Little ol’ Portland is no stranger to the occasional visit by a well-known Web or tech type. I mean, we’ve had Robert Scoble and Jeremiah Owyang in town for conferences, Sarah Lacy swung by for her book tour, Gary Vaynerchuk and Mark Shuttleworth have presented, and Chris Messina and David Recordon are through here on a regular basis, to name a few.
Plus, we’ve got those well-known-in-tech-circles folks who actually live here. People like Ward Cunningham, Linus Torvalds, Rael Dornfest, Andy Baio, Dawn Foster, Josh Bancroft, Raven Zachary, and Marshall Kirkpatrick.
Enough name dropping. You get the point.
Each impressive in his or her own right. But for sheer volume of internet fame in one room, this Thursday may rival all of those previous visits.
How?
Well, this Thursday, as part of the Intel Insiders program, Intel will be hosting a who’s who of social media types here in town. And on Thursday night, they’ve scheduled a meetup in conjunction with the Social Media Club of Portland.
These folks are literally the who’s who in social media and technology and they’ll be in P-town checking out Intel’s tech and touring their fabs and research centers. As a special bonus, they’ll be heading downtown in the evening to join several folks from Social Media Club PDX at The Green Dragon Pub for chit-chat and beer.
Sweet, huh? Join your fellow Portland Social Media Peeps on Thursday, April 16 from 7:30 to 8:30 for a Tweetup at the Green Dragon. And if the notoriety of these Insiders isn’t enough to spark your interest, Intel will provide the first round of beers (depending on how many people show up).
So who’s going to be there? Well, let’s take a look.
Sarah Austin was one of the first live streaming, life-casters popularized on Justin.TV and now hosts a weekly live show in conjunction with Pop17 at Mogulus.
Cathy currently serves a multi-faceted role at Seesmic, overseeing marketing, assisting with business development, and driving content. She was also instrumental in helping Seesmic founder Loic Le Meur develop LeWeb, now one of the largest and most well know tech gatherings in Europe.
In 2004, Tom became the first journalist from a leading newspaper to resign his position to pursue a career blogging full-time. That decision launched Silicon Valley Watcher. He is often cited as one of the most influential people in Silicon Valley.
Frank is best known for his blog, Somewhat Frank, which covers social media and emerging technology. In an effort to facilitate startup community, he co-founded TECH Cocktail, an organization that “that offers events and community-powered projects open to bloggers, technology enthusiasts, entrepreneurs & professionals interested in technology in under served technology communities.”
Irina is the co-founder and host of Geek Entertainment TV which has been on air since November of 2005. She also put together the Vloggies, an award ceremony for video bloggers.
Whoof. That’s quite a line-up.
So, if you get the chance, please swing by the Green Dragon, this Thursday (April 16) at 7:30 or so. Not only would it be a great opportunity for you to meet this interesting group of people, it would be yet another chance for us to expose some very influential folks to the amazing Portland tech community.
Plus, to repeat: free beer.
And if you’re interested in video on the Web *cough* Strange Love Live *cough*, I’d doubly recommend that you try to make it. Since there’s a heavy contingent of video savvy folks—Sarah, Cathy, Frank, and Irina—in this little gathering. I’m just saying.
Strangely enough, for a “social media” gathering, there wasn’t anything on any of the social event services. So I added the event to Calagator and Upcoming. Please RSVP if you plan to attend.
Hope to see you Thursday.
(Sarah Austin image courtesy Pop17; Cathy Brooks image courtesy Dave Sifry; Tom Foremski image courtesy Denise Howell; Frank Gruber image courtesy hyku; Irina Slutsky image courtesy TheBulBrothers.com)