Jeff Jarvis blew off a little steam about SXSW's blogging policy faux pas. I sympathize -- I had a heated rant all written in Ecto and then deleted it (standard e-mail practice for writing when mad -- write it, throw it away, and then write it -- or not). The thing is, that the big go sit through the talk conferences are kind of an outmoded animal anyway. I've been to some big name ones and I didn't really enjoy them that much. The conferences that I've enjoyed the most were the ones that were more like sci-fi "con's". Less formal, much more interaction, and lots of space set up for people to talk, hack or whatever. Everybody says that the most important/interesting stuff happens outside the sessions anyway, so why not just organize meetings to facilitate more of that, and save the broadcast learning for distance learning tech. I'd be happy just to get together with interesting people -- there's sure to be plenty to talk about.