February 23rd, 2009 § 2 comments § permalink
WordCamp India was a great event, at least in terms of the fact that it was a start for us. The First from India, and at this platform, I thought I would present how WordPress as a platform, helped me and my company, when we launched the First from India – Online Platform for Taking Events and Conferences Global!
And since I have been getting requests from people, to upload my presentation on the blog (I already have 60 views and 3 downloads) in a day! Thanks all 
Here you go :-
February 22nd, 2009 § 13 comments § permalink
Wordcamp India. the First ever WordCamp in India.
The two day event concluded today with not much to rave about. I have lots of feedback from real people who attended the event and well, I have lots of inputs for the WCI team.
Two days, a host of speakers, and nothing to rave about! The biggest draw for the event were Matt Mullenweg (Creator WordPress) and Om Malik (Giga Om fame). Well, and both of them were amongst the fewest of the good things to talk about at this event. Matt I think is an amazing guy and am already a fan. He really knows his stuff, and well he can talk and talk good. The best part, the guy is really innovative. Looking at his presentation which contained pictures of the Taj mahal and the Autorickshaw he travelled in, I was glad to see his keen eye for details
Okay, lets come to the point now!
So what did I get from the First Indian WordCamp? Hmmm…lemme think, not much, I’d say (I really have to think on answering this one). There were some really lax speakers, who were speaking on whatever context they liked speaking on. There were product presentations (Radioverve, though I really like the work), and I was told by the event organizers outright (when I asked them for a speaking Op) that we dont really entertain product displays!! Thanks guys!
There were gyan sessions on codes, plugins and some really cool features of WordPress, but I dont really know how much value would they have provided to the people, who are common basic level users of WordPress, who probably dont even know, how to install a version on their own site!
There was mis-management
The event was mismanaged. Day two saw the event organizers coming to the event LATE! and the show started pretty LATE! There were shift in speaker schedules (Do you not call up the speaker a night before, and send an SMS reminder, in the morning)?? Basic things right?
And here we have a Supreme Court lawyer, talking on IP and other stuff and he starts with an example which referred to Priyanka (twilight fairy) one of the organizers of the event as an example. Sir, with due respects, there are better ways to connect both with the audience and the organizers Though Pavan was the only speaker after Matt and Om, who really made an impact.
We will allow you, but we don’t really think your topic is different from 2 others, who are speaking the same
Okay, so I was told by one of the organizers of WCI on day I, that I could take his speaking slot to present what I have with WordPress. And I woke up till 1 am in the morning and mailed him my presentation as I discussed with him. And on the second day, well one of the other organizers, has an objection to it!
What objection – She thinks that my presentation is on how to make money out of WordPress, and well I think she totally missed the point. What I had, well it was not presented by anyone. Anyway, my point of writing all of this is not that I have any hard feelings or anything, but the fact that I would have appreciated, if this would have been communicated to me earlier that I am not up for speaking, so I would really have invested my time on more productive things in life.
Networking – I met some really young and budding entrepreneurs today!
Well, the young crowd really was something that I liked about the event, though the same was a deterrent to the scope of relationships that you could really look forward to, forging.
I know people from the event, who supported my thoughts on it!
Coffee machine was the favorite place to network and talking to many a people around, I got the same feedback that It wasn;t working for them. That they are really not seeing much value from the sessions.
There was no appreciation for SPONSORS!!
So the day one of the event, would really have included a word of thanks to the sponsors for the sponsors and partners to the event, in the opening note of the organizers, which I personally felt was missing.
I think, the event was okay, and nothing special to really have missed and been repenting about. I wish these guys the best for the future events, and hope they do live to their brand!
I highly appreciate the Co-organizer of the First WordCamp India, Mayank, calling up, to really give certain clarifications on the event, and I appreciate his honesty.
For the same, I would like to present to the readers of this blog, that this blog has no relations to the fact that I was not given an opportunity to speak (Have a look at my Bio, do you really think, I would write a blog post, for such a trivial matter)?
Hence, the post only reflects my views and of some people from the event, I interacted with, who shared their’s. This post is not meant to point out or hint at any particular individual and is not biased
February 22nd, 2009 § 0 comments § permalink
Ankesh Kothari, speaks about talks about how to turn a blog into a Business, and he starts with a story, of a boy and his shoes.
A lot of people out here have been blogging but they still dont have the ideas of really hoe to convert a blog into a business
How many have a blog and it is not active anymore? – Well not many in the room.
