The keynote, at which Jobs will speak, is scheduled for 1:00 PM Eastern (10:00 AM Pacific) today, where Apple’s (presumably) magical new offerings will be unveiled. The company said in an announcement last week, “At the keynote, Apple will unveil its next generation software – Lion, the eighth major release of Mac OS X; iOS 5, the next version of Apple’s advanced mobile operating system which powers the iPad, iPhone and iPod touch; and iCloud, Apple’s upcoming cloud services offering.”

While the new versions of Microsoft’s flagship operating systems are major points of interest, much attention will be paid to iCloud, which should reinforce Apple’s place as a leader in music offerings, and will almost certainly one-up rival Google’s recent unveiling of Google Music, which so far doesn’t even include music purchasing. Apple, on the other hand, has managed to secure deals with the four major record labels.

Apple already has a huge advantage in the digital music space with iTunes – an advantage that only grows with the increasing popularity of its iPhones and iPads. Adding a cloud service with music storage can only help.

I’m going to go out on a limb here, and say that we can also probably expect Jobs to rattle of some stats related to Apple’s products, as he often does in his keynotes. On Friday, we linked to a WWDC 2011 Keynote Bingo, created by Krazybig, which provides a little game for the event.

We’ll cover Apple’s news as it comes out.

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According to reports, Apple is almost ready to release a cloud-based music storage service compatible with iTunes.

Sources say the product is finished, and Apple might be ready to launch its service before Google’s competitive product sees the light of day.

Several sources close to the matter and aware of both companies’ plans told Reuters that Apple will soon let iTunes customers keep their music libraries on a remote server. The music would then be accessible from any Internet-connected, iTunes-running device.

But though the technology is in place, one all-important piece is missing from both music offerings: licensing agreements with major record labels. Google is stalling on its own music projects due to rumored tiffs with record labels, and Apple has yet to discuss any new licensing agreements with labels, according to Reuters’ sources.

However, since the latter company has been working with musicians for a long time vis-a-vis iTunes and iTunes’ new social component, Ping, one might imagine that Apple has a laid some groundwork for fruitful discussions around licensing.

Google was rumored to be building an iTunes competitor in the summer of 2010. The service was said to have an Android-friendly component or two, and the Android music store was expected to launch with the release of Gingerbread. The service was also rumored to include music-streaming options in addition to music locker features.

However, more current reports suggest that Google may be further than ever from an actual launch due to licensing snafus with major record labels, particularly Warner Music Group.

We’ll keep you updated on Apple and Google’s music services as the weeks wear on — particularly next month, when Google is set to make a slew of announcements at its annual developer conference, Google I/O.

More About: apple, cloud, Google, music

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According to reports, Apple is almost ready to release a cloud-based music storage service compatible with iTunes.

Sources say the product is finished, and Apple might be ready to launch its service before Google’s competitive product sees the light of day.

Several sources close to the matter and aware of both companies’ plans told Reuters that Apple will soon let iTunes customers keep their music libraries on a remote server. The music would then be accessible from any Internet-connected, iTunes-running device.

But though the technology is in place, one all-important piece is missing from both music offerings: licensing agreements with major record labels. Google is stalling on its own music projects due to rumored tiffs with record labels, and Apple has yet to discuss any new licensing agreements with labels, according to Reuters’ sources.

However, since the latter company has been working with musicians for a long time vis-a-vis iTunes and iTunes’ new social component, Ping, one might imagine that Apple has a laid some groundwork for fruitful discussions around licensing.

Google was rumored to be building an iTunes competitor in the summer of 2010. The service was said to have an Android-friendly component or two, and the Android music store was expected to launch with the release of Gingerbread. The service was also rumored to include music-streaming options in addition to music locker features.

However, more current reports suggest that Google may be further than ever from an actual launch due to licensing snafus with major record labels, particularly Warner Music Group.

We’ll keep you updated on Apple and Google’s music services as the weeks wear on — particularly next month, when Google is set to make a slew of announcements at its annual developer conference, Google I/O.

