Gnomedex Morning 1: The Highlights

I had a GREAT time at the party last night. There are so many great people here from SF and Seattle + a bunch of folks from all over the country – including Ohio
Part1:
The Opening Keynote was by Robert Steele. I unfortunately had a conference call to plan for ShesGeeky – the women’s (only) tech conference in October – so I had to miss the presentation.
However I had some incling about what he might present since I first met Robert at Nexus for Change – people there largely in the granola crowd listened to him because of his connection to Tom Atlee from the Co-Intelligence Institute and author of the Tao of Democracy.
I spent several hours dialogging with him there. In my conversation with was interesting on the one hand he was talking about ground up citizens deliberation (see NCDD) BUT – these are THE 10 Threats, THE 12 Policies, THE 8 Players. [Here are some of the “jems” from his talks captured in a live blog this morning. Here and here.]
Part 2:
I got to hear most of Daren Barefoot present he covered some interesting topics including:
Gross National Happiness (they have conferences on this – I found a Frontline that covers it.
Build infrastructure if you want to make a difference.
He put forward several great online ‘do good’ projects
* I could Be
* GeekCorps
* Get a First Life
* Nothing But Nets
He highlighted Web of Change as an Awsome conference – He asked if anyone had been. I raised my hand, agreed yes it was AWSOME.
He pointed out NetSquared as a conference.
I put forward the Nonprofit Technology Network (NTEN) which is a great network of technologists working on social good stuff. Bouns: Their conferences are 50% women.

Personal Side Note related to IT and Changing the World:
Just this week I began planning for the next Planetwork Conference – and where to begin but around Themes. The one we are currently playing with is Infrastructure Patterns for Collaboration and Sustainability.
Part3:
Guy Kawasaki closed of the morning asking us what we wanted him to talk about. We chose Evangelism.
The ART of EVANGELISM
1) Make Meaning
2) Make Mantra (2-3 words)
3) Roll the Dicee
* Deep 1.0 is plenty good eg. Fanning (Reef)
* Intelligent [DESIGN MATTERS]
* Complete
* Elegant
* Emotive
4) Niche Thyself (high and to the right. Value that is Unique).
5) Let a Hundred Blossoms Bloom
6) Make it Personal
7) Find the True Influnencers
8) Enable Test Drives
9) Look for agnostics, not atheists [or the religious]
10) Provide a Slippery Slope
11) Don’t let the bozos grind you down