The second one, as is is evident from the title of this post, is Madonna’s only London date from her Sticky & Sweet tour at Wembley Stadium. It was a bit of a manic drive up there (I allowed 4 1/2 hours to get from Swindon to London, which should have been plenty of time, but for the traffic snarl-ups that occurred seemingly from the moment we passed the M25 turn-off and immediately regretted following SatNav’s ‘through’ London route!). She was due on at 8:30 and that was pretty much the moment we were got to the multistory car park on site, so we arrived in our seats a little stressed! In the end, she didn’t start until after 9pm which would have been a relief for the many other people we saw stuck in different traffic queues leading to the event.

As we sat in the stadium waiting for her to start, comparing it with O2 Arena (it looked, to me, like it was wider than the O2 and had mores space for the standing masses below, but otherwise not massively different), I commented to Manda that I was surprised about the number and size of speakers hung from the rafters. I’m no sound rigging expert, but for a venue of that size they just didn’t seem to be big enough or in sufficient numbers, but perhaps they were deceptively powerful?

Apparently not.

From the get-go, it seemed like the sound was going to be an issue. Perhaps the sound was good for those people directly in front of the stage, but the vast majority were not down there, the vast majority were reliant on these speakers. The effect was that the sound comprised a low – but loud – rumble and Madonna’s voice often screechingly loud over the top; there was nothing in the middle or top ranges for the music. It sounded very poorly mixed and was, at times, really quite uncomfortable (largely depending on how well Madonna was singing at that point). I read one person comment that it was difficult to tell what she was singing until some way into the song. I don’t know about you, but one of the things I really enjoy about concerts is listening to the lead-in to a concert gig, recognising the tell-tale chords, melodies etc as they hint to the song that’s about to start. For this gig, there was none of that – it was often a few lines in that I recognised the song, because the melody was not there in the music (because of the missing mid and high ranges)!

I did wonder if this was anything to do with the fact that the stadium was open air – perhaps the wind that occasionally came in and made an appearance was messing with the sound, but I suspect not. I still think it’s down to poor rigging/set-up, not atmospheric conditions. The O2 Arena sound was brilliant, in comparison.

Still on the topic of the sound, another thing that irritated me was not really one of the technical set-up, but artistic choice – Madonna’s insistence on doing mash-ups of older songs with new. The best example I can think of is when she did a ‘version’ of the vocals of Vogue over a backing track of ‘4 Minutes (to Save the World)’. Perhaps good in theory, but what with the sound problems we experienced, it sounded very flat. People wanted to hear some hits, and there was a brief moment at the end where the familiar piano riffs from Vogue were dropped in and the effect was instant ‘yay!’. Comparison time – when Kylie performed, she did some alternative versions of here song (e.g. an a cappella version of ‘I Believe In You’) but didn’t try to be too clever, and for her final song? The original, not mucked-about-with ‘I Should Be So Lucky’. Yes, it’s cheesy, but boy did it hit the right spot, and the atmosphere was fab. There was none of that sheer exuberance and joy at the Madonna gig, I’m afraid to say.

And now on to the stage setting. Once again, probably very good if you were in the minority who were at floor level or at the back of the stadium looking straight on. For everyone else, it wasn’t great. There was a big screen showing the pre-production graphics and video clips, but it was inset on the stage – if you were viewing from the side, it could not be seen. There were additional screens at either side of the stage which were used for the camera close-ups of what’s happening on stage, but these were not really big enough and were set far too low for everyone to see – they absolutely should have been rigged far higher up. If anyone in the seating area stood up, the people behind would also have to stand to get a chance of seeing the screen, and so on it would go until everyone was standing. Perhaps the argument is that seats are optional and that you should be on your feet anyway, dancing. Fine – give us some decent sound and an atmosphere to go with it and that might have transpired! Cue comparison time … At the Kylie gig, the screens were bigger, brighter and easy to see and as for the stage graphics, if your vision of the graphics behind the artist and dancers was obscured, the entire stage floor area was also lit up and displaying graphics – so no-one got left out. Just look how good it was here!

Final comparison time – the end of the show. At every gig I’ve been to, there’s been some kind of encore. Kylie absolutely excelled with hers, while Madonna didn’t ‘play the game’ at all. When the screens showed the phrase ‘Game Over’, it really meant over.

