The Best Moment, PDX Edition

Conferences are filled with so many great moments — that a-ha moment when a speaker says something that just clicks, the moment when you meet someone who shares your interests and goals, the moments (or moments!) when you suddenly are filled with a thousand great ideas for what to do next with your blog.

I had a few of those moments today! One of them was getting to see and catch up with speaker Ariel Meadow Stallings when she arrived. As we reminisced about our early blogging days in the 2000s, there were a lot of funny memories I got to relive. Another was at lunch at the table with Doctor Who as the discussion topic. It went from Doctor Who to companions to Fringe to acupuncture to privacy vs honesty in blogging, and a few other places that were just as interesting, with mostly people I’d never met before, so that was pretty fun. And getting to see someone’s face light up when they learned about a feature in WordPress that they hadn’t known about, but had been wishing existed, was awesome, as it always is.

Did you have a best moment today? Tell us in the comments!

Comments

    1. OK, in the training today they taught us how to edit comments. Or delete them. This one should defnitely not lead the string. I’d take it down for inappropriate. How did this gal wander in here?! The seminar wasn’t even over.

      1. I got this in my email. I don’t quit understand your issue. A question was asked and I answered. It wasn’t specific to writing and I answered appropriately. I’m sorry you have such a problem that you had to respond like that. I bless you.

  2. help! I am lsitening to Live stream, took dogs out for a potty, and now Livestream is down. I need to keep listening please!! to final palel of Going Pro!! Desperate and grateful in Kansas. Can you please leave the livestream up???

  3. Whew, I made it back in to Queen Marie room Livestream for the final panel. By that time, Fireside Livestream was down, but hey, I’ve been in my kitchen listening and taking notes for nine hours! So even tho I couldn’t listen to every talk, I declare myself complete. I need a cookie and I deserve a merlot. I toggled back and forth on the two Livestreams, thanks for posting both, so grateful to you. I worked thru your lunch. I learned so many mistakes to avoid–haven’t launched yet. i learned I really want to monetize my online newspaper blog, and how to do it. I fell in love with Jetpack. I just decided today, now I know I want to go with WordPress instead of Blogger, because of your plugins and widgets and support staff. So many great speakers–that little fireball Josepha Haden. I love a tech company where so many techies are women–it builds our confidence that we can figger dis out. (oops, I forgot the coaching that spellcheck counts with SEO.) But the queen of all presenters today has got to be Kathy Cano-Murillo. She may not be the most monetized, but just watching her was like goin’ to church. So many Aha Moments: Kathy Cano-Murillo is the Oprah of Glitter. Bless you, WordPress. Very generous of you to allow me, from Kansas, to eavesdrop for free.

  4. I had many great moments today – from checking in at registration and hearing another woman say, “Your name is Mary Ellen, too?!” We connected right away. Hers was an easy name to remember.
    Eating the fabulous food and sitting between two fascinating women, Megan and Margaux. Margaux is a home-schooled teen who has great plans to blog about STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math).
    Listening to Kathy Cano-Murillo’s presentation was a joy. I agree with Tracy, who said it was like going to church! I don’t usually act all groupie and take selfies with presenters, but I was inspired by Kathy. I met her and yes, got a selfie of us together.
    I came today hoping to give my blogging a reboot – be inspired and energized to move forward. When I got home, I practiced my soprano saxophone for 90 minutes! And part of my brain was imagining how I could make a blog post about my practice today.
    So, off to write!

  5. My best moment was livestreaming from Australia, during an unusually busy early Sunday morning in the car with my husband driving along the freeway, between family commitments, with coffee in one hand, phone in the other watching Celi of TheKitchensGarden make her presentation. Gold! Thank you to WordPress for arranging livestream so we could do this 🙂

  6. I watched Livestream off and on all day, and was extremely impressed with the slick organization, and wowed by the timekeeping! There were lots of moments (in the instructional items) when I wanted to freeze-frame the action so that I could write stuff down without missing anything. I shall be experimenting on my blog, with no doubt disastrous results.

    My favourite speaker was Celie with her animals – hers is my all-time favourite blog – which makes you feel part of a tight-knit and valuable community.

    Thank you, WordPress for all the effort you put into the event – may there be many more!

    ViV Blake

    1. Viv, by chance I finally realized it WAS a DVR —if you rewound. It was a tiny red box in the upper LH corner. So I was able to stop, let the dogs out and take lots of notes. And also scroll up and down to the second room’s Livestream. Because at first I was listening on two devices in my kitchen, bombarded by two sound tracks.

      I wish that DVR/vs Live option had been explained a bit to us. I think I watched about 2/3 of all the prezis, and am still hungry for more. I would LOVE it if WordPress would now generously agree to post the two Livestreams at least for the next month, so we could all go back and finish, repeat, share with colleagues, and TAKE BETTER NOTES! Even the paying customers in Portland would like and benefit from that. I am sure that WordPress would benefit from getting new customers. And the Happiness Engineers or Farmers or fireflies or whatever would not have to repeat themselves quite so often, explaining the basics.

