Christmas Bloggers Meetup

We held the Christmas edition of the London Bloggers Meetup last night and if I had to describe it in one word I’d have to say it was simply great. There seemed to be a lot going on so it’s difficult to know quite where to start, but I have to start somewhere, so here goes. Let’s kick off with the speakers.

Stefan Wesche from Symantec kicked off with a talk about staying safe and secure online. He ditched the PowerPoint and adlibbed his way through, which was refreshing given he represents a big old company. He’d also come across from Munich to be with us, which means Stefan has made one of the longest LBM commutes to date. Good man. He took a difficult question about pricing on the chin and moved on to deliver some useful pointers about security. A couple that stood out include:

1.    use a different password for each site, it’s too common and too easy for hackers to use a script to hack your password these days

2.    make sure you use the latest version of WordPress / other blogging software as this will have any security holes patched up, making you less vulnerable

3.    be careful about your choice of hosting provider, particularly if you use a shared server solution – which gives me an idea, would anyone be interested in hosting their blogs on a server just for LBM’ers, let me know and I’ll set something up.

4.    choose your plugins carefully, do some research and download them directly from the author

Of course he did mention you might like to buy the latest version of Norton which is their “best product to date”. I queried him on some advice I’d been given previously about Norton using up a lot of your PCs processing power and this is something they’ve improved on in a big way with more recent versions. Roll-on Norton I say.

Well, thanks Stefan and Symantec for the guidance, the beers and also the numerous prizes.

Next up we had the rather marvellous Sian Meades talking about her blogging adventures and life as a domestic slut. A long standing LBM’er, Sian is an impressive personality in the London social media scene and I thought she delivered some useful advice, of which perhaps the most memorable was telling us all not to listen to her advice. Interesting. Well, I thought the tips about looking pretty i.e. using images on your blog, and asking for help from the LBM community were both very valid.

Thanks to Sian and the Domestic Sluts for bringing some really tasty cakes along too. I tried about four of them and I would say the mince pie and the cheesecake brownie were topping the tables, but that’s not to say I didn’t enjoy the others. The sluts are welcome back any time.

Last but not least we had Arvind, who introduced his Blog with Heart Challenge. His aim is to alleviate world poverty by helping entrepreneurs across the globe with funds to setup or run their businesses. To do this he is working with microfinance team at Kiva.org. You should definitely check this out. Arvind has created some resources specifically for any blogger who wants to join in:-

1. A resource page for bloggers with lots of ready made posts you can use in any way you like
2. A videos page with a heap of videos about Kiva and their download links.

As I mentioned last night, I have created a team on Kiva for the London Bloggers Meetup community called rather imaginatively ‘LBM’. If any LBM’ers would like to join up and see how much of a difference we can make as a community, you can do so by joining Kiva and the LBM team here.

So there you go. Thanks everyone for making this month a fantastic LBM and I look forward to kicking off again in 2010 on January 13th!

Cheers,
Andy

PS news years resolution number 1 is that I must go on a photography course.  Evidence above suggests I am a complete monkey with the camera…

Tuesday 3rd November was a very good day

Why you might ask?

Well, largely because it was the day of yet another really great London Bloggers Meetup. We were back at one of the LBM favourite spots at Dogget’s Coat and Badge on Blackfriars Bridge. Such a good venue with magnificent views over the river, a plentiful bar and lots of room for a very relaxed Meetup. I would say we had around 50-60 bloggers in the end with a really good mix of newcomers and regulars.

london bloggers meetup

The evening was very generously supported by Paramount too. I have to say, they were very welcome to be there, not only because they bought some beers and ran a great prize draw, but because their team was generally very knowledgeable. I was particularly delighted to hear about Iron Man 2 coming out next summer. I never thought I would like Iron Man, but on a long flight last year I watched and massively enjoyed it, so I can’t wait for the next edition.

