South Bye

426.

That’s how many entries I had in Google Contacts mentioning “sxsw” in the notes.

426 people.

Those are just the ones I managed to tag properly.

Some of these are people who I knew before and got to know much better during South by Southwest over the past dozen years.

Most are people I met for the first time at SXSW, riding up to the Salt Lick, prepping for a talk, or waiting in line for a panel or a party or a pastry.

There’s no way it was just those 426. Most of those entries were written around 3 a.m. before I went to sleep or after 11 a.m. when I woke up, exhausted but functioning in large part to the wonders of that seltzery savior known as Topo Chico. The sparkling water has become the Viagra of SXSW, helping older festival-goers last just a little bit longer each night.

I can’t remember every one of those 426 people, but scrolling through those names, I can tell you stories about so many of them, and most of the best stories involve times we spent together at one or more SXSW festivals over the years.

As I looked at those names, I had to hold back a few Topo-y tears.

Hours before SXSW was canceled, I reached out to their housing desk, which offered to refund my hotel deposit, and the registration desk, which refused to refund my badge fee. I was grateful for the change in housing policy and hardly surprised I’d eat the badge cost. It didn’t make sense for me to go this year, and I had to make the tough decision after so many friends and businesses pulled out. I’m shifting around some of the projects I’m focused on, so I had other reasons to skip it. But still, I wanted to be there, coronavirus be damned.

Even after SXSW got canceled, and even after they said they will issue refunds or allow attendees to apply badge costs to next year (which I also requested when I wrote them, and which they also refused to do at the time), I still felt disappointed. I gave up on SXSW before Austin gave up on SXSW. As I looked through those 426 names, it wasn’t right. I should have stuck it out. I had more than 426 reasons to return.

I can’t tell you all the business value I got out of SXSW over the years, whether for my employers, my clients, or myself. And I won’t get into the return on investment of those MRY parties. Damn, those were fun though. Every now and then, I take out the 3D-printed sandstone Rev Run figurine that I ordered from Shapeways to accompany VIP invites to one of those bashes. Mini Rev hangs out in my desk drawer as a token, if not a totem, of all the creative energy that went into the events.

I’ll miss it all. SXSW 2021 can’t come soon enough.

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This too shall pass.

Not for all of us. COVID-19 is deadly. Many more people will die, and there’s no softening that blow.

As a society though, whatever human society we’re a part of, we have a way of getting used to death. For decades, we were comfortable with all the deaths caused by tobacco products. For even longer, we’ve accepted the hazards caused by automobiles, even as the macro health issues have become clearer (sedentary lifestyles, pollution, ease of isolation, etc.). We are just now trying to address preventable deaths related to heart disease. Then there’s gun violence, which seems to be preventable in much of the world but is somehow less so in the country where I write this. With death, we are habituated to the one thing we tend to fear the most.

Then there’s the flu. We mobilized around making flu shots available, but the flu kills hundreds of thousands of people globally each year. We’ve grown comfortable with doing what we can to treat it, including by quarantining ourselves briefly when we have it, and we accept the risks.

By most predictions, we will have a coronavirus vaccine soon, whatever "soon" is (to those who contract it, it's clearly not soon enough). We have no clue how effective it will be and how fast it will be mass-produced and widely distributed. Once that happens though, we will then return to habituating ourselves to the risks.

That does not lessen the trauma of losing loved ones, and it doesn’t mitigate the short-term economic burdens that will cause so much chaos to many people’s livelihoods. None of this should be taken lightly. But, socially, we do accept many risk factors that can kill us and our peers. Somehow, however long it takes, coronavirus will be another one of those risks rather than some nuclear mushroom cloud that prevents us all from seeing the light of day again.

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Video conferences – as substitutes for events, rather than group chats -- are typically terrible today. They’re all the worst parts of conferences (slides, talking heads) without most of the upside (making emotional connections with the speaker who’s presenting right in front of you, meeting people serendipitously, those metallic bottles of Diet Coke that seem to only appear at hotel-catered business events).

You can’t have SXSW over video. There’s no bonding with people over a video pedicab ride. Through video, you can’t scramble to find a new restaurant for your vegetarian client because the first one you picked smells like an abattoir. There’s no sneaking out of a slow session or event with your seatmate and finding a funky food truck in a nearby parking lot.

Virtual events can be a temporary salve. They’re okay when you’re trying to learn a concrete skill, like changing a tire. They’re not so good when you’re bringing together experts on the history of wheels as a springboard to discuss how future applications of the wheel will change transportation, mobility, and urban development. It's like going from movie theater popcorn to the Jelly Belly buttered popcorn-flavored jelly beans. 

For those who can't get to physical-world conferences, virtual conferences can present more access and information than attendees could have ever previously imagined. Now, even those of us in the most bustling cities where there are typically tons of events will have to make the most of the virtual variety. Or skip them until we can shake hands again.

Virtual communities are wonderful. I am biased, and I believe they are needed even more now, and people will rely on them in ways they never had. The greatest forms of value that people can derive from them may happen outside of the community, especially in person. But that's not necessarily the case. I've done so much business with people who I've met through online communities as well as resources like Upwork and Fiverr, often without a single call.

Whether you're even in Serial Marketers, you should find a virtual community or two that resonates with you and commit to being more active, even for just five minutes a day. Set a reminder or a calendar appointment. Help others, share ideas, and build a presence so members know you and will be there for you when you need it. Your life may not depend on it, but in a year like this, your livelihood may. Start now.

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SXSW will be back.

We’ll be back.

We’ll be shaking hands, and perhaps hugging more.

We’ll be filling planes and hotels and restaurants. 

We’ll be looking for food pantries to donate all this canned food to before it expires – for those of us who are fortunate to avoid quarantine.

We won’t all get through this, but as a whole, we will, and we will not forget what it means to be human.