      We all learn differently. So much info is delivered auditory, but 65% of the world is visual, so need to see the slides and take notes.

  7. Anothe Livestream attendee from the wilds of County Antrim, Northern Ireland, I tuned in 15:45 (my time) a few minutes before kick-off and let the Buzz and laughter of those gathering in the Queen Marie Suite, soak through to my bones. I was back in the days when I attended my first Bloggy/Podcasting events in 2007/08.in Ireland. Friends I made then are still my friends today, I hope this will prove true for those fortunate to be in Portland yesterday!

    I had starred the talks I did not want to miss, and dipped in and out of others. I learned. I laughed. I enjoyed. But I did have favourites:- Joe Boydston gave me plenty to think about… if I can read my own handwriting this morning!

    The Star of the Show for me was Cecilia Gunther who brought all those well behaved and smiling animals with her. As a regular to her comments lounge, I know the love, hard work and long hours she puts into the TheKitchensGarden. She tell us how it is, good and bad, yet always manages to end each post on a positive note.

    Thanks to Livestreaming the Press Publish Portland conference became a world wide event. Thank you, WordPress!

      1. Viv, I have met Tinman at the Irish Blog Awards, several years running. One year I was surprised when the DJ played “When I’m Sixty-Four” by the Beatles, in my honour and gallant Tinman invited me to dance!

        I notice he has not posted since February, I do know that at times he has health issues and his work life can be stressful. 😦

  8. Yet another Livestream attendee, from Australia, and for me the best part was seeing Cecilia Gunther, whose blog I follow, whilst I was still in bed. I watched the forum next (after breakfast and walking the dogs – not still in bed) and was very impressed with the efficient running of the event. I am in awe of all you inspirational young ladies (and gents). Such fun. Thank you for making this possible. Joy.

  9. Cecilia Gunther is a truly American story, never mind the accent. She is my neighbor and she really tells the truth. Life on the Farm can be very difficult and hard work. Cecilia makes it fun and kinda funny for us here every morning. Happy to have her in central Illinois. The conference guests were all inspiring. Thanks WP for this platform.

  10. Wow, I missed seeing Cecilia–a big loss. What’s that they say for brides–and actors–the scene stealers are always kids and animals…! How about this WordPress and Press Publish. Keep the two Livestreams up for a month, AND, let each presenter post their prezis on their blogs–via YOUR plug in or via YouTube. (See, I was paying attention.)

  11. I am so grateful for the Livestream and took lots of notes on things I didn’t know about WordPress even though I’ve been using it for several years. I didn’t know we could save or pause or anything like that and would love to have a shot at some of the sessions I missed because a friend invited herself over and wouldn’t stop talking, I couldn’t watch both rooms at once, and my Internet connection died toward the end. But what I saw was great and so well organized.

  12. Thank you so much for lots of informations. I am not a fast note taker. I was able to use my phone to record some of the talented speakers and using the same phone to take pictures of the slides. So I have something to listen to again and lots of slides to look at. Sad to say, I missed a lot of topics too. Since I did not close my computer, I was able to watch and re-watched some of the topics again today until the content was removed. I also wish if you can keep the Press Publish Event for another week or month, so I can view it over and over again. Maybe, we can view a transcript of the entire workshop would be nice.
    So informational. Thank you so much.
    Only one thing about some questions asked were not clearly heard, maybe because did not use microphone? Some speakers rephrased the questions so that’s helped a lot. Thank you.

  14. Great to spend Saturday with you all.
    I learned about using a post from an interview of someone related to the story as a way to promote original story/post. Creating content to promote content.
    That promotion technique will become handy as my big “aha” idea comes to life. My revelation was a cumulation of the day. I picked up two key pieces at the event:
    -Old content can have new life.
    -My old content can be rewritten to be more story-like.
    Those two insights combined with time at the event focused on blogging helped me come up with http://www.rewritingmypast.com.

  15. I had such a wonderful time in Portland! I met so many great people and learned more that I could have imagined. Mary Laura Philpott was the first speaker I sat in for and here is a quote that stuck with me, “Publish – Edit – Posh. Be proud of what you put out.”
    Ananda Leeke had an amazing story to tell. I learned about bogging burn out and combining two separate blogs into one. But the highlight of her speech for me was:
    B – Be yourself
    L – Love
    O – Open up for opportunity
    G – Give back
    Later our speaker was Kelly Bejelly who went from ‘Blog to Business’ by sharing photos and recipes of her gluten free and Paleo food and got a book deal. She said, “Network + Collaboration = Saving Time.”
    I could go on and on, but I think that you all have a pretty good idea of what a great day this was. Thank you Word Press.

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