Going Solo

I discovered six groups a few days before Going Solo Lausanne, when Stowe created a channel for the conference. I’m happy to announce that they are sponsoring Going Solo Leeds and helping us get set up with their service, as it was pretty quickly obvious they were a really useful service for an event like ours.

If you already use Twitter (and you should!) you won’t have too much trouble understanding the utility of six groups. The Going Solo six groups livecommunity aggregates tweets from members of the community which are hashtagged #goingsolo. If you don’t have a Twitter account, you can of course participate directly on the six groups site.

Six groups also provides code which allows us to display the latest message sent to the Going Solo Livestream, and gives easy access to the functionality:

So, in practice?

• register for a six groups account (you may use OpenID)
• join the Going Solo community
• edit your profile (add your Twitter ID in there so that @sixgroups can follow you!), add a photo, and look through community members to start adding friends
• adjust your Twitter settings so that your tweets are captured into the livestream
• for your tweet to appear in the livestream, use the #goingsolo (that’s a hashtag) somewhere in your tweet
• of course, the livestream is available through RSS.

And:

• you may also post a message directly from anywhere on the Going Solo websites, by using the six groups toolbar which appears at the top of each page
• if you enjoy being identified as something like “Gast88684”, you don’t even have to register! 😉

If you would like to add the Going Solo six groups bar to your site (and become a partnersite), all you need to do is copy the widget code into your template, just before </body>.

Looking forward to having you all take part in the livecommunity! Use the comments here for questions if you have any.

Join the Going Solo network | Add a Going Solo trip

As you probably noticed, I’ve started introducing our partners and sponsors here so that you can get to know them if you don’t already.

Now, who hasn’t heard of Dopplr? Dopplr allows you to keep track of who is going to be where amongst your contacts — essential, you’ll agree, in today’s increasingly nomadic world (a theme will touch upon throughout the sessions — or should I call them lectures? — at Going Solo).

I’ve long been a fan of Dopplr. It allows me to see who I might be bumping into during my travels (even if they don’t live where I’m going — they could be travelling too!), and who of my long-distance friends might be travelling to my area.

And when I go to a conference, of course… Dopplr tells me immediately which of my “fellow travelers” are going to be in the same town.

So, Dopplr and Going Solo are happy to offer you two fun features to help you connect and stay in touch with the great people you’ll meet in less than a month at the conference:

• First, if you don’t have a Dopplr account yet, follow this special sign-up link. It will allow you to sign up to Dopplr (free, zero risks, many benefits) and automatically make you join the Going Solo network. Joining the network will make it easier for you to find follow travellers who are also part of the Going Solo network. If you already have an account, follow the link too — it will simply add you to the network. The people you may know page is now updated to include people from the network. (Also, don’t let anyone know we told you, but this hidden page shows you people in your networks.)
• Second, to add a trip related to Going Solo to Dopplr, use this smart add Going Solo trip link. It makes things a tad easier to you, and displays a tiny Going Solo icon next to your trip. Shiny!

We hope Dopplr will help you stay connected with your professional and personal network when everybody is travelling!

With a month to go until the conference (it’s the 16th today!), how about starting to get in touch with the follow soloists you’ll be meeting there in the flesh? Or learning a bit more about the speakers and the staff?

Most conferences nowadays provide a social network for their attendees — it makes perfect sense. We’ve chosen Crowdvine for the Going Solo social network, firstly because it’s really neat, and second because chances are you may already have an account and contacts on Crowdvine (if you’ve been to FOWA or Web2.0Expo Berlin, for example).

So, if you’re attending Going Solo, head over to Crowdvine to meet your fellow attendees.

And if you’re not attending Going Solo… what? Head over to registration right away, and don’t forget to bring a friend!

Looking forward to connecting with you on Crowdvine.