When Microsoft couldn't get me to TechFest as planned, we decided we still wanted to go to a conference about emerging technology - how handy that O'Reilly was running one that week and that a friend reminded us at just the right time. It's like spending a week mainlining gadget blogs, New Scientist and Usenet but with other people in the room - lots of really smart, really interesting people. I wish I could have got to more sessions and sometimes I picked the interesting (food hacking, Violet Blue... read more