Finally, we had the fun and games of getting out of the venue – it took me an hour just to get out from the multistory car park and on to the street! While I was expecting a delay, I didn’t think it would be quite that bad. I have read that because of the late start, many people who used public transport to get there were unable to leave by the same method because stations had closed, causing the streets around to be clogged up with masses of people which, in turn, seemed to stop the flow of traffic exiting the site.

All in all, this was a disappointing concert, mostly because of the sound problems which led to the lack of atmosphere in general. Madonna didn’t appear to be on top form, either – screechy and often out of tune vocals and arrangements that seemed to lack pizazz.

Manda (my wife) had always wanted to see Madonna live, but this wasn’t the experience she had hoped for, for sure. "The thing is" she said, "I know that she can sing, but this set-up didn’t seem to give her the opportunity to show that fully." We might give ‘her Madgesty’ another go in the future, but it sure as heck won’t be at Wembley Stadium. One thing is absolutely without question – the dancing and choreography is excellent and you have to take your hat off to the woman (I nearly said girl), she is supremely fit.

The irony of this is that having seen Mrs Ritchie’s latest offering, tomorrow we’re going to see Mr Ritchie’s latest offering. Given the reviews of the film so far, and having seen her offering last night, I think it’s fair to say that Madonna’s concert will be ‘Swept Away’ by Rocknrolla as this year’s must-see Ritchie extravaganza.

In summary then … Kylie: Wow! Madonna: Ow!

Fair Offer Policy: I agree to wait 24 hours to see what responses I
get before deciding who to give my item/s to. This gives members on
Daily Digest, or those who don’t have continual access to the
Internet a fair chance to reply.

Wow, that little phrase there really changes the responses you get. No longer is it first-come, first-served. Instead, the responses are all about who’s most deserving of the freebie. Here are just a handful of the responses I got (all typos are theirs, and I can’t be arsed to tidy up for them):

hi if this is still available i would be very greatful for it as our
matrress (passed down from family) has got the springs sticking out and half of the buttons missing,its very uncomfortable to try and
sleep on but cash is tight so cant afford to buy one new for quite a
while.we can collect anytime over the weekend sunday would be better
for us but if saturday would be better then im sure we can do that.if
you want it gone before that i could pop round after school
hours.many thanks lisa

A good one for starters. A mattress that has "passed down from family", like some kind of heirloom? "Here you go, son, this was my father’s and my grandfather’s before him, and now I’m letting you have it". My heart bleeds. Probably because of the those vicious sticky-out springs. It’s uncomfortable but there’s no cash to buy a new one "for quite a while" – evidently they’ve calculated how long they need to save up for a new one (but the broadband and computer obviously gets funded – much more important than sleep, after all). Fail! So, I thought this response was atypical. How wrong I was:

I would be so very grateful of this for my sister, who is having to use a blow up matteress at the moment. Due to a serious incident her mattress was taken away by police and she has not been able to afford to replace it yet. Thank you so much for taking the time to read this.

Now it’s the sister who’s suffering, and on a "blow-up mattress" too. But what’s this? "Due to a serious incident her mattress was taken away by police". ? And again ? WTF? Let’s hope it wasn’t anything serious, like a stabbing incident which caused the police to remove it for DNA testing or something. And if it was, let’s hope it doesn’t hapen again – it’s a blow-up mattress, after all, and wouldn’t take a puncture very well. Anyway, if I am to give away a mattress, the last person I want to invite over to my house to collect is someone who admits in their begging note that their last mattress was in some way involved with a "serious incident" that required the police to take it away from the scene of the crime. Who are these people? Fail! Who’s next?

Hello I hope I am not to late to ask about this. I would like to ask you if I could have it please I am disabled and on a very low income my Husband is a large framed man and he has killed the mattress that is on the bed. It does not have any spring in it and I cant even lay on it these days with out being in pain. even to sit on it the mattress is uncomfortable. This would be so welcomed in my home please.

I think this one might be genuine. But the husband "a large framed man" has, apparantly, "killed the mattress". Perhaps it was the same man who was responsible for the previous lady’s mattress which appears to have met an unfortunate end? Anyway, they didn’t get the mattress on the basis that I know that if I find the mattress squidgy and not up to supporting my 13-stone carcass without giving me backache in the morning, it won’t be any good for said disabled lady and her large-framed husband. So, who’s next in the queue?

Oh, YES PLEASE!!! We desperately need a new mattress as ours has
outlived its lifespan and I’m waking with backache. I prefer a
softer mattress. My husband and I keep meaning to go look for a new
mattress but with a very hyperactive little boy we foster, we just
never seem to find the time to go looking and buying one!! You would
be saving us an ENORMOUS effort if you would allow us to have it! We
just never seem to have any leisure time at all!

