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Those of you who have been wanting a Technology conference to visit the South Eastern United States are now in luck. The event is called South By Deep South and is a take on the familiar South by South West conference. The event will be held in Birmingham, Alabama on September 26th-28th. The final details of the event are still being worked out but Ike Pigott has already let us know some of what we can expect from this event:

• Social Media/PR/Marketing
• Web development
• A full-blown WordCamp

In case you missed it, that last one says WordCamp. Personally, I thought Atlanta, Georgia would of been the first city in the South Eastern United States to get a WordCamp event, but it looks like I was wrong. Ike also notes that there will be a SideWalk Festival that will be taking place during the same weekend.

I’m really glad to see these WordCamp events making there way east rather than being confined to silicon valley. As a matter of fact, WordCamps are starting to crop up everywhere, and that is a good thing!

So, who is looking forward to this event and will you be lucky enough to attend?

This might be the last WordCamp Dallas 2008 post you see on this blog and since that is the case, better to go out with a bang! In case you were one of the unlucky ones who didn’t have a chance to attend the conference live, the good news is that there were plenty of attendees blogging, vlogging, and live blogging the event. I present to you a list of links which will correspond to the conference schedule.

Matt Mullenweg discussing WordPress 2.5 and beyond. Actually, he announced the redesign of WordPress.org along with the release of 2.5.

John Pozadzides presented his 45 ways to power up your blog.

After Lunch, Jonathan Bailey gave us the lowdown on content theft and protection along with a number of other things that bloggers of any platform would be interested in. Jonathan has also published the slides for his presentation on his own blog which can be viewed here.

Cali Lewis and Neal Campbell shared their experience with using WordPress for powering their websites.

Liz Strauss gave a presentation that was titled, C’mon, Let’s Talk! which dealt with building influence and interaction with blogging. You can check out her full presentation here.

Lorelle VanFossen stepped up to the plate and shared her WordPress Power Tips. Her presentation can be viewed here.

The next day of the event featured a live recording of the WordPress Podcast. The full video of this presentation is now online at WeblogToolsVideos.com.

The next panel was by Chris Smith who went over SEO for Bloggers. The link to the Natural Search Blog contains a link to the presentation that Chris Smith gave the attendees.

Aaron Brazell offered up an extensive presentation called WordPress FAQ. The FAQ answers questions such as can you have too many tags, what is the GPL, and the explanation of hooks. The end of the presentation takes questions from the attendees.

A panel that I particularly found interesting was the Business of blogging session featuring Liz Strauss, Mark Ghosh, Matt Mullenweg and Aaron Brazell. A ton of interesting points and conversations took place during the session and I thought it was one of the highlights of the event. Check out the ustream video that Mark Rizzn of Mashable.com recorded here.

Last but not least, Jacob Santos closed out the event with his presentation on Testing With WordPress. I have yet to see any videos posted of his session but he goes over it in more detail here.

For those that have yet to see what this thing called Woopra is all about, Cali Lewis of GeekBrief.TV interviews John Pozadzides and gives you the low down.

Tony Scott has published an entry on his blog entitled WordCamp UK proposal. Inspired by WordCamp Dallas, Tony is looking at quite possibly holding the first ever WordCamp within the UK. His blog post will serve as a gauge of interest. So far, the topics of discussion regarding this event center around:

• Format: A little more structured, such as WordCamp Dallas 2008, or more BarCamp, as WordCamp Hamburg?
• Size: Number of attendees?
• Location: London or other city? Take into account travelling and accommodation.
• Sponsorship: Would be good to subsidize the event!

If you would like to participate in or help organize the event, be sure to stop by Tony’s blog and leave a comment.

WordCamp is a conference type of event that focuses squarely on everything WordPress. Everyone from casual end users all the way up to core developers show up to these events. These events are usually highlighted by speeches or keynotes by various people. For example, WordCamp Dallas will feature the following speakers

• Matt Mullenweg on WordPress 2.5 and Beyond
• 45 Ways To Power Up Your Blog by John Pozadzides
• How to prevent, detect and stop content theft by Jonathan Bailey
• Cali Lewis and Neal Campbell
• C’mon, Let’s Talk! Building influence and interaction with blogging by Liz Strauss
• WordPress Power Tips by Lorelle Van Fossen
• SEO For Bloggers by Chris Smith
• Aaron Brazell
• A panel of people to discuss the business of blogging: Mark Ghosh, Liz Strauss, and Aaron Brazell
• Testing With WordPress by Jacob Santos

WordCamp is a spin off from the popular BarCamp which was a spin off of FooCamp. Each one of these events are smaller in nature when compared to your particular conference, but they are usually focused on a particular subject. So what can you expect when you attend a WordCamp event? Based on the numerous amounts of videos and photos taken from attendees, you can expect a whole lot of fun in an atmosphere that promotes social interaction.

The first WordCamp conference was held in July of 2006 in San Francisco. Matt Mullenweg pulled this event together in only three weeks time and ended up with about 300 people in the Swedish American Hall. The first international WordCamp event was held in Beijing China on September 1st, 2007. However, not too many people knew of the event. So the first KNOWN international WordCamp event took place in Israel on October 25, 2007. Since then, there have been WordCamps all across the world including Hamburg, Melbourne and soon to be Dallas.

You don’t have to be an expert to show up to WordCamp. In fact, the majority of folks are casual end users/fans of the open source software. The conference is great but what happens at the local pubs after a day of speeches is even better, or so I’ve heard. If you want to learn more about WordPress from those who practically have it within their bloodline, do yourself a favor and purchase a ticket and show up. You’ll be glad you did!