That’s the title of the ultimate session of everything you could possibly learn at BlogWorld, according to comic blogger Jordan Cooper who opened the New Media Live! session late last week at the conference to a large ballroom room filled with bloggers, e-mailers, and social media users who came looking for ways to capitalize on their growing audiences.
Rick Calvert, BlogWorld’s co-founder, CEO, and Grand Poobah explained why this session was called Media Live: “The idea is to do it like a “Tonight Show’ format. Not so much to educate people, but to show people what you could do, and what’s possible with new media. I mean we can do the same things you can do on television or on radio or in magazines or in newspapers. This is supposed to be an example of that.”
While the four day BlogWorld conference was intensive, factual and data-driven, this final session was fairly hysterical. Cooper opened to a large ballroom filled with passionate content-driven audience. “Down in Louisville Kentucky, it’s weird –I lived down there for 4 and 1/2 years,” said Cooper. ‘You could buy guns at Wal-Mart — I thought that was a joke. I went to the counter and the guy behind it was like, ‘How much ammunition do you need?’ And I was like well, how many people do you have working here today?’”
Dave Cynkin, BlogWorld’s co-founder and Sleep Deprivationist wanted blogging enthusiasts to understand why humor was so vital, explaining that humor is a part of entertainment and that entertainment media is one of the most important types of content. “In our spare time, what do we do? We consume entertainment media: comedy, drama, fiction — so humor is obviously super important. Comedy, new media sites and videos are some of the most popular in the world or the most shared in the world. So, yeah it’s incredibly important.”
Cooper talked about the break out session. “In the Q&A part, the first three questions are always the same thing,” he semi-jokingly said. “The first person is completely wrong, the second person just makes a statement, says their website URL, their blood type and what their sign is, and the third person is just f-n crazy.”
Many of the speakers, like Jenny “The Bloggess” Lawson, talked about the books they wrote based on their blogs. Another panelist, Chad Vader in full black Star Wars armor and incredibly deep, loud and doomsday voice, just finished his own book too. He was interviewed by moderator Matt Malkoff, a writer, comedian and filmmaker:
Malkoff: What do you like to do?
Vader: I like stocking produce, I like checking people out with their purchases. Just anything to be out from the shadow of my brother pretty much.
Who’s your brother?
You know who he is; don’t be coy with me.
Tell us about your new day job?
I manage a grocery store. I do it very much good. Sorry I just had a few beers; I drink it with a straw so that I get drunk really fast.
I heard that you started a book club, is that really true?
It is true; it’s called ‘Chad’s Reading Pals’.
Chad Vader, who is in fact the combined duo of partners Aaron Yonda, the Body and Matt Sloan, the amplified Voice said that they never got a cease and desist order from the movie studio, and in fact have gone on to gain over 1.5 million online fans. People love them.
Chad Vader had solid advice for the audience, “Always make stuff, try out different things, do what you love. I guess that’s like two or three tips right there,” said Yonda, the Body. Sloan, the very funny Voice, had his own advice: “If you’re going to blog use a computer. That’s a great tip.”
Panelist David Thorne, humorist and New York Times bestselling author of I’ll Go Home Then, It’s Warm and Has Chair: The Unpublished Emails chimed in, “For a job that takes four weeks to do — do it in one day.”
Malkoff summed up the session, “Give yourself no backup plan; just focus on the work with no expectations. Do work that you love and really try to put stuff out as much as possible. Write down your goals, I think that’s a good thing. Get a lot of advice. Don’t be afraid to knock on doors of people you admire, and ask for their advice; if you don’t hear back from everyone that’s fine. But really have a mental picture of where you want to go and just stick with it and know that it’s going to take more than a couple of months and maybe more than a couple of years. I think if you just stick with it and do what you love to do, amazing things can happen.”
He told the audience that they should change the world, create a better future, stop hoping and start earning. “Just overcome your biggest obstacle – you.”
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