Suffering from back pains? Check. No time to get a new one? Check? Tugging at heart strings by letting me know that they are good people who take on foster children? Check. Again, might be genuine, but who knows for sure. Finally:

hello, i would really love this as mine has just about had it with
the springs sticking through, and i dont seem to be able to get one on
here always gone before i can ask , or as i dont drive and have to
arrange it with family, i think they give it to first to collect. but
never mind if its gone i will keep trying, but i would be very grateful
of it.

Another person suffering from deadly sticky-out springs. Seriously, does this happen anywhere other than Tom & Jerry cartoons? Apparently it does. Swindon seems to be plagued with inferior-springed mattresses, by the look of it.

Oh. Wow. This is just perfect. I had said ‘finally’ a moment ago, but just as I finished the last paragraph, another response came in. Perfect timing! And this one has it all:

do you still have this available please? as a single mum i cannot afford to replace the one i have (which has springs poking out all over lol)..we have just moved to your area,we are in newhall street….my eldest and i could walk it round the corner at your convienience …
please please please…. i am so desperate to get a good nights sleep but what with christmas and my 3 children needed new ones when we moved alas mummy gets overlooked lol

In the end, I decided to offer the mattress to none of the above. The winner simply wrote:

yes pls can i collect it patricia

To which I replied:

As you replied with the most straightforward and non-creepy ‘woe is me’ tale, I’m giving you first dibs on this.

So, FreeCyclers, the lesson if you want something from lloydi is to cut the crap and keep it simple. Oh, and a bit of punctuation, spell-checking wouldn’t go amiss, either. Tsk tsk.

Some of Manda’s relatives have gone into a business venture together (a Chinese Buffet in Swindon, Wiltshire), and I offered to help by building a web site for them. I knew that they had enough financial outlays, and didn’t want them to get someone else to do it and either be charged too much or get a shoddy product, or both! I knew, also, that it didn’t need to be too involved – just a web site to give people an idea of prices, what’s on the menu, a booking form (Christmas bookings much welcomed!), all fairly simple stuff.

But the original logo designs I saw were not great. The ideas were created in PowerPoint by one of her family and I couldn’t help but think "That really shouldn’t go up out the front of the building", plus there were other considerations like letter headings, menus, flyers etc. Admittedly, these are things that I’d not thought of before, as I’d never had to.

Knowing that that Photoshop is not the best tool for logo design, and acknowledging that it would take me an age to get something half decent together in Illustrator, I ended up using the simple drawing tools in Skitch, a program that’s really only designed as a screen grab tool, with some basic tools for annotation/highlighting etc. But I have found them to be a real joy to use. And so I ended up creating the main logo and other related images entirely in Skitch. The image can output as SVG – it’s all vector-based.

Last week the restaurant opened for business, and I couldn’t believe how good the logo looked in place on the front of the building. The simple black background contrasting with the backlit red and orange was so effective – from a distance, it was clear to see that there was something new at the site, and I really hope that it draws attention to random passers-by, just as it did to me. Naturally, I hope that they are able to make a success of the business and if they do, I can feel happy that I may have contributed in some way towards that goal.

‘cos I paid a man to iconize me … and I’ve either aged a few years (e.g. 10) or I really have a false self-perception!

I’m pleased to report that I can tick most of the boxes where preparation is concerned, but I wanted to elaborate on one point that Joe makes regarding setting up browsers in advance for anything that you want to demonstrate. My advice – don’t.

In my experience, most of the conferences that offer wireless connectivity suffer almost from the word go, such that good connections – or any connection at all – cannot be guaranteed. Thankfully, it’s never happened while I’ve been presenting, but I cannot say how many times I’ve seen people presenting visibly flapping because their idea of showing off a feature of site A or site B has to be cancelled becaue they can’t connect. And even when there is a connection, the mere fact that you may have 800 eyeballs staring at you means that when you are trying to do something like fill out a form, you will make stupid mistakes, you will fumble, you will find it uncomfortable as there is silence while you wait for the browser to do something.

So, I’d like to add to Joe’s already excellent list of tips with one of my own: pre-record anything that you want to demonstrate.

