I am very excited and more than a little bit overwhelmed today. I’m heading down to Toronto for the uber-cool Blissdom Canada conference to play with a whole bunch of bloggy friends, including the co-members of the Fisher-Price playpanel team. More on them in a minute.
While I’ve been to quite a few academic and business conferences relating to social media, this is my first personal blog conference. I’ve always been torn about this kind of event, trying to find the fine line between value and time away from the family. The sheer volume of people attending kind of wigs me out, but I’m really excited about meeting face to face some fun people I’ve “known” online for years.
After reading the agenda, I’m more excited than ever, and looking forward to attending panels on subjects like “what’s in a brand” and “to publish or not to publish” and “finding your muse” and “how and why to monetize your blog” — well, there’s a little something in there for everyone, isn’t there? And I’m positively starstruck that the opening night bash is being sponsored by the CBC, including guest speaker Nora Young, the host of Spark, which is the radio program that inspired my 365 project back in 2008. My head may yet explode from excitement!
And that’s if my head doesn’t explode from the travel arrangements. You heard about that pesky potential strike by Air Canada flight attendants? That might happen today? Guess which airline I’m flying with? For one trip to Toronto and back, I have two airline tickets, one rail ticket, and two possible seats reserved with friends who are driving down. Talk about trains, planes and automobiles!! As of the time I hit publish on this post, Air Canada seems to be behaving itself — cross your fingers for me!
But here’s your sneak peek at the really big news I’ll be helping to promote at Blissdom Canada: the Fisher-Price playpanel is going to be extended for another year, and Mom Central Canada is looking for 15 more parent bloggers to join the team! Here’s the details from the Mom Central Canada team:
In 2011, we helped Fisher-Price Canada launch the Fisher-Price Play Panel. This group of 8 incredible Canadian bloggers has spent the past year learning more about the company, it’s people and what goes in to making learning toys. You can check out the Play Panel here. We will build on the momentum of the existing play panel team and are thrilled to announce we’re expanding our Fisher-Price Blogger Community! This Community, comprised of 15 additional Canadian bloggers, will help spread the word about Fisher-Price; its toys and various initiatives throughout the year. In addition, Fisher-Price will be launching a new advertising campaign all about the “Joy of Learning†which you will be hearing much more about.
Want more info? You can sign up here. It has been an incredibly fun and rewarding couple of months working with Fisher-Price and the playpanel team, and I’d highly encourage anyone who is interested to apply to be on the team!
I’m very excited to meet you! It’s going to be a great few days!