More About: apple, cloud, Google, music

For more Tech & Gadgets coverage:

• Follow Mashable Tech & Gadgets on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Tech & Gadgets channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

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According to reports, Apple is almost ready to release a cloud-based music storage service compatible with iTunes.

Sources say the product is finished, and Apple might be ready to launch its service before Google’s competitive product sees the light of day.

Several sources close to the matter and aware of both companies’ plans told Reuters that Apple will soon let iTunes customers keep their music libraries on a remote server. The music would then be accessible from any Internet-connected, iTunes-running device.

But though the technology is in place, one all-important piece is missing from both music offerings: licensing agreements with major record labels. Google is stalling on its own music projects due to rumored tiffs with record labels, and Apple has yet to discuss any new licensing agreements with labels, according to Reuters’ sources.

However, since the latter company has been working with musicians for a long time vis-a-vis iTunes and iTunes’ new social component, Ping, one might imagine that Apple has a laid some groundwork for fruitful discussions around licensing.

Google was rumored to be building an iTunes competitor in the summer of 2010. The service was said to have an Android-friendly component or two, and the Android music store was expected to launch with the release of Gingerbread. The service was also rumored to include music-streaming options in addition to music locker features.

However, more current reports suggest that Google may be further than ever from an actual launch due to licensing snafus with major record labels, particularly Warner Music Group.

We’ll keep you updated on Apple and Google’s music services as the weeks wear on — particularly next month, when Google is set to make a slew of announcements at its annual developer conference, Google I/O.

More About: apple, cloud, Google, music

For more Tech & Gadgets coverage:

• Follow Mashable Tech & Gadgets on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Tech & Gadgets channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Go to Source

According to reports, Apple is almost ready to release a cloud-based music storage service compatible with iTunes.

Sources say the product is finished, and Apple might be ready to launch its service before Google’s competitive product sees the light of day.

Several sources close to the matter and aware of both companies’ plans told Reuters that Apple will soon let iTunes customers keep their music libraries on a remote server. The music would then be accessible from any Internet-connected, iTunes-running device.

But though the technology is in place, one all-important piece is missing from both music offerings: licensing agreements with major record labels. Google is stalling on its own music projects due to rumored tiffs with record labels, and Apple has yet to discuss any new licensing agreements with labels, according to Reuters’ sources.

However, since the latter company has been working with musicians for a long time vis-a-vis iTunes and iTunes’ new social component, Ping, one might imagine that Apple has a laid some groundwork for fruitful discussions around licensing.

Google was rumored to be building an iTunes competitor in the summer of 2010. The service was said to have an Android-friendly component or two, and the Android music store was expected to launch with the release of Gingerbread. The service was also rumored to include music-streaming options in addition to music locker features.

However, more current reports suggest that Google may be further than ever from an actual launch due to licensing snafus with major record labels, particularly Warner Music Group.

We’ll keep you updated on Apple and Google’s music services as the weeks wear on — particularly next month, when Google is set to make a slew of announcements at its annual developer conference, Google I/O.

More About: apple, cloud, Google, music

For more Tech & Gadgets coverage:

• Follow Mashable Tech & Gadgets on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Tech & Gadgets channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

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Roku owners just got another music source, this time from subscription streaming music service Rdio.

Rdio subscribers can enter their credentials into the Roku set-top box and they’re good to go. For those who are uninitiated to the service, Rdio is offering its usual seven-day free trial, with an all-you-can-stream $9.99 charge per month after that.

It’s another win for Rdio, which just received an influx of cash a few weeks ago, bolstered by the addition of more indie bands and greater selection on its service that now boasts more than 7 million songs. It already was no slouch, streaming music from four of the major record labels and aggregators IODA, INgrooves, The Orchard, IRIS and Finetunes.

Add to that Rdio’s presence on a variety of platforms, including its own website as well as iPhone, Android, BlackBerry and Sonos clients, and the result is a hot competitor in the music subscription space. The service might even be putting the heat on aspiring newcomers to the U.S. market such as Spotify. Making it extra competitive is its ultra-social nature, offering music discovery where users can follow each other and learn about new music from friends’ recommendations.

It’s another win for Roku as well, which is consistently adding services to its burgeoning stable of entertainment choices. It most recently added Amazon’s rebranded Prime Instant Video service to its dossier.

