At Podcamp NYC, you are encouraged to take pictures, record sessions with video or audio, blog, or otherwise record media during the event. One caveat is that all recordings made at Podcamp carry a Creative Commons Attribution- Non-Commercial- Share-Alike license.

If you do record things, and post them to the web, you need to provide attribution about where it was recorded, and we ask that you tag pictures, audio, video and the like with podcampnyc metatag, making things easier to find on the web.

You may want to bring:

-Power You might want to bring a power strip, and be willing to share. We will have access to power outlets, but they aren’t unlimited. As a result, a power strip would help you and your friends have power to your cell phones, computers and other gear you might have in tow. Extra batteries for your gear is always a good idea as well.

-your laptop. Some people like to live blog at events, and we think this is great. Keep in mind that while wi-fi is available at Poly, with this many people hopping on at once, access may be a bit slower than optimum. Keep this in mind, and consider maybe waiting to upload large files until the end of the day.

-or Just a Notebook- Sometimes, taking notes with a pen and paper works just as well as dragging all your gear around. Sometimes it’s even better, because you have less distraction during sessions.

-Business cards- You’re going to meet a lot of people at Podcamp, and you’re likely going to want to continue those conversations after the event. Bring a bunch of business cards or simple cards with your name and contact information on it. Even if you don’t have any fancy business cards, you can make and print simple ones - the important thing is to exchange contact information easily with the really great people you’re going to meet. (I look at business cards as a memory booster, and a reminder of who I’ve met. Sometimes, I even put notes on the back so I remember relevant information for later. )

-Comfortable shoes and dress- If you haven’t been to Podcamp before, this is a very relaxed conference, and you’ll see pretty few people dressed in suits or business attire. We like you just the way you are, and you’ll probably feel more comfortable if you dress casually.

-A quick word about Food and Drink- We will have access to Poly’s cafeteria for food and lunch. Beyond the cafeteria, other information about places to go grab breakfast, lunch or dinner will be available in our Podcamp NYC guide, which will be available shortly. Information about local food options is being coordinated and put together by our good friends Jennifer Iannolo and Mark Tafoya from the Culinary Media Network and will be available as part of the guide. Thanks Jen and Chef Mark!

A Cautionary Note

Polytechnic University is still in session on Friday, and it is a public place. You will need to keep track of your gear, and Podcamp NYC and Polytechnic University cannot be held responsible for anything you might lose, forget or misplace during Podcamp. Do keep in mind that you should label all your gear with your name and contact information, should you get separated from it, and we will use the registration Desk as the informal Lost and Found for the event.

All of us on the organizing team want you to come to Podcamp and feel right at home. Don’t be afraid to start talking to someone while in a session, or waiting to register. The people we’ve met in New Media are some of the nicest and greatest people around, so don’t be afraid to introduce yourself and start talking!

We’ll give you more updates and Podcamp hints as we approach the event. We’re hoping you’re looking forward to it as much as we are!

We have a few new sponsors for Podcamp NYC and I’d like to thank a moment to thank them!

Red Lasso has joined us as a Platinum sponsor! Red Lasso allows you to search commercial TV and Radio programs, and clip and use portions of these broadcasts in your blog or website. I’ve found this particularly useful when I am blogging about news items, politics or the like, and I can excerpt just the piece of a show I want to discuss, so anyone who might not have seen the show can see it right then and there on my site. Red Lasso has been a major sponsor of several Podcamps to date, and I want to thank them for being so supportive of our community.

Lee Gibbons and Doug Smith at Podango have come forward to sponsor Podcamp NYC again this year! I’ve gotten to know Lee and Doug better over the past year, and they are committed members of the podcasting community, hoping to help us all figure out the metrics game once and for all. Podango has been a sponsor of many Podcamps to date, and I wanted to take a moment out to thank them for not only their financial support to help make these events happen, but for truly caring about the community.

The great folks over at mDialog have come on board as Gold Sponsors, and I am really looking forward to meeting them in person! Thanks to Gail and her team at mDialog and to CC Chapman, who helped introduce us!

Bill Palmer of iProng has been sponsoring Podcamps since the very first Podcamp Boston in the fall of 2006. Bill will be flying in from the West Coast to attend the event, so be sure to say hi!

VitaminWater has donated its product for the event, so for those of you looking for a mid-day boost during Podcamp should be able to grab a VitaminWater and get the boost you need to carry on during the day.

Philip Richardson and the great guys at ooVoo are also sponsoring Podcamp NYC this year. ooVoo is a videoconferencing service that allows up to six users to chat at once, and they did a neat launch in February with their My ooVoo Day, allowing people to talk with some of their favorite online bloggers. I got to talk to with many people I had known only through twitter up until that moment, including Shel Holz and Connie Reece, among others, so it was nice to be able to connect in a new way through ooVoo. (On a side note, ooVoo also donated $750 to the Ma Chen- Autism in China project I just finished up, so thanks again to ooVoo for your generous donation to that great cause as well.)

Jeff Hinz, Barry Kantz, and the folks over at Raw Voice/Blubrry are a new Platinum Sponsor of Podcamp NYC. They are sponsoring our Friday Night social event, and there will be more details forthcoming about this event shortly! (I secretly love the Show Notes pads Raw Voice has given out at previous Podcamp events- they help keep me organized from planning a show to recording through writing up the show notes.)

Blogger and Podcaster Magazine is sponsoring again as well, and I’d like to thank them for sponsoring so many Podcamps to date. They have joined forces with mainstream media and have it set up so that individual Podcasters can afford to have their podcasts advertised in USA Today and on the USA Today website, something most podcasters could not afford on their own. Be sure to check out their table at Podcamp NYC and consider taking advantage of this offer for your show.

Thank you to all of our sponsors. We have sponsors who donate in three main categories, each contributing to making Podcamp NYC happen. Some sponsors help us out with cash donations, helping us pay for the venue, printing and administrative costs, insurance, and the like. Others have donated products or services to help us out, like VitaminWater, Confabb, iContact, and ZipCar, to name a few. Others have donated time, manpower, employees, and introductions that have also been integral to the success of Podcamp NYC 1.0 and Podcamp NYC 2.0 equally.

It’s important to us that each of our sponsors feels a part of the community itself, and not just someone we look to for financial, technical or in-kind support. While we provide sponsors access to our community, who are, in turn, likely to be interested in their companies and products, we are more interested in developing long term relationships with the people behind the companies, who are doing some of the most interesting and innovative work around. The Podcamp community is a family to us, and We hope all of you will see our sponsors as an integral part of that family.

We’re working on the session schedule as we speak- and if you are still interested in presenting at Podcamp, please let us know by April 6, 2008.  After that date, we won’t be able to guarantee you a formal spot to present.  While we are working to make sure a room is open for impromptu and flash sessions, we can’t count on this being available at this point, so if you want to guarantee a presentation spot, please let us know as soon as possible.

Drop us an email at pcnyc2@gmail.com as well as posting your session on the wiki (click the link to the right and look for the speakers and sessions link) and you should be all set!

We have a small block of rooms available significantly reduced cost, at the Marriott-Brooklyn Bridge, directly across for Polytechnic University for Podcamp NYC.  You must ask for the room rate for Podcamp - saving about $100 a night over regular rates for both Friday and Saturday night stays.

Please act quickly- this rate is available for a limited time- Book now!  You can reach Marriott reservations at 1-800-228-929.