Rootstech - last chance to register at $149 (soon)

Well, wouldn't you just know it, I blogged about today being the last  day to register for Rootstech at the special rate of $149 for a full 3-day pass, and exactly 20 minutes later up pops a message on Twitter from @RootsTechConf to say that the deadline has been extended by another week!

So you have little longer to crack open the piggy-bank (go on, you know you want to!). You get a lot for you money, with an amazing range of sessions to attend - at least a dozen to choose from in each time-slot, plus 'un-conferencing' activities and lots going on in the Expo Hall.

I attended the first two Rootstech conferences - I think I must have been one of the first to book for Rootstech 2011. That first year it attracted over 3000 attendees, last year there were more than 4000...who knows how many will turn up this year. Fortunately Salt Lake City has lots of hotels, although the two closest to the convention centre were filled up very quickly.

The full schedule for all three days has been online for a while, but as yet there are no details of the exhibitors, only a plan of the Expo Hall, which will be 40% bigger than before, and apart from the 'usual suspects' in the form of the major sponsors, I learnt today from the latest Family Historian Bulletin that Family Historian software will be exhibiting at Rootstech for the first time. This is my software of choice; although I also use (and like) Family Tree Maker and Rootsmagic, Family Historian is my favourite. If only they had a Mac version and a mobile app...

This time next week I shall be up to my neck in Who Do You Think You Are? - Live! but once that is over the suitcase will come down from the loft and I shall turn my attention to Rootstech, all the friends I will catch up with, and the research I plan to do in the Family History Library. I can hardly wait.

Rootstech minus one - the calm before the storm

This is the last day before Rootstech, and I am not the only one trying to get some research done in the Family History Library before it all kicks off tomorrow, in my case starting with a breakfast meeting at 7:15 - if I tell myself it's really 2:15pm (GMT) it's not so bad. It will be good training for the 7:30 breakfast on Friday! I weakened this morning and had one of the hot cinnamon rolls in JB's, that I have managed to resist for the last week. Just in case there isn't enough fat and sugar in it for you, they serve it with a big ball of butter (no, I didn't, since you ask). I'll be out of temptation's way for the next few days as I'm moving hotels, to the Hampton, where they don't do don't serve them.

On Friday we (Jill Ball, Amy Coffin and me) present our panel discussion on Web 2.0 and social networking in genealogy. I have to report that it has already been very much in evidence these last few days, principally in facilitating genealogists' dinner arrangements. I had intended to have a quiet night in last night, planning today's research, when I saw on Facebook that there was a big table with some empty spaces at the Copper Canyon girl in the Radisson, anyone want to come over? I was there in 5 minutes. I had a very pleasant dinner with, among others, arch-Geneablogger Thomas McEntee who apparently has a hot-tub. The things you learn over dinner!

Seriously, sites like Twitter and Facebook are an ideal way for people to keep in touch and find each other when there are literally thousands of us spread between several hotels, the Family History Library, the Salt Palace Convention Center and (be honest) the Gateway shopping mall. Most of these places have free wi-fi. Phones are all very well, but trying to contact groups by text or voice messages would be much more time-consuming. And it's not ALL about dinner arrangements, there will be un-conferencing sessions again at Rootstech, and social media are ideal for spreading the word instantly when someone comes up with a really good idea.

With the fantastic speed of technological change in the last decade or two, it strikes me that genealogists are doing what they used to do, but the opposite way round. We used to go to meetings, in venues of lvarying quality, and then make contact by phone or letter with people at a distance who shared our interests. Then some adventurous societies took advantage of new technology to set up websites, newsgroups and the like. Now an online community of some kind is where many genealogists meet for the first time, making contact on the basis of shared interests rather than shared geography. But the virtual world on its own is not enough, and 'virtual' friends are eager to arrange 'tweet-ups' when they are all headed for a single location, be it Rootstech, WDYTYA Live or some other gathering. I have genuinely lost count of the number of people I already knew quite well online before I met them face to face. And I have some 'geni-mates' to coin Jill Ball's wonderful phrase, where I can't remember how we first met, online or in person. It's all getting to be quite seamless, and I think that's a good thing.

 

Countdown to Rootstech - it's this week!

All of a sudden, it's nearly here. Today is my last chance to tie up loose ends at work before disappearing for a week. I have a mental to-do list, so I think I have everything covered. Car parking, flights, hotel and conference registration are all booked, and I have plenty of clean clothes; not ironed, mind you, but they only get crumpled in the case, don't they?

I signed up for Rootstech as soon as registration opened, because I thought it looked quite interesting, and I was looking for an excuse to go back to Salt Lake City. I had no idea that it was going to be so BIG. There will be over 2000 people there, from all over the world. Some of the sessions will be broadcast live online, which is appropriate for an event that is looking at  potential uses of technology in genealogy.

For the first time the providers and designers of the services we will be faced with genealogists en masse. Just think of all that walking, talking feedback! And of course the genealogists will have an opportunity to find out about the services we use. And buy new toys (I have my eyes on the Flip-pal Scanner I have heard so much about).

Apart from the live sessions, you can follow the proceedings through the posts of the official bloggers (and quite a few unofficial ones, too). If you use Twitter. the hashtag is #Rootstech. See you there I hope, one way or another.

Rootstech - a week from now

I've got three work days and one day off to go before I leave for Rootstech. I'll be in Salt Lake city for a whole day before the conference, and two days after it, and my diary is filling up fast! 

I arrive in SLC very late on Tuesday night, and I seem to have promised to meet some fellow bloggers for breakfast on Wednesday. I have also agreed to give a couple of classes on British records for Library patrons while I am there, one of them on Wednesday afternoon. After more than 20 years of using LDS resources, free of charge, this is the very least I can do to give something back. The talks will also be recorded for the Research Courses section of FamilySearch. On Wednesday evening I will have dinner with friends, if I can stay awake that long.

Then there is Rootstech itself, Thursday to Saturday. My bloggers' breakfast will be good practice for the early starts that I have found are the norm at American conferences. There are so many sessions and demos I want to attend, and people I want to meet, I just hope I can fit them all in. I have signed up for luncheon talks on all three days, so I can learn while I eat. The evenings are catered for too, with Thursday night at the nearby Planetarium, sponsored by Brightsolid, and Late Night at the Library on Friday, starting with a showing of that night's episode of 'Who do you think you are?', this time courtesy of Ancestry. On Saturday night, Dick Eastman is hosting one of his legendary post-conference dinners, and I have managed to get a ticket this time! 

Sunday will be a well-earned day of rest, and it may involve brunch at the Grand America - not cheap, but worth splurging out of if you are in SLC. No need for any more food for the rest of the day, either. Monday brings another talk and recording in the Library, and, I hope, time to get some research done there. I think I shall sleep very well on the long, long flight home the next day.