We’ve tried most of the Roku boxes, and find them to be an outstanding value, priced at less than $100 for a plethora of channels. Now with the addition of Rdio, it’s almost enough to persuade you to cut the cable TV cord.

More About: rdio, roku, streaming music, Subscription service

For more Tech & Gadgets coverage:

• Follow Mashable Tech & Gadgets on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
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It seems that as a community, designers tend to be very entrepreneurial. Members of the industry are constantly starting new ventures that are either extensions of their businesses or of personal brands. Some create and sell their own apps and premium WordPress themes, while others start new blogs. A growing number of professionals and companies are also founding new conferences focused on design (sometimes in multiple locations) and reaping incredible financial rewards along with other less quantifiable benefits (such as recognition and visibility in the industry).

Perhaps you have attended An Event Apart, FOWA, Build Conference, or any one of these big events and totally loved it. Maybe in your mind you have toyed around with the idea of starting your own event, or even something small-scale like a workshop or meet-up.

Or maybe you attended a disappointing event that left you thinking that you could do a much better job.

Whatever your reason, the goal of this article is to show you the possibilities and then discuss tips and inspiration on how to host your own event.

Why Create Your Own Design Conference?

Before I get into how to start your own event, let me first talk about why you might want to do so in the first place.

There are a number of reasons why a person or organization might consider starting a new design conference. The most likely reason is that conferences can produce large profits. Why do you think the major record labels are so eager to do 360 deals with new musical artists, in which they take a cut of everything an artist brings in — even revenue generated from gigs and tours, and not just sales of music? It’s because live events are very lucrative — and it’s no different in the design world.

We have to look no further than the famous TED conference that charges a whopping $6,000 per ticket and routinely sells out months in advance. Sure, TED is huge and it has been around since the 80’s — but even at a much smaller scale, events can be quite profitable when conducted properly.

Aside from turning a profit, there any other compelling reasons to start a design conference. If you run a company with one or more mass-market products, like Adobe for instance, it would make sense to establish an event that drives interest in your products and offers hands-on training and tips for your most enthusiastic customers. Adobe has done just that with the Adobe MAX conference which focuses on all things digital media.

Still others establish events for no other reason than to drive a sluggish industry forward or foster innovation. It’s an approach that makes sense: What better way to tackle a problem than to bring together a group of the best and brightest in a particular field?

Not to mention the network-enhancing effects of organizing a conference: Within just a few short months, an event organizer can become an instant social networking maven — both within and outside of the Web — by forging relationships not only with the amazing professionals that attend, but also with the visionary keynote speakers as well.

What kind of people or companies are well-positioned to start a new design conference? People with a strong brand and respected companies, for starters.

Knowledgeable people (whether solo or in a group) are perfect candidates for starting an event, as are people who are well-connected and have a lot of influence within the industry. The popular tech blog, TechCrunch, for example, did this with their Disrupt conference.

All of this isn’t to say that you can’t start your own conference if you don’t feel like you fit into those categories — you can — it will simply come easier for the types of people I just described.

Above all else, a person who is creative and committed can bring a good event to life if they put enough effort into it. Remember, you can always start small and scale up as you become more successful.

Learning from the Establishment

Before digging deeper into how to create your own event, it may help to look at a few examples of conferences that are already successful.

The information that follows gives us a snapshot of each conference: what their website looks like, who’s on-board as a sponsor, the cost to attend, and who the founders are. As your own event starts to take shape, you may want to borrow some ideas and get some inspiration from those who have gone before you.