In many presentations that I’ve given of late, I’ve used screencasts embedded in my slides. I can do however many takes I have the time and patience for at home, keep that video file for the presentation and re-use later. In that screencast, I make sure to allow for live explanation of what’s happening – usually accompanied with a circular motion of the mouse around the section I might want to refer to – and when presenting it, the cursor is in itself a prompt for me to describe that feature. Another advantage of this approach is that you *know* how long the demo portions will take, which makes timing as a wholemuch easier.

There’s no problem with lack of internet connection, although you have to be aware that if you rely heavily on the visuals, a hard drive failure or other similar disaster means that you will not be able to wing it using notes alone (but, again, you can prepare by having backups of slides on a key drive, and even a backup ‘pooter).

So, that’s my way of doing things, and it really makes presenting so much more stress-free :-)

Yesterday was the day that we said our final goodbyes to dad. If you read my previous post on this blog, you’ll know that my relationship with my dad was, like the rest of my family’s relationship with him, not a typical one. Nonetheless, I wanted to be there for his funeral (or rather cremation); it was the right thing to do even if I hadn’t had much to do with him in recent years.

I allowed almost 3 hours to make the journey from Swindon to South London – plenty of time, or so I thought. I had imagined I’d be there an hour early, having a cup of coffee with my brother somewhere near the venue. But as I reached the first Reading  junction on the M4, the traffic slowed down to a crawl, with all three lands almost at a standstill and remained like that for the next 30 minutes. My ‘buffer’ was disappearing fast. When I reached the next motorway exit, I decided to come off, loop around the roundabout at the top and use that as an opportunity to get a look further ahead up the M4 to see if it cleared ahead. It didn’t (and now I know what the cause of the delay was) so I diverted to Basingstoke, took the M3 up to London, back on the M25 and then on to the M4 again taking me into central and then south London, all the while watching my estimated time of arrival (according to Satnav) slip further and further back. It went to 1:05pm (the service was at 1pm) but with my foot down I managed to squeeze it down to 1:00pm exactly. I never saw It creep back to 12:59 and once I hit central London it only started to slip back again.

I knew, in my heart of hearts, that being a bit late would not change his ‘present condition’, but I really wanted to be there to hear what my brother had to say at the service. We got there at 1:15, and walked in to the venue to the sounds of Andreas Bocelli’s "Time to Say Goodbye". I’d caught the closing credits, you could say.

Afterwards, we made our way a short way across south London to a café (it was a low-key affair), where Manda and I, my brother and partner, Sandy (one of my dad’s previous partners and someone who went through so much of the mad moments with dad) and a handful of dad’s recent friends and neighbours joined us. It wasn’t the traditional wake – there was no heavy boozing (somehow, that didn’t seem appropriate), instead we had baguettes and coffees and just talked about some of the funny moments in dad’s life, his unending wit and the crazy/dark moments he had.

Andy (my brother) has said to me in the past that we should try to write some of this stuff down for prosperity, combining it with some of the other characters he’s known in his life. And I suppose in some way I can do that here – there were some things that I hadn’t heard before that made me laugh and some that really shocked me. I heard the story about a bar he was sat at once, a bar that had underneath it some hooks to hang handbags on. He fell off his bar stool – probably not for the first or last time – but on his way down managed to catch himself on one of the hooks. By his nose! For what probably seemed like a slowed-down comedy moment to others (but a slowed-down moment of sheer agony for him), he hung there for a moment before the nostril gave way to the inevitable. Ouch. Then there was the time that Sandy answered the door to dad who had been sleeping rough for some weeks: "Can I use your toilet?" he asked, to which Sandy said yes. Some time later, Sandy went up to investigate why he was taking so long to discover him taking the side panel off the bath – he must have had a flash of inspiration weeks after last leaving the house, remembering that he’d hidden something in there: a stash of vodka. I imagine the scene as he stood there at the door asking to use the toilet, screwdriver in hand (that wasn’t how it was, I was just thinking of the absurdity of it all)! Sandy probably has so many other stories of his crazy times, due to the alcoholism. One New Year’s Eve he told her that he would be back by midnight (yeah, right) but ended up back at 2am, handcuffed to two policemen who wanted to search the house. They uncovered a gun and Sandy was not entirely sure whether they believed that she wasn’t complicit in some way! Turns out he’d tried to pull (or had pulled) off a bank robbery, for which he’d later do time. Another time after an argument, he’d threatened to shoot them both! Sandy wisely decided to go for a walk and let him cool down. When she returned she discovered holes in the wall and thought to herself "that’s a funny place to make holes for the radiator pipes", as he was in the process of fitting a radiator. Later when moving the sofa about, a couple of bullets fell to the floor. Crazy times indeed.

