Lauren Cotton's blog

Voting ends for the annual SXSW Panelpicker on today at 11:59 CDT - which on this side of the pond translates to 5:59am tomorrow morning (Saturday 3rd September).

The Digital Brand Strategy Summit 2011 (22nd November) is designed to create a unique showcase from leading brands and industry experts on how to create, launch and implement an effective Digital Marketing Strategy for your brand.

We're delighted the organisers have offered 2 lucky Chinwagger(s) the chance to win a free conference ticket.

BeingDigital 2011 (11th - 12th October) brings four big themes for business over a two day summit giving your organisation the flexibility to participate and attend one or all four themes. Meet early stage businesses, innovators and entrepreneurs building, creating and pushing the boundaries of digital business and the new generation of digital and social technology products.

We're delighted that organisers, media140, have offered 2 lucky Chinwaggers the chance to win a free conference ticket.

The Business of Social Business (Tues 27th Sept) will take a closer look at the fundamental changes business and organisations need to make to ensure they stay abreast of the connected consumer.

We're delighted that organisers, media140, have offered two lucky Chinwagger(s) the chance to win a free conference ticket.

The Unethical Social Web (15th September) will delve into the darker side of the social web with a series of talks from the world of journalism, law and advertising, taking place at the RSA, London.

We're delighted that organisers, media140, have offered 2 lucky Chinwaggers the chance to win a free conference ticket.

Sizzling sausages and other char-grilled delights are on the menu at our Late Summer BBQ on Thursday 8th September, combined with the opportunity for Chinwaggers, the Digital Mission alumni and Bootlaw regulars to gather, mingle, chat and sip a cold beverage. Let's face it, we don't need much of an excuse and it will be the end of Summer.

You've got just over a week to submit entries for this year's BIMA Awards thanks to a two week extension, making the new deadline midnight on Friday 26th August.

The Social Media Strategies Summit (25th - 27th October) promises to see the best and brightest speakers in the social media marketing arena present emerging strategies, tactics and case studies in the successful use of social media.

We're delighted that organisers, GSMI, have offered 2 lucky Chinwaggers the chance to win a free conference ticket worth up to £1795.00. 

Social Media Marketing and Monitoring 2011 (Mon 19th September) will feature Guardian Tech Editor, Charles Arthur, "Rage Against the X-Factor" Facebook activist, Jon Mortor, Play.com, Vue Cinemas plus a hat-full of case studies and social media marketing examples.

Organisers, Our Social Times, have kindly offered one lucky Chinwagger the chance to win a free conference ticket worth £195.00

Entering the competition could not be easier, simply fill in the form below by Monday 12th September and a ticket could be yours.

The Green Data Centre and Cloud Control Conference (25th - 27th October) will foster an educational environment that aims to allow you to analyse new techniques that will not only help our environment, but also save your organisation time and money.

We're delighted that organisers, GSMI, have offered 2 lucky Chinwaggers the chance to win a free conference ticket worth up to £1290.00.

Entering the competition could not be easier, simply fill in the form below by Tuesday 18th October and a ticket could be yours.

We're known here at Chinwag for our Digital Missions - week long intensive trips to expand and develop small UK digital businesses internationally.

From our experience with Digital Missions, the group environment provides a whole bunch of benefits (more on this below), so we've been considering an exciting new idea, to create 'Mini-Missions'.

Mini-Missions will take advantage of both travelling with a group of UK delegates and the many wonderful conferences, like Picnic and LeWeb, that are currently around, some closer to our shores than others.

Following on from our recent post 'Digital Mission: The Story So Far, Future Plans, New Initiatives', for the past few months, we've been busy gathering information from as many of our Digital Mission Alumni as possible, asking how they've been getting on since their first Mission.

As previously mentioned, we're big infographic fans here at Chinwag.  So much so, that we decided to create our own based on our findings.

Combined with a few Digital Mission facts and figures, and some of the results of our survey earlier this year, there's some very interesting and impressive findings, if we do say so ourselves!

During my dreary morning commute this morning, I was flicking through the Metro only to stumble across a feature including UKTI Mission to SXSW Alumni, ParcelGenie.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has announced plans to dramatically increase the amount of domain suffixes allowed for websites in one of the biggest ever changes to the Internet's Domain Name System.

The PanelPicker entry process for the 2012 SXSW Festivals and Conferences has officially opened, proposals will be accepted until the end of the day on Friday 15th July (11:59pm CST // 5:55am UK time).

The SXSW PanelPicker was developed to offer the community a chance to get involved in SXSW - not only by submitting panel, workshop and presentation ideas but also by reviewing, commenting and voting for the ideas they'd like to see become part of the SXSW festival.

Entering a solo presentation, workshop or panel to the PanelPicker is the best way to share your ideas, make sure your expertise are included and help shape SXSW 2012.