wemedia fringe anyone?

The We Media Global Forum (London: 03-04 May) brings together the trailblazers of the connected society – the thinkers, innovators, investors, executives and activists seeking to tap the potential of digital networks connecting people everywhere… but entry costs a whopping US $795 and a source tells me that tickets will soon be scarce.

I’d love to go to Wemedia but it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen. I’m sure there must be lots of people in the same boat. Don’t be me wrong, the people behind wemedia aren’t all bad – they even handed out quite a few fellowships for this year’s conference. I reckon a large number of attendees and speakers will be arriving from overseas and won’t have much to do in the days before, after, or nights during the conference.

So I propose that we – those of us who can’t go, those of us who think we’ll have time before/during/at night during the conference, and as many hangers on as we can find put together some informal gatherings in London around the time of wemedia. It’s not exactly the Edinburgh Fringe but it could be interesting.

Want to help put something together? Post a comment below or drop me an email: robin at cybersoc dot com

[some backstory for those who have read this far: Back in 1998, the International Symposium of Electronic Art was jointly hosted by the cities of Liverpool and Manchester. No sooner had the conference been announced then it became apparent that many of those in it’s target audience of students, media activists and starving new media artist types wouldn’t be able to part with the necessary cash to attend.  In response, Micz Flor, Josephine Berry and myself quickly organised Exploding Media, an almost free (I think we asked for £15 if people had it but didn’t keep anyone out) one day conference. We didn’t really step on the toes of ISEA because we held the conference a couple days earlier and our audience of 70+ consisted primarily of people who couldn’t afford an ISEA ticket anyway. ]

(Please note: "wemedia fringe" is not endorsed by or in any way connected to the wemedia conference, The Media Center, or BBC and Reuters who are co-sponsoring this years’ event. In fact, they’re unlikely to even know about this whimsical idea of mine to organise some informal gatherings to drink beer and discuss wemedia like stuff around the time of the actual event. There is also no budget whatsoever for this event and anything we manage to organise should be free or nearly free to attend.)