The Boss of You

Next March, many of us Vancouverites are going to be sweeping up the confetti from the 2010 Winter Olympics — but some of us will be recovering from that civic-chaos hangover by diving straight into another whirling cloud of madness, the geek conference extraordinaire, South by Southwest. (No, not the cool music festival. Or the cool film festival. The interactive festival. I know, I know — lots of you won’t have heard of it, but for us webby types it’s kind of a huge deal.)

A couple of years back, before our book came out, we co-hosted a panel with some of the most fabulous gals around on the topic of women-run online businesses. And now we’re very excited to announce that we’re going back to Austin for more — this time (we hope!) as part of a panel with Leif Utne and Noah Scalin, which we’re calling “The Socially Conscious Geek: Makin’ Money While Doin’ Good“. Here’s the quick & dirty description:

Can you make a living as a geek without sacrificing your ideals? Definitely. These pros have carved out a niche working with mission-driven, ethical clients in both the non-profit and for-profit sectors – and want to show you how to bring your values to work while keeping a roof over your head.

We’re really excited about this panel, but we need you to vote for us! The way SXSW panels work is that all the accepted submissions (this year, there are over 2200 of them) get posted online and only 300 will be selected. Anyone can vote for their favourites, using SXSW’s online panel picker — all you need to do is visit the website and set up an account (click the “Create an account” link, and follow the simple steps), then click on the thumbs-up graphic below the panel title.

And if you’re looking for more great panels to vote for, I’m particularly excited about the lists put together by two women I admire greatly:

• Beth Kanter’s list of nonprofit SXSW panels
• Alexandra Samuel’s “SXSWonderWomen: Ten women speakers to look for at SXSW Interactive 2010“

Vancouverites may also be interested in checking out the lists of Vancouver panelists compiled by Dave Olsen, Rebecca Bollwitt, and Kris Krüg.

Oh and hey, if any of y’all have panels up for voting, please let us know in the comments — we’d love to support you, too.