Ankesh says there is no incentive in taking the blog further and that is why this happens. there could be different sorts of incentives. Monetary, Fame and the rest…
Why relying on Ads is a BAD IDEA?
You can compete with New York Times, I’ll show you how. Can you make your blogging Worth YOUR While?
You are probably working from yoru kitchen table so competing with such big companies is a scary thought…Ankesh shares the story of Car manufactures, GM and what made them do this, and Ankesh gives his thoughts, on how to really implement it into your blogging!
The Tripod strategy for blogging by Ankesh
The strongest, most geomtrical figure in nature is a triangle…if you have the three prong approach to your blog, well it would be stable, just like a three legged table is! It will take you at least 2-3 years for you to make money from your blog.
How do you get Ads, ehen your blog is NEW?
Find out who is advertising on your competitors website, and hit them on the charge structure. Out of 5 such advertisers, definitely 2-3 of them will test your platform for their Ads. Say if 100 people visit yoru blog 1 of them will end up buying your 10 dollar product and this money, should really go into your advertising budget, which would fetch you more business.
How do you go about creating a front end product on the very first day?
Create an audio product – Ex: an interview a personality for your blog. You can have a 45 minute to a 1 hour audio product which you can get rolling within a day. Play on pricing, its important to price and position your product right.
The third prong – keep creating products (these may not really be manufactured by you) you could just act as a successful integrator. Ankesh is a great chap, who is open in sharing the real time examples of products that he is working on in his presentation (which I’ll get for you guys, exclusively on this blog!!)
If you have this three pronged approach, you will have an upper hand over the other bloggers. My blogs become profitable and sustainable within the first 100 days. And hence competing with Gawker Media and NY Times, is really not a great deal.
How do you market your Blog?
Ankesh shares a story of “the most known bank robber in the US history, who is being interviewed by a journalist” and the journalist says, you’re the smartest guy I have ever met. You may have become a senator. And Billy answered in a simple way that is: “I target banks, because that is where all the money lies” Interestin Ankesh!!
Ankesh ends the session with a 100 day plan strategy for your blog!! Do the most of the work in this time and keep on with your momentum. Give yourself time and keep going strong.
To connect:
http://ankeshkothari.com
twitter: ankeshk
http://www.NonToxin.com
February 21st, 2009 § 0 comments § permalink
So Matt starts by clicking a group photograph, and hey Mattm I really love that camera 
State of the word
This is the first time Matt has been to India.
To contact Matt, find him here:
m2mullenweg.com
Twitter: photomatt
In the beginning Matt had a movable type, blog, which was hmmm…well….lemme see…gosh, were blogs like this?
And now Matt talks about how things slowing down, with all the HTML, taking up, Matt says, I am a typography geek. I submitted a patch on sourceforge and I was zapped and I felt great! And my entire involvement with open source, is the feeling, that so many people are using your code!
On Jan 24, Matt wrote a blog post, on the blogging software dillema! and Hence was founded WordPress. Mike who is the Co-founder WordPress, whom Matt never met for over a couple of years, and well, the rest they say is history!
And so was born WordPress!
The last year for us was really amazing, people from all over the world started getting involved. We had two major re-designs. The average WP blog has 4.96 plug-ins involved. Couple of weeks back we crossed 4000 plug-ins.
I think the concept of personalization is the most beautiful thing that software provides!
WordPress 2.7.1 has had almost half a million downloads since the past 11 days. This is about 2.5 times any previous update. Matt is amazing, he says the direction that we are taking WordPress to, is like Firefox, as a great Open Source project.
Nothing that we have done with WordPress is original, many people said there are many
Hindi Blogs, is what Matt is talking about now. I was surprised when WordPress had languages as wide as hindi, tamil, telugu, marathi and many more…Its really amazing, and I had no idea of this!
Once I added all these languages, there are 11,651 blogs which are written in multiple languages
There are 4.2 million unique visitors in the past 30 days!
WordPress Themes, Matt now emphasizes on User Generated versions. Well, and Matt now shows the first version of WordPress, which was pretty primitive, and then we had a major re-design with version 2.5!! Well, we added the color Blue!!
We then released the version 2.7 in december, the most successful release for WP so far!! Better navigation, and some of the nest features!!