An Event Apart

• Site: aneventapart.com
• Subject(s): Web Design
• Sponsors: Adobe, Aquent, Extensis
• Cost to attend: $1,095
• Who’s behind it: Eric Meyer, Jeffrey Zeldman

Future of Web Apps (FOWA)

• Site: futureofwebapps.com
• Subject(s): Web Apps
• Sponsors: PayPal, Mailchimp, Squarespace
• Cost to attend: $174.90
• Who’s behind it: Carsonified (a web design agency)

AIGA Gain

• Site: gainconference.aiga.org
• Subject(s): Design, Business
• Sponsors: Pantone, Aquent, Neenah Paper
• Cost to attend: $1,200
• Who’s behind it: AIGA

HOW Design Conference

• Site: howconference.com
• Subject(s): Design
• Sponsors: Adobe, AIGA, Shutterstock
• Cost to attend: $1,275
• Who’s behind it: HOW Magazine

TED

• Site: www.ted.com
• Subject(s): Technology, Entertainment, Design
• Sponsors: Nokia, Microsoft, Cisco
• Cost to attend: $6,000
• Who’s behind it: Richard Saul Wurman, Harry Marks

Adobe MAX

• Site: max.adobe.com
• Subject(s): Digital Media
• Sponsors: Google, HP, Intel
• Cost to attend: $1,695
• Who’s behind it: Adobe

The Economics of Live Events

Here is where the rubber really meets the road: Live events, including design conferences, can pull in enormous sums of money.

The flipside of making money is that live events, including design conferences, can also lose money (as TED did at its inaugural outing). As you are planning for your event, keep in mind that tickets sold do not equal pure profit. You have to pay for expenses such as renting a venue and paying speakers.

Let’s take a hypothetical look at the possibilities of making a profit using the ticket prices of the events I listed earlier in this post. For the purpose of illustration, I’m going to arbitrarily pick a few numbers out of the air.

First, let’s assume that there will be 200 people attending each hypothetical event below. Next, let’s hire two keynote speakers and assume that it will cost $1,000 per keynote speaker. Finally, our hypothetical event is going to last for 2 days and it will cost $2,000 per day to rent our venue. In real life, we’d also have other costs such as marketing expenses or hiring an event-planning company to bring it all together, but for our purposes, I’m keeping it rather simplistic.

Here’s what we would end up with:

Wow! That’s a lot of money, right? As previously stated, this is a pretty simplistic demonstration of possible profits, but it should still give you something to think about.

Your ultimate success or failure will depend on many things including your organizational skills, your ability to rally others to your cause, the quality of your sales skills, your professional network, and so forth.

To determine what the price of admission should be for your event, you need to place yourself in the position of the person who will be responsible for shilling out the money. This, of course, is going to depend on your target audience. An individual that comes from a freelancing background might view a $1,000+ ticket as outrageously overpriced. A medium-to-large business manager, however, may view this as an affordable investment — a way to keep employees up-to-date without paying for costly continuing education classes at a nearby college. As you can see, words like "expensive" and "acceptable" are all relative.

Digging a little deeper, it’s possible to examine why it makes sense for a couple of the previously mentioned events to charge what they do. Let’s start with the Future of Web Apps conference, or FOWA, run by Carsonified. If you think about the target audience of web app developers, there exists a wide variety of possible attendees ranging from large companies down to work-at-home freelancers. Most people interested in attending a conference like this fit into the small business or freelancer categories — in other words, people with smaller budgets — because the barrier to entry in this market is so low.

We can also get a feel for the audience by taking a look at the sponsorship: PayPal, MailChimp and Squarespace are all services used by smaller-sized companies. So, a price under $200 makes quite a bit of sense for this particular event.

Now let’s examine the Adobe MAX event. The sponsors of this conference are much, much bigger than those sponsoring FOWA: Google, HP and Intel to name just a few. Yes, these three companies make products used by small- to medium-sized customers; however, they are going to spend their money marketing to big buyers. The attendees of events like Adobe MAX are most likely sent all expenses paid by their employers who want to equip their employees with knowledge that will give them an edge. Therefore, a price tag of $1,695 is quite understandable.

While tickets will most likely be the main source of revenue generated by your event, there are a few other ways to make money as well. Sometimes you can get sponsors to pay you money to put their logo on all of your marketing materials (and sometimes sponsors just donate something, like printing). Another valid option is to sell merchandise to the crowd: shirts, bags, hats, and the like.

The Key to Success: Make It Worthwhile

When it comes to creating a live event that people will enjoy and that returns a decent profit, the key to success is making it worth the while of all involved parties. This includes you, the sponsors, the speakers and presenters, and, of course, the attendees.

