Spent a fine few minutes enjoying the stencils under Waterloo on Sunday Night. The Banskys and Blek le Rats were great, but I also really liked some of the smaller, cheekier stencils.
Art which puts a smile on my face. Nice.
Full set here on Flickr
I don't normally trust my levels of work productivity in pubs. But with a 10am start in London's most new-media friendly hostelry (Coach and Horses on Greek Street), and met by Mr Will McInnes armed with two portable flip charts, I knew today was going to be a bit different.
I missed Measurement Camp 1 (I was on hols) but caught up on the blogs after, so this was my first taste of what some of the social media industry's finest would get up to when let loose with caffeine and marker pens. And it was a very positive experience.
I wondered just how helpful everyone would be. The answer is: extremely.
I wondered how strong the thinking would be. The answer is, again: extremely.
And I wondered who the primadonnas would be. There were none
Maybe every industry has events and sessions that seemed as transparent and honest as this. But somehow I doubt it. In one room above a pub there was a genuine desire to develop something together, which no one person or agency would "own" but everyone could use - from PRs to social media planners. (Almost worthy of a Billy Bragg song isn't it?) An opensource movement indeed.
Anyway, I came away both enthused and enthusiastic about how the industry is developing, and also how those of us in that industry can develop the tools and techniques to prove it's effectiveness.
The proceedings will be written up on the wiki, and added to and amended there - so I'm not going to go into things in detail here (though I will do there)
But hats off to Mr Mcinnes for kicking things off and getting this group together, and for trying to encourage others to pick up the baton to take it forward - count me in.
And hi to everyone who was there - including Rachel Clarke, Dan McQuillan, Helen Lawrence, Matt Morrison, Adrian Moss, Anna Carlson, Katie Howell and all the other fine souls (who's names I didn't write down properly) from far afield. See you next time.