The weird thing is that despite the tragic aspects of his life, we were all able to sit there ourselves and have a laugh about it, even Sandy who’d witnessed some of his most bizarre behaviour. I was glad that I’d gone up to the service and the aftermath. I was also pleased to discover that regardless of his darker moments, he did have a group of people who he called his friends and who thought John was a real character, a funny guy who would, to use one of their word-for-word quotes, "be sorely missed". The truth is that it’s much easier to forgive friends and drinking acquaintances for their various foibles than it is close family. Friends can make new friends, they can decide who they wish to associate with and they can more easily overlook parts of their friends’ lives that don’t fit with their moral code. With family it’s different, it doesn’t work like that. The irony is that had dad been the funny guy who lived next door to me and who I occasionally chatted to while nipping out for a pint of milk, the old guy with the colourful past and the raft of amusing anecdotes, rather than my dad, I probably would have got on better in recent years.

So, now the deed is done. All that’s left is for us is to work out how we collectively pay for the service (not surprisingly, there is pretty much nothing in the ‘estate’ that he leaves behind, aside from letters, photos and other memorabilia) and for his ashes to be scattered. He’ll finally settle somewhere over a cliff-edge in Cornwall, a place that he loved as a young adult, when he would take us on camping trips as a family, before the various demons took hold. 

There’s the saying "You come into the world with nothing, you leave with nothing -  you can’t take anything with you" (or words to that effect). I get the sentiment, but most people do leave something behind, even if it is a bit of material wealth that is passed on . But in dad’s case, there really is nothing left behind – other than us, his children. He apparently wrote in a letter to one of his sisters in the past something along the lines of "It’s not what you achieve in life, it’s what you leave behind", a bit of a twist on the earlier saying. It’s almost as if he had admitted and accepted his failures in life but acknowledged that he had indirectly left a mark, be that by his children or by the impact he may have made on friends.

And now I’m wondering quite how to finish up this entry and drawing a blank, so I’ll just leave it at that. Oh I know what else I wanted to say: do you know if there’s any way I can find out if I’ve fallen foul of any speed cameras? In my mad journey up to the crematorium, I think I may have been over the speed limit in a couple of spots as I desperately tried to make it to the crematorium. I may have to write a pleading letter or two, but for now I’m keeping my fingers crossed!

When I heard the news that you had shuffled off this mortal coil, my initial reaction was "Oh, so it finally happened then – took yer time, didn’t you?" On one hand I felt guilty for responding like this, yet on the other hand I know that because of your actions, I couldn’t really feel any other way.

Later that day, I withdrew into myself a little, feeling sad. Not sad at losing a father as others would, but sad at what might have otherwise been, sad that I wasn’t able to really feel sad (if you catch my drift) and sad that you spent the last years of your life in what I would consider to be very sad circumstances. Yes, that was a lot of use of the word ’sad’ there, but that’s how it all ended up.

I was mentally recalling picture’s from mum’s photo album – you remember mum? She was the one you used to slap about when you first started drinking – where you were building the extension on the house in which I was born. I can see you in that photo looking all proud – you had a wife, 3 children, a good sized house and a good job. Things were only on the up, and how might things have been if that good upward curve had continued in that fashion?

My early memories of you are blocked. I cannot remember the screaming rants and the violence – either I was asleep, too young or my own mind decided to file that away in a corner somewhere never to be found again – but I know they happened. My memories of you as a child are of that person who visited when he wasn’t working out of the country somewhere exotic ( Saudi Arabia – was that for the work and money alone or did you choose to work in a ‘dry’ country on purpose?) and who always came with gifts. My first brand new bike (a Raleigh Boxer) that was from you, as was the first tape recorder, and I have to give credit for my early interest in music – I was the only person in my class at the age of 8 years who could claim to ‘be into Kraftwerk’, thanks to the pirate tapes that you used to get out there and bring back.

In later years, as I grew older and was more able to understand your illness, so did your inability to be able to deal with it despite numerous occasions where people who loved you tried their darndest to help you through. There was the accident that nearly killed you (Mr Indestructible), your cry for help dive into the River Thames, your bank robbery shenanigans and the ensuing prison terms and of course the ongoing AA meetings. We tried to help but along the way and over successive years you managed to alienate everyone until all you had left was a flat in Peckham that you didn’t own and some drinking buddies who, while perhaps not angels themselves, were well aware that you could be a problem once you had a drink inside you.

