CONIECTO

Two days after myself and Ina were chatting over Skype about that busy week in March, Bernie Goldbach and Conn Ó Muíneacháin gave it a name: Irish Blog Week 2008.

This is how it looks like until now:

• March 1st:
• A Ladies' Tea Party , event organised by Sabrina Dent and Ina O'Murchu
  
• Irish Blog Awards, Dublin
  
• March 2nd:
  
• Gourmet Brunch for Food Bloggers and Fans, Dublin
  
• WebCamp - Social Network Portability, Cork
• March 3rd, 4th: BlogTalk 2008 Conference, Cork
• March 8th: Creative Camp, Kilkenny

There's already a Jaiku channel for it: #irishblogweek

My apologies for suffering of blogstipation lately (sorry Lexia;); I'd tell you I've been busy , but... ain't I always?! I seem to have a special talent to keep myself busy!

The thought that kept me so busy these days was figuring out how to achieve work-blog-life balance... do more of the things I love doing... try and see the big picture! Not that I got to a solution, but I'm a few steps closer!

The funny part is that after writing the beginning of this post, I just realised that I've booked accommodation in both Dublin and Cork for the night of March 1st! Now this is really stupid of me, we Transylvanians have the reputation of being slow, but excuse me, how slow can one get?!

I will go to the Ladies Tea Party and Irish Blog Awards in Dublin on the 1st, and then will travel to Cork on the 2nd to attend the Webcamp.

BlogTalk will be a less relaxed event for me this year - after 5 years, I am among the presenters again. See the programme online! Our paper was initially on a sort of waiting list - it got in because someone else had to withdraw - the competition was tough and I'm happy we made it in the end.

The paper is a reflection on the social practices developed by IBM-ers around the social software tools they build and try out inside the Big Blue, and I consider myself lucky to work on this study with Brian O'Donovan and Liam Bannon.

As a member of the organising committee, I was very impressed by the way the 4 chairs handled the reviewing process and by the efficiency of the software app chosen for handling it: easychair.
All the papers were read , commented and assessed by two independent reviewers. It wasn't easy at all, I had to stick to my reviewer chair when everyone was enjoying the Christmas break,but I am confident we'll hear some great presentations down in Cork in March .

I'm looking forward to the Irish Blog Week and would be happy to meet you at one/all of these events!