Monday 22 March 2010

Univercell Chennai IndiBlogger meet



Univercell Chennai IndiBlogger meet


The much awaited IndiBlogger Chennai meet was held in Chennai on the 20th of March 2010. Since the meet is happening after 2 years, there was huge expectation for such an event. Since there were some problems with the WiFi setup in GRT convention centre, the start was a bit delayed. About 200 bloggers had turned up for this event and were swarming the registration desk for registering their attendance to the meet.

Event started with Anoop introducing (or damaging should I say) all the people behind the IndiBlogger. This was followed by a hilarious video presentation of Hitler doing everything he can to make it for the meet, but was unable to. This did set up the tempo for the meet.

The main purpose of such a meet is to have face connect with other bloggers and to know about each other. The session that followed was a self introduction – 30 SECONDS OF FAME – in which every one is given 30 seconds to say something about themselves and their blog. It usually would be 1 min, but due to the overwhelming crowd and a bit of delay in the start this was restricted to only 30 seconds for each person.

What would have otherwise been a boring session in almost any other forum, this was rather very interesting, made interesting by the people who introduced themselves and occasionally the “manual time reminder” by the organizers. We were introduced to people who maintain a whooping 18 blogs and still manage to manage all these along with getting good hits, people have earned from their blogs – there was a person who was blogging for over 5 years and have earned over 1.5 lakhs!!! We also had people from media who are regular bloggers and who think blogging gets more reach than the traditional media. It was really good and pleasantly surprising to know almost all the 200 people blog about 200 different things! Even more heartening was to know that there was a very good number of Tamil bloggers who attended this meet. There was even one Tamil Blogger who had come for the meet all the way from New Zealand, where she has settled down for the past 25 years, but actively blogging in Tamil. Hats off to the entire crowd!!

Following the introduction, everyone were given a chart with a string attached to it. This exercise was – I would put it as – BACK SCRATCHING – something like a backbiting? Maybe. Once people know what each other do, they are to comment on each other and their blogs. This was mostly used to as a written introduction to each others blogs. A very welcome and different kind of exercise which immediately interested everyone. I am sure there had been many funny comments on some of the charts. 

Next came the DISCUSSION TIME in which Mr. Bala Barathy of Zee Tamil was to answer the queries that bloggers have. He along with another veteran from an Australian media answered to the queries of the bloggers. To be honest this could have been still made better. Of course, there were some useful information and talks, but overall this part was not as interesting as the rest.

Next, it was the turn of the sponsors of the meet UNIVERCELL gave their talk in which they revealed that they are now planning to start a blog on their own. They also have invited reviews from the participants about some of the latest mobile phones and announced that the best reviewer would get become the official blogger for Univercell. I am sure there are quite some takers for this.

Finally, FOOD AND REFRESHMENTS, definitely the most awaited of all. I somehow cannot stop wondering if it is master-plan of the organizers to have this at the end. . Friends were made during this time as well and many of us exchanged our cards and blogs with the others. T-shirts were distributed after the refreshments to end a very well organized blogger’s meet.

Overall a very well organized event which helped in knowing more about blogging as well as fellow bloggers. It would be great if more such events are organized in Chennai.

12 comments:

Srivalli said...

It was great meeting all the wonderful bloggers from Chennai...we should have more such events.

Anonymous said...

This was a good post providing details and impressions of the blogger meet.

Shrinidhi Hande said...

I missed it. Will try to make it next time...

Trails of a Traveler said...

@Srivalli: I agree with you. It was a very useful event and should be conducted more regularly.

@Linda: Thank you

@Shrinidhi: You definitely missed it!

ROAD TRAFFIC said...

good! my name can also be added for next meeting.

Trails of a Traveler said...

@ROAD TRAFFIC: Definitely. That can be done!

S. Susan Deborah said...

Hi:

Don't think I met you but the meet was wonderful.

Hope to see more of your trails.

Joy always,
Susan

Trails of a Traveler said...

@Susan Deborah: Thanks a lot. Even I do not remember meeting, but I am going through blogs of everyone who attended the meet. Will catch up soon.

Ram

Shrinidhi Hande said...

when is the post on Agumbe trip expected?

Trails of a Traveler said...

@Shrinidhi: On its way!

ROAD TRAFFIC said...

If possible, this meet may be organised once in 6 months on a holiday.

Trails of a Traveler said...

@Road Traffic: It is actually conducted everymonth, in various cities...
So depending on the number of cities being covered, the turn will come Chennai after other cities are covered.

Ram