To be sure, you don’t want to bite off more than you can chew, so start small and scale up when you’re ready.

Above all else, don’t waste people’s time or money.

To make sure the event is worth it for yourself, you may need to brainstorm a list of goals and see how they can be met. Putting together a live event can be a lot of work so ask yourself if the potential positives (like making money) outweigh the potential negatives (like taking time away from day job).

Making It Worthwhile to Event Sponsors

To make your sponsors happy you’ll need to connect them to your audience. Usually this comes in the form of putting logos on stage banners or event programs or making announcements like, "This presentation is sponsored by…"

If a sponsor is paying money to get in front of your audience, make sure they actually get in front of your audience. If you don’t, you can bet that sponsor won’t be back next year. If you do, it could be the start of a long and mutually beneficial business relationship.

Making It Worthwhile to Speakers/Presenters

What’s the best way to make an event worthwhile for the speakers and presenters? Pay them a fair amount and make sure they are well taken cared of.

Most popular speakers have riders (or contracts) in place to assure they are paid a proper amount and have access to things like food, a quiet room to prepare in and other similar privileges. It’s always nice to give your speakers free access to the rest of your conference as a perk (in fact, it’s probably assumed).

Making It Worthwhile to Attendees

Perhaps most importantly, your event must be worthwhile to the attendees. These are people who have probably traveled a good distance, have given up time from their regular working schedules and who have paid a hefty fee to attend. They deserve to be wowed. They deserve to get what they have been promised.

Keep in mind that you are fostering relationships with all the parties mentioned above that will either help or harm your chances for success in the future. If you do your very best to deliver the goods, it will indeed be completely and totally worth it — for them and for you.

Finding an Opportunity and Filling a Void

If you paid close attention to the events listed above, you may have noticed that each event caters to a niche. The AIGA Gain conference is all about design and business. An Event Apart drills down past the crust of general design to focus more specifically on web design. Adobe MAX is all about digital media while TED adds technology and entertainment to the mix. You get the point.

To create a successful event of your own, you’ve got to go where the opportunity lies. To find out where the opportunities are, you’ve got to do some research.

Ask yourself questions like these:

• What’s already been done?
• Was there anything missing from a recent event I attended?
• What group of people in my area would benefit from information I can easily deliver?

To sum this idea up: If you can identify a problem, you may just have the beginnings of a new design conference.

So what niche will you serve? You’ve got to analyze the market across the board. Let’s say you are an expert in developing web apps. Well, just because a conference already exists that deals with web apps doesn’t mean there isn’t room for another player. For example, FOWA was only held in two locations: London and Las Vegas. That means that, geographically speaking, there are plenty of opportunities to establish an event that covers a similar topic somewhere else.

While important, location is not the only way to distinguish and entrench your event. Maybe a good conference has not been set up for a new technology or perhaps a certain group of people (e.g. freelancers, church marketers, people looking for a new career, or students) could use an annual professional boost.

The possibilities are endless. Just remember: you’ve got to be able to make your event worthwhile to your target audience or it just won’t work.

Keynote Speakers: The Anchor of Your Event

Keynote speakers are not only the engines that will drive initial interest in your conference but also create the electricity in the air (or a lack thereof) during the actual event.

Your keynote speakers will largely be responsible for the overall satisfaction that attendees get after the event. In other words, they have the ability to anchor your event.

Getting a good keynote speaker is a little like planning a baseball lineup: you stick your best hitter in the 4th position with three other good hitters in the first 3 slots so there is a chance to hit a grand slam. Everyone else goes after.

In other words, they are the highlight of the conference and you should plan everything else around them. Whatever the size of your budget is, you’ll probably spend most of the money you’ve set aside for speakers for the keynote speaker.

To get an idea of great speakers, here are a few examples of people who have spoken at design conferences in the past:

• Eric Meyer, Author, CSS: The Definitive Guide
• Andy Clarke, Author, Hardboiled Web Design
• Jeffrey Zeldman, Author, Designing With Web Standards
• Aaron Walter, Author, Building Findable Websites
• Alexa Andrzejewski, Designer, Adaptