Cshel Chicago SEO, PR and Web Development

Silicon Prairie Social Re-Cap

Posted on 21. Sep, 2007 by Carolyn Shelby.

The Silicon Prairie Social was puh-ACK-ed…. bursting at the seams packed. Turns out there’s a lot of technology geeks in the west burbs and apparently, we’re a hungry bunch. The food seemed to run out pretty quickly. The bar was a trifle hard to get to due to the crowds, though the beers were being passed around in abundance and I saw a couple people two fisting their Rolling Rocks pretty early in the evening. Overall, there seemed to be a whole lot of networking happening and the place was rife with recruiters, so if you’re shopping for a gig it would be a good idea to catch the next event.

As you entered there was the standard “Hello, my name is…” sticky badge for your name (I had to restrain myself from nicking the cool comfy grip hot pink Sharpie… I’ve never seen one before and I want one now), but then they also had sticky badges that said “I Know…” and “I Need…”. Of course, you had some smartasses walking around with “I Need… a girlfriend” and “I Know… lots of stuff”, and then there were people who felt this was a good place to write a tome about their wealth of experience in what could be considered a -5 pt font. (Little tip from cshel — boil it down to 5 or less words and WRITE BIG — otherwise you get people leaning in *awfully*close and squinting at your chestal region to read your sticker). [...]

Popularity: 26% [?]

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Going to the Silicon Prairie Social? I am.

Posted on 19. Sep, 2007 by Carolyn Shelby.

I’m planning to be at the inaugural Silicon Prairie Social this Thursday (tomorrow, September 20th) at Mullen’s Bar and Grill in Lisle… which is conveniently located a mere 8.4 miles from my office in Oak Brook. The event runs from 6:30p-10:00p, and the bar itself is open until 1:00a. Admission is free, but if you’re interested in going, you need to rsvp pdq as they’ve already got 250 people signed up and they expect it to fill up. (Though I don’t know at what number it’s “full”… just hustle and rsvp if you want to come, k?) There will be free drinks (YAY!), lots of networking and they’re giving away an Xbox at some point during the evening.

So what is the Silicon Prairie Social? Well, to steal from their website…

Silicon Prairie Social is an opportunity for technology professionals in the Chicago area to connect in a social setting with likeminded people. The event is open to everyone, and specifically targets upwardly mobile tech professionals, entrepreneurs, service providers, Internet professionals, Web 2.0 and startup companies, the mobile industry, and mobile marketing professionals.

I’ve been to two of the TechCocktail events in the city, and they were great fun (witness the obvious fun being had in the photo — on the far left is Steve Krull, one of the sponsors of Silicon Prairie Social, I’m in the middle, and then Dave Choate is on the far right). The only problem with the downtown events is they’re just a little hard to get to from the burbs and then it’s a hike and a half to get home afterward. I’m really hoping this event turns out to be a huge success because I love the idea of being able to attend these kinds of things without having to schlep all the way downtown.

Just for giggles and some possible content for the SEO 101 podcast website, we’re kicking around the idea of me bringing a camcorder and doing little interviews with random people at the event. So if you see me walking around with a video camera, feel free to either flee in terror or come on up and ask to be interviewed. Make sure you bring me a card though… no business card, no linklove later. I’m pretty good at remembering names, but there is just no way I can remember everyone’s website addresses without something written down.

Popularity: 20% [?]

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