We focused on the number of clicks and we worked on this amazing technology, using “laser eye mapping”. We are able to time every single action of the user on WP. Hence making every single action faster!! (I say amazing work Matt, I really didn’t know of this)
WordPress 2.8
Deadly – Ugly – icons!! WordPress users are Smarter and Sexier than the general audience ….am already feeling good
WodPress 2.8 is still open to suggestions and we are inviting suggestions. We are working on more widgets, making WordPress more and more Faster!!
One of our greatest DIFFERENTIATORS!!
Our dashboard, well, Prologue, would pretty much take it away!! – Food for thought, !! Matt is amazing !
Have you heard abotu BuddyPress
Well, its your own Social Network on a blog!! Its neat and its cool, that’s my first reaction to it. Its perfectly scalable. And to know more about BuddyPress, you can go to this test site: http://www.testbp.org/
What’s coming in 2009?
Well, taking a step back occasionally, sometimes we should do that. Where are we going, what would WP be in 5 years!
Software should be:
And that is what we are trying to fit into the WordPress platform!
Matt is an amazing guy, and I am amazed with all the innovations which are up for grabs. Gosh and there are fake WordPress logos…well, Matt jokes about the various versions of logos present and well, tells the difference, which came out when he was in Indonesia.
Freedom
Freedom, is what Matt is talking about now! there were 100 people working on the WP 2.7 version, and well, why do they do it? Matt pushes the envelope for innovation further and really creates with the entire audience the biggest answer that they were looking for!!
And the answer was to the question, which is asked to Matt most often, and that is: “How do we contribute to WordPress”??
Matt, was pretty open in saying that people should share their knowledge on their blogs, spread more and more openly and really take things to the next level!!
Thanks Matt, I thouroughly enjoyed your session:)
February 21st, 2009 § 11 comments § permalink
Okay, after an interesting Key Note by OM Malik, from GigaOM, we have Shreyas from RadioVerve talking about how to convert your own Radio Site using WordPress as a platform.
Building a Radio site on wordpress
I absolutely LOVE WordPress, Shreyas
(Pretty interesting concept Shreyas, using open source codes, and other innovative stuff)!! Radioverve is a platform where anyone could come and listen to some of the best Indian Music – alternate, rock, and the other genres!!
We wanted to improve upon the concept and continue to add something new to the already existing web site that we had in 2004, which was a text pattern site. And we decided upon open source. Shreyas is an itneresting presenter.
We wanted something which most people are aware of
So I loved the support of the community on my questions, and putting in each saturday and sunday leaving our social lives behind, and 6 months of work made us this: And Shreyas shows the all new evolved RadioVerve, on WordPress platform.
We have nine RJ’d stations and we are working with a whole wide section of people. Okay Shreyas, I think Im in love with the site. And the WordPress theme you have implemented is amazing
Shreyas now discusses the Lessons he has learnt !!
Okay, so now Shreyas is talking about some php codes and some technical lingo, which I really am dumbfounded with So…but Im amazed at the simplicity with which Shreyas and the RadioVerve team has created amazing customization through WordPress.
I think i’ll start making music again, and put em up on the site
Now the best thing about WordPress is it can be customized to any extent, which I agree on with Shreyas!! Amazing cuztomization Shreyas. I am a fan!! Kudos.
Shreyas opens the session for discussion, and I must say, Shreyas, you have touched some real cords!! I think Shreyas is an amazing guy, he is open to sharing all his open source knowledge, with the room here. For all the Social Geeks go to Github.com, and you would get amazing source codes, with which you can work magic on WordPress!!
LIVE by Paritosh Sharma!!
February 19th, 2009 § 0 comments § permalink
WordCamp is in town!!
Yes! New Delhi, is proud to be hosting WordCamp India, at Adobe’s Noida, the venue for which is displayed below:
If you are a WordPress fan (which in all probabilities, you would be) this event is a must attend! Matt Mullenweg the creator of WordPress, is touching base in India for the event. Also, One of the respected Industry bloggers Om Malik (GigaOm) is touching base from Frankfurt as well.
The event sure is creating enough waves around to go un-noticed. This is one of those parties which are worth a dekko, as I am personally excited about meeting Matt and catching up with some of the best Bloggers around.
I personally extend my invitation to bloggers who are really interested into UI (User Interface) and Messaging, and how it changes users perception, to mail me at: paritosh@paritoshsharma.com and I’ll feature you at my blog: http://www.paritoshsharma.com/category/blog/
The event is being supported by The Delhi Bloggers Bloc !!
I would probably be LIVE blogging WordCamp India at certian occasions! You can follow me here:
http://www.paritoshsharma.com/live-2/
See you there on Saturday
