Ottawa Writers Festival 2010 Spring Edition Starts This Week

The Ottawa Writers Festival was launched in 1997. For the last 13 years, the festival has brought hundreds of celebrated authors to Ottawa, honouring "the world's best writing from home and abroad with an electric program that presents interactions with leaders in the worlds of science, history, poetry, politics, spoken word, economics, drama, fiction, biography, music, religion, spirituality and more." For more information about the festival, click here.

The 2010 Spring Edition runs from April 22nd to 27th. Most events will be held at a pretty cool venue - the Mayfair Theatre in Old Ottawa South. There are also some post-festival events lined up for May, June and September. The full schedule can be found on the official website.

I think I might check out Terry O'Reilly and Mike Tennant's presentation on Sunday, April 25th. Their CBC Radio show The Age of Persuasion is consistently interesting and Terry has a pretty compelling website as well. If you're interested in marketing and culture, this would be a great event for you. Maybe I'll see you there!

The Power of People

As a marketing blog, we spend a lot of time talking about the latest and greatest marketing strategies and technologies. Twitter, viral videos, and Google are definitely among our favourites. As are social networking and new media in general.

But lets not forget about the simple power of a room full of people. And that power is what the Ottawa International Writer's Festival, running through to May 2, is all about.

Last Thursday I had the distinct pleasure of attending "The Big Idea" session the carbon shift, led by Canadian writers William Marsden and Thomas Homer-Dixon. The topic was at times very tense and distressing, and there was definitely something viral about the way the energy moved through the room.

In the end, however, I left feeling more alert and also more connected than I have in quite some time. I guess my point is this: that while webinars, tweets, and wall posts are all well and good (and, sometimes, the most effective way to communication), there is still something to be said for the energy that can only be created by bringing people together.