You had something about you – I’ve described it to people in recent days as ‘a spark’, perhaps a cheeky glint in your eye. You were funny and always a practical person, good with your hands (even while in Prison … learning how to use the computers to make Fake IDs that later got you in to trouble, ah such fun and games!). You were intelligent too, but obviously that was not enough to tell yourself that what you were doing was affecting you and everyone else around you, such that when you died you had little contact with any of your family. When I think of what happened on the night you died – waking from sleep with breathing difficulties, effectively drowning in your own lungs before having a heart attack – and realising that the person you called from your little one-bedroom flat was a support worker, not one of your sons, your daughter, one of your sisters or a wife/partner, it makes it seem even more sad. As we ready ourselves for a Christening this weekend for baby Freddie, I cannot help but reflect on how badly things can go wrong, that one day you were like this too, cradling a child and wishing the best for him/her (and I think we all turned out pretty well, despite anything else that might have happened). I would hate to think that anything in our lives – as in your children’s lives – could ever cause us to be in the situation that you ended up in. Actually, now I think of it you have been inspiration of sorts – you’ve showed us exactly what we should not do.

So, farewell dad. I may never understand the demons in your head that caused you to go so massively off the rails and I hope that if there is an afterlife that you get a better crack at it next time around, for you and everyone who knows you.

Click on the thumbnail to see a comparison (it’s a 2.8mb animated gif).

[Note - I was accessing AOL's site from work and it appears to be missing some content blocked by the firewall, but you can still see the similarity]

Well, that’s what I always use to say to people: "You have got to check out the Boost bars in Aus – they are to die for." I’ve oft lamented the fact that back here in the UK we don’t seem to have anything that quite matches up. Sure, there are fruit juice and shakes bars, but somehow they never really seem to have that extra special something that I remember from when we used to have them in Aus.

But this weekend something wonderful happened – while taking a walk through a shopping centre in Oxford Manda spotted a familiar looking logo: "It’s a Boost bar!" I had to do a double take, but yep, there it was, no copycat affair, this was the real thing!

It turns out that the outlet had opened just over a week ago and is only the second to open in the UK (the first being in Manchester). The guy on the counter gave us all the sales spiel (including one particularly cheesy line about some people considering it the ‘eighth wonder of the world’) but I cut him a bit short by explaining that he didn’t need to sell to us – we were already well and truly sold on the concept! He added that ultimately they want it to be as big as Starbucks. Sounds a bit pie in the sky at first, but when you consider that the brand started in 2000 in Aus and has had phenomenal growth since then – "the fastest-growing juice business in the Southern Hemisphere" – that may not be all that unlikely. The guy who’s brought it to the UK is Richard O’Sullivan (no, not the actor), and he can thank his daughter for the tip-off:

It was his daughter who came across Boost Juice on her gap year in Australia. She phoned home to tell O’Sullivan, “Dad: you could do this.” He got straight on a plane to judge Boost for himself. “It stopped me in my tracks. It was an explosion of flavour, tasted great, and you just knew it was good for you.” O’Sullivan, 44, now believes the UK juice bar market is ripe for an Aussie invasion.

And the thing is, I can remember thinking exactly the same thing: "This is such a great business opportunity, why aren’t there any in the UK?". It’s just a shame I wasn’t able to phone up a fabulously wealthy entrepreneurial father to come out to see what I was on about, as it looks like I’ll have to shell out the full price for a Strawberry Squeeze from here on in. But I’m happy to do that :-)

So, I can remove that ‘you must do this if you’re in Aus’ from my list, or at least I will be able to once they’ve established more of a foothold in the UK. Perhaps I should be sending people to Manchester or Oxford instead?

Read more about Boost in this article in the Independant

There are ten copies to give away and all you need to do is:

1. Print out the PDF below
   
2. Track each of us down (the flyer has a picture of each of us and where we’ll be speaking)
3. Ask us nicely to stamp the relevant section on the flyer.
4. Buy us a beer (optional)
5. Offer up some mindless chit chat (optional) before finding your next victim, I mean author
6. When you’ve got the whole set, be sure to ask your final stamper to mark the time/date and sign it for you (the final stamper will need to retain the flyer or just tear off that bottom section as proof)

The first ten people to complete the flyers will each get a copy of the book, once it’s available to ship. Good luck!

[tags]SXSW, SXSW2007, WSC, Web Standards Creativity, Competition[/tags]