David Wilcox

Last night at The Hub, Kings Cross, Steve Moore, curator of 2gether08, soft-launched this year’s digital festival with a taster of what’s planned. There’ll be more detail early next year, with a series of meetups and online activities through which people can pitch ideas for what they want to contribute. Steve’s plea: make it fresh. No chance for recycled content.

I took along my current favourite social reporting tool, which is a portable videobooth on a Macbook. Well, Videoboo actually, as you can see here in previous use on an iMac at Chain Reaction.

More on Videoboo in a moment. First here’s Steve with a preview of his presentation, above. (as the evening progressed I got better at staying out of the frame)

And then his concluding remarks with tips on how to contribute.

I found that using the camera on my Macbook, and the Videoboo software, was a terrific way to capture people’s comments and ideas … partly about 2gether09, and partly on other projects that they are involved in. I’ll post more on that late, and more on the great stories and ideas I captured in the videos.

For the moment I’ve just put the videos together in a playlist which you’ll find here while pulling out this one of social media Minister Tom Watson MP saying how much he liked the portable videoboth. Or it might just have been the new Macbook. Tom is a very experienced blogger, and well able to cope with a videobooth … but he did ruminate on how dangerous such a tool might be in the hands of the unwary MP. One click to record, another to preview, a third and it is straight to YouTube. Default setting is private, so there’s a chance to hold back on any late night ramblings. A bit tempting though.