It is time for SXSW 2014!
I am pleased to be attending for the first time the SXSW Interactive Festival in Austin, Texas from March 7th to March 11th. In its 21st year, the show is touted as the “incubator of cutting-edge technologies and digital creativity”.
Globalization Partners International (GPI) was invited to join Sitecore and a few of their other partners to host an evening event one of the nights. This seemed like enough reason to finally attend SXSW.
The focus of SXSW covers film, music and the interactive space. While the full show runs until the 16th of March, the Interactive Festival and sessions wind down by the 12th, , just as the Music Festival is getting started. The Film Festival runs across the full timeframe.
The Interactive Festival is where I will be focusing my attention on attending sessions with topics like Agile Methodology, Next Generation User Experiences, Africa, and Next Generation Retail Stores. There are hundreds of sessions covering topics you would expect at an interactive show and many I expect you would not find elsewhere, like Brazilian Speed Dating #2. (I assume #1 was big hit!) There are even a few session titles I don’t feel comfortable mentioning in this blog.
In addition to the sessions, many events go on throughout the day and deep into the evening from book signings, workshops, panel sessions, meet-ups and mentor sessions with some of the industry leaders.
SXSW originally started a music festival in 1987. The interactive and film festivals were added in 1994. It was quite cutting edge to have an interactive festival at that time and while the industry has grown a great deal since then, it still pushes the limits of cutting edge.
Last year the SXSW Interactive Festival had over 30,000 attendees. It is expected to exceed this number in 2014.
Source: www.outbrain.com
Globalization Partners International is excited to join Engagency, Digial Yalo, The Escape Pod and GHI Internet Services for a co-sponsoring event with Sitecore on Monday, March 10th when we take over a downtown restaurant to enjoy some food, drinks and two great bands/musicians.
GPI is largely focused on the interactive space as we have seen significant growth in localization efforts by large B2B and B2C companies expanding their international business opportunities online. A key contributor to this growth has been the use of content management systems (CMS) like Sitecore that have a strong multilingual capability. In support of leading CMS’ with such capabilities, GPI has built connectors to ease the workflow process for exporting and importing content. We recently uploaded on demand videos for each of our connector demos that can be viewed upon request. For more information, check our page: Sitecore Translation Connector.
I will post a report upon my return from the festival. If you are planning to attend SXSW please email me at pbetts@globalizationpartners.com and let me know if you would like an invite for the Monday night event with Sitecore. If you attend I hope to see you at the Festival and that you have a great time.
