After my exhausting hospital ordeal, I mustered enough strength to fly out to Raleigh, North Carolina for this years Science Online conference (many thanks to Bora Zivkovic and Anton Zuiker for their marvelous efforts again this year). This is where those of us who use the online environment to share about science come together to discuss current issues and generally share a lot of ideas. This conference is run as an "unconference" style where the attendees create the content and topics of the workshop. We do this on our own wiki and it is a successful event each and every year!

Thursday night was the keynote talk by Robert Krulwich. You may have seen him on TV or have heard him on the NPR as one part of the team of RADIOLAB. You might want to check out their innovative podcasts that help people sneakily and enjoyably learn science.

Friday included a morning full of optional tours. My roomie and co-presenter for a few workshops, Carin Bondar, and I instead took some time to have our photo taken (many thanks to Louis) together for a future video blog project we have in the works. More on that when the opening day draws closer.

Since Carin and I both create videos, we volunteered to host a workshop on amateur video making. The portion I presented was based on questions I receive on a regular basis about making videos from people who watch mine on occasion. In case people were unaware, I do everything for my videos. It would be great to have a team of helpers, but they'd have to work for free at this point. I do not claim to know everything about video making and I consult web resources quite often.

This powerpoint presentation contains the information we presented. It is in pptx format, so not everyone will be able to easily access it if the ppt program is not up to that level. 

Carin and I also presented a First Annual Science Online Film Festival, Video: from YouTube to TV to Hollywood and back: Mini Science Film Festival. We have some great entries. Here are the links to the videos eligible for voting with 1st, 2nd and 3rd place videos listed as such. Thanks to those who attended and voted!

First Place: Bill Hammack, Photocopier 

Second Place: Neil Losin, Researcher Profile: Kristin Aquilino

Third Place: Kate McAlpine: Large Hadron Rap 

The other entries, in no particular order:

Jeri Ellsworth: Darlington Learns Electrophorus 

Science in Seconds: Female Orgasm (I think it is SFW, but parents may want to screen to be sure!) 

Science in Seconds: Dinosaurs + Evolution

Debbie Berebichez: Science Babe Time Reversal

Jamie Vernon: Don't Drink Bacteria

Ben Paylor: Epigenetic Landscapes

Biovisions: Powering the Cell: Mitochondria 

Carin and I are keeping our eyes out for great entries for the next Science Online Film Festival, and also for featuring on our new project, so feel free to suggest some to us or to start making some yourself!

I also hosted with The Science Comedian, Brian Malow, a panel called The Entertainment Factor - Communicating Science with Humor as well as assisting on a panel about How to explain science in blog posts with too many co-panelists to list, and finally, Perils of blogging as a woman under a real name with wonderful co-panelists Sheril Kirshenbaum, Anne Jefferson, and Kathryn Clancy

Saturday night's banquet included a marvelous talk by Canopy Meg (Dr. Meagan Lowman), a performance by The Science Comedian, and our presentation of the three top videos in the Science Film Festival. 

As always, I had a wonderful time and enjoyed meeting many people I only speak with online! I could not possibly list them all here!

Upcoming next post, my review of three chemistry books and an introduction to the International Year of Chemistry!

Until then,

Kindly, Joanne