Alongside the Paramount shenanigans we had a talk from blog tipster Marko Saric from Howtomakemyblog.com which was both entertaining and nicely pitched. Marko has some great ideas for complete beginners and a few tips even the more established blogger could take away. You can see Marko’s slides below and there’ll be a video out shortly soon too. Keep your eyes peeled on Marko’s blog for the video, or come back here in a week or so. Look forward to seeing the guest blog post we setup with Seojoblogs too!

As usual thanks to Peter for the excellent photos which can be found here or there are a few samples below. Also some name checks:

Tikichris – maybe you could raffle that flat screen you won for charity…
Godwyns – a pleasure as always
Matt – presumably you left last..? BTW can you send me on of those Starbucks cards, seem to have mmisplaced the one I picked up at the LBM
Siany – a brief hello and goodbye, but nice all the same. Looking forward to some cakes!
Shell – same dress for 14 days is impressive, do you think I could do the same thing with a pair of jeans and a shirt…

And so many more. Thanks to everyone for coming, it really was a fantastic evening.

Cheers,
Andy

Marvellous Mayhem at #LBM

We had another enjoyable #LBM last week with Mojito Mayhem and the very generous sponsorship from our friends at Havana Cultura. Not only did they provide us with an unending supply of Mojitos – one of which was made by my fair hands – but there was also some free tacos and a handful of great prizes. I can’t think when we’ve had more prizes tro give away in one evening, particularly with the last minute surprise gifts from Girl Geek Dinners and from the charismatic Timinator.

If you would like to know more about the Twitter Treasure Hunt (launching on 19th Oct) and the chance to win yourself a trip on Eurostar to Paris to the Giles Peterson launch party, check it all out by following them on Twitter

A huge thank to Judith from SEO Chicks for the great presentation on SEO, the slides from which you can see below. I certainly picked up a few good ideas which I’ll be looking at as soon as I grab a spare five mins. And of course thanks to Tim, best of luck in Australia and I hope we cross paths again some time soon. See if you can setup a live hookup with the Sydney version…?

Well, all that’s left to say is enjoy your Mojitos, good luck in the treasure hunt and I’ll see you all at the start of November for another fantastic London Bloggers Meetup.

Blaugust #LBM

Did you wake up this morning, tired, with a slight hangover, dehydration and a ringing in your ears?

If you did, it’s probably because you went to the Blaugust #LBM last night, which was another cracking evening. Thankfully, the tiredness and the hangover were quickly resolved with a nice cup of coffee. Now I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one to be quite surprised by how good Starbucks’ new instant coffee really is – see the picture to the left if you haven’t seen one of them yet. There was much scepticism last night, but so far the chat on Twitter today has been really positive and I’m delighted to have a life time supply – well at least enough for 20 cups (I grabbed the left overs before heading off for my train). Thanks so much to Starbucks and the Edelman crew for supporting our event.

OK, so the heat was a little much last night, but I suppose we are in British summer time, apparently. I think I’ll probably head for a slightly larger venue next time, as much as I liked the Old Crown, I would hate to be in there when they fill it with 80 people. We had around 60 and it was packed. Oh and I’m told the wine selection was pretty dreadful, at least according to our resident expert @thirstforwine.

So what was great about last night?

Well, apart from the coffee and free beers, Matt Brown from Londonist delivered a really interesting talk. Can you imagine producing over 20 blog posts each day, I struggle with one every week! This was followed by Chris from Buy.at who talked a bit about monetisation through affiliate promotions – I was surprised to hear the potential through this channel. I’ll certainly be giving it a go at some point soon.

It was great to see some old hand LMB’ers and new newer faces too. I had a good time chatting with Ruthy, Godwyns, Splendid Chris, the Bitch Buzz crowd, Mirona plus one, Jason and the Edelman folks and so many others. I always love the friendly atmosphere you all create!

That’s it from me, hope to see you all at the next #LBM which looks like being another cracker – details coming soon.

Andy