Now, where was I?  Oh, yes… cheesecake.  Good stuff, right?  Anyway, after thoroughly enjoying that cheesecake and chatting with a few others during the break, it was time for afternoon sessions.  During each time slot, there were four breakout sessions to choose from.  Sometimes, it was a tough choice.  At other times, I didn’t have to think twice.  You will probably not be surprised to learn that the title of this next session called to me like a siren to a sailor.

A punny title?  Pop culture references?  How could I say no?

This session was presented by Lauren Spencer from Fetching Communications.  We learned about various widgets (stand-alone applications that you can embed on your blog to create a more dynamic and interactive experience for your readers – check out Something Wagging This Way Comes for list of the links we got from Lauren that day).  It seems like there are widgets for everything – including Facebook (so readers can like your page… hint, hint), Twitter, and YouTube.  You can even create polls and surveys for your site.

Just make sure not to engage in widget overload – too many widgets and your page begins to look like Times Square.  Your reader won’t even know where to start.

Anyway, there was one widget in particular that piqued my interest: embedding a slideshow from Flickr.  Lauren showed us how to do this using Flickr’s own app, as well as third-party applications from Flickr’s App Garden.  I made the one below using pictobrowser:

The Chronicles of Cardigan meets Something Wagging

Cool, right?  I have a feeling I’ll be using this tool a lot in the future – I was wondering how to create slideshows on the blog, but was a bit too lazy to figure it out myself.  So thank goodness for punny sessions. The session even came with an unexpected bonus: I finally got to meet Elizabeth, Jon Farleigh and Dewi from The Chronicles of Cardigan!

Now that my brain was playing songs from The Wizard of Oz on a permanent loop, it was time to head to yet another session – the last one of the day, in fact.  For this final session, I chose to attend “StumbleUpon: How to Create, Share and Discover Great Content.”  I’d heard about StumbleUpon but wasn’t really familiar with how it works.

Apparently part of the concept is based on “unexpected relevance,” which I thought was interesting.  According to our presenter (from StumbleUpon, of course), it’s the second biggest social media referrer online in North America.  So you know… kind of a big deal, I suppose.  This was yet another technical session – there are a variety of free tools and widgets (as well as paid ones) available.  If you’re interested, you can check them out here.  Any of you use it?  What do you think?

That closes the book on the sessions from Day 1.  However, the day wasn’t over yet… up next, I’ll tell you all about my evening.  It included popcorn, candy, a movie, puppies, and new friends.  After that, I’ll give you a recap of Day 2, and finally some closing thoughts.  The end is in sight!