically leaking… and I’m pretty sure that’s not good. Luckily, I generally heal like Wolverine.  Harmony said all I have in common with Wolverine is stubbornness, but I like to think it’s more.  I stayed home yesterday, aside from a necessary run to Fred Meyer for more hydrogen peroxide, but managed to limp in to work today.  I’m still eager to bike again as soon as possible.

It’s also a bummer because I was supposed to start climbing this week forward on Tuesday and Thursday mornings early (like 6:30am early) at the Stone Gardens Gym in Ballard with Harmony.  But, seeing as I barely get up the stairs, I doubt I’ll be Spider-Man-ing up any walls soon.

Wow, two Marvel Comics references in one post.  Nice.

I guess my own personal Bike-o-Rama August started on August 1st, but I didn’t know it then.  That Friday, I took my Little bike riding.  I’m trying to emphasize non-consumer-focused activities, and bike riding is one of our favourites together. We biked from Sandpoint past Matthew’s Beach and back.  It was then I decided that the rest of August would be dedicated to seeing how much I could make my bike my main form of transportation. I’ve taken the bike to work before, but starting Monday, I would be seriously commuting by bike.

Saturday, I rode from my place to the University District to get some lights and a gear problem looked at.  I rode to Gasworks park to meet my friends Erica and Eva, and a bike festival was going on in the park. Not seriously, I took that as a good omen of my newly determined hardcore hobby.  Turns out, Eva just got a bike too, and needed a bike buddy!  Perfect.  After a bit, Erica went to go sailboating (as people are want to do in these parts) and Eva and I fetched her bike from Phinney Ridge and headed downtown to meet up with other friends for The Dark Knight at The Big Picture.  After that, I rode from Belltown to Justin’s place in lower Queen Anne, and even ran into (not literally) Andy along the way.  Biking is great!  All was well.  I was feeling really prepped for Monday’s commute.

So, along rolls Monday.  My ride into work is swell. I scoff at a hipster on a fixie along my way (internally, anyhow). I feel like a hardcore bike commuter.  I got up Pine Street!  Booyah!

(Warning: graphic description of DOOM)

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