My dad and I used to talk excitedly about the technological future. In the early 1980s it was "every home will have a computer in 10 years."
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My late father and I both marveled at our Mac SE's true-to-the-printed-page (TTTPP, WYSIWYG) display and the awesome array of 28 fonts! It was amazing how many channels cable TV offered and buttons in the car that could remember your seat position. He even bought me a picture-phone — using fax technology to transmit monochrome images to it's screen — so he could see his grand kids long distance.
Technology promises a lot, like world peace. I'm not kidding. Think about it, if we could find a cheap, alternative energy source many of our economic problems and therefore world struggles would be solved, at least that's what Arthur C. Clarke often proposed. Java was going to save the suburbanite's life by embedding itself in our appliances. That turned out not to be Java. Mobile phones were also going to jump from Mission Impossible's car to ours. Who knew where they'd lead.
Good, bad or unrealistic, technology is now ubiquitous. Client-side scripting language is a-buzz everywhere. Screen resolution and cloud service are now relevant at Saks Fifth Avenue. People don't make choices, arrange meetings, buy a cup of coffee or feed their dog without consulting a global system of interconnected computers—the internet. I always wanted a tricorder but didn't know I'd end up with 4 personal devices, three of which I carry around with me.
Entrepreneurship's rise is probably the result and the cause of all this techno saturation. A new economy, new advances and our good ole curiosity have turned the petri dish of geeks in the 1980s to a forest of experts today. The thickest part of that forest will gather on Saturday April 14, at the Tequila Cowboy (formerly Cadillac Ranch) in downtown Nashville for PodCamp Nashville 2012.
PodCamp Nashville 2012 is for the geek in all of you. Everything from blog tips, content management (and structure), podcasting (that's from where the name came), Googling, social networking (and tons of advice about that), 3D, music, analytics, job getting/making, startup-ing, video, storytelling and digital images—whew! Art dude will be spreading a little pixel dust on your digital image skills.
Go see what's in store for you. You will learn something but better yet, you will meet great people with great ideas and awesome skills. See you there.