#TAL10, our second un-conference had a lot to live up to after #TAL09 but again managed to surprise us with not only it’s popularity but also the quality of the people who attended and the sites that they run, that is before we start looking at their ideas for the future!

We had booked Old Broadcasting House in Leeds to capacity for the event and ended up with it about 3/4 full, the weather and lack of flights in to the UK were responsible for some of the non attendees. While others I’m sure decided not to attend as there were no food based sports like Pork Pie Rounders.

As expected the whole event was blogged by almost all of the attendees and reported on most accurately and efficiently by Sarah Hartley from the Guardian along with Hannah, John & Tom from the Guardian Local Blogs. Their reporting on the day can be seen here.

Michael Grimes also made notes on the sessions he attended during the day.

Journalism.co.uk also reported on the Un-Awards which were presented after the un-conference had closed. The Guardian also reported on the Un-Award winners here.

Un-Award winner Josh Haliday from SR2 Blog gives us his thoughts on the days events on his personal blog.

Philip John gives us his account over at JournalLocal as does Damian Radcliffe onDPC. The excellent Greener Leith report by Alistar Tibbitt and finally and by no means least Matt from My Tunstall writes

Twitter was, and still is, awash with the #TAL10 tag which link to many interesting posts which we have archived here.

Pictures are being uploaded to our Flickr Group.

We are delighted that this event will be in partnership with The Guardian’s Local initiative

As in Stoke-on-Trent in October, we will be using the Un-Conference format and we hope to have some of the very best hyperlocal publishers and special guests attending on the day.

After the success of the Pork Pie rounders, arranged by our own Nicky Getgood, there is a rumor that a skool sports day is being planned for one of the sessions, more than that we can’t yet announce, yet….

50 Tickets will be available on EventBrite from 1400 today (8 February)  with further tickets being made available after we have ensured that local bloggers in Yorkshire and the North East have got their tickets.

We will be publishing updates at http://talkaboutlocal.org and on Twitter @talkaboutlocal or you can search Twitter for TAL10 to see what other people are saying the Un-Conference Google Group is reopened for you to start discussing and planning what you hope to gain from the event.

Talk About Local Un-Awards
The glittering Talk About Local Un-Awards ceremony will take place on Saturday evening after the Un-Conference at a venue yet to be confirmed. As you will no doubt remember we were going to hold the Un-Awards in Birmingham earlier in the year, but after much procrastination and it being left on a low light we decided that it made logistical sense for us to hold it in conjunction with the Un-Conference.

Tickets for the the Un-Awards will be available on Eventbrite as soon as the venue is confirmed.

That is probably the best thing I can say about this weekends event.

We were not really sure what to expect on Saturday morning, we had spent the whole of the last week planning the un-conference getting swhag from sponsors and working out the logistics of getting it all to Stoke-on-Trent. On Saturday morning once we had set up at the uni, we said well all we need now are people.  At 9am the first delegates started to arrive, at 9:30 there was a queue and the breakfast oatcakes had gone! By 10 we had about 50 people signed in, this was our personal success point, we had said all along if we get 50 or 60 people we’d be happy.  At 1030 there were still people arriving the room was getting pretty full and people were starting to organise the days sessions on the boards.

People! Photo Simon Perry

Post-it notes on the board with the days sessions on

The final delegate count was 88, which is fantastic number for our first event and the free lunch seemed to go down well.

In the afternoon Nicky did a session on games which culminated with a game of pork pie rounders, yes you read correctly PORK PIE rounders..

Pork Pie Rounders Picture Will Perrin

We are not sure that Nicky will be allowed in to Stoke-on-Trent again as she used the local Wrights pies for the game and this would be treated as sacrilege, but if we don’t tell anyone she might be ok…

There were too many sessions to mention here but some of the highlights were Andrew Stott speaking about data.gov, Nick Booth on Social Media Surgeries, Will Perrin on Talk About Local and the future of Hyperlocal blogging.

I personally got a lot from it, met up with some old friends made a lot of new friends and contacts and I hope that each delegate not only made some connections and contacts but also learnt something or shared something that will help others who are hyperlocal publishing.

Since the event a number of posts have been written and videos uploaded by people who attended so we thought we should try and list as many as we can here.

RaveCam

The #TAL09 rave cam, @franbury got feedback from people as they were leaving the Un-Conference

A full playlist of TAL09 Videos on YouTube can be viewed here

Twitter

26 pages of Twittery goodness can be seen here on Tweet Doc

If you prefer something a little more animated look at #tal09 on Visible Tweets

Flickr

A lot of delegates took pictures at the event and posted them to our Flickr pool.  If you took pictures please feel free to add them to the pool for us to share

There have been many blog posts about the un-conference most of which are linked in the comments below.  If you know of any posts that we haven’t  got a link to or have not had a pingback drop us a quick mail at the address below and we’ll sort it out.

Feel free to leave feedback here or drop us a mail to info[@]talkaboutlocal.org

We were awestruck to have some of the best hyperlocal web people signed up to attend the event.

Talk About Local Unconference 2009

Links

• Google Group
• Twitter
• Delicious

Timetable

• 0930 Registration opens in the Film Theatre Foyer
• Un-Conference planning, Networking & Coffee
• 1030 Welcome speech in the Film Theatre
• 1100 Morning Sessions
• 1300 Lunch (yes the free one)
• 1400 Afternoon Sessions
• 1600 Closing speeches & mutual back slapping
• 1700 Drinks & Networking in the Clayhanger Bar at the North Staffordshire Hotel (opposite the Rail Station)

Sponsors

Business Link, Media Trust, Ofcom and Cisco.

All the team are working away on different bits to make sure that Saturday is a huge success. We will have wireless connections in the venue for you to use, but due to the complexity of academic networks we will be using 3G routers throughout the building, so if you have your own mobile broadband you may wish to bring that with you.  If you do use our connections please play nice and don’t start streaming movies!   We will have a couple of cat5 connections for people who are presenting or running sessions to plug in to.

As Will has said previously, we are pretty awe struck with the names that have appeared on our delegate list. We have some of the best bloggers and social media people around turning up.   There is one ‘very’ special delegate, Andrew Stott who has signed up to come along and has offered to give a talk on data.gov.uk to say there was a certain amount of jaw dropping when we saw Andrew had signed up would be an under statement!

We have had an excellent response from sponsors and supporters who we would like to say a big thank you to (in no particular order):

Screen WM
OFCOM
Cisco
UK online centres
Business Link WM
4iP
Media Trust
Advantage West Midlands

For making the event possible.

We  have shwag for you, we have pads, pens, mouse mats (does anyone still use them?) mugs, a free copy of The Sentinel courtesy of Mike Sassi.    Interestingly we will be having a competition to win a serious prize provided by Media Trust as part of the Festival of Learning.  Nicky is busily working away at some questions for you to win a blog make over.

The prize will include, a trip to Talk About Local offices in Fazeley, a make over for your blog by some of the best social media practitioners in the UK,  lunch and some other goodies.

We won’t be able to stream the event but there will be a number of social reporters covering the event and we ask that delegates use #tal09 as your tag to appear in these feeds:
- Twitter
- delicious

You can also add photos to the TAL Flickr group and join in longer conversations at the Google Group.

If you have any questions about the event, need to check anything or just want a chat then drop us a mail at info[@]talkaboutlocal.org and we’ll get back to you.

We look forward to meeting you all on Saturday morning, or on Friday night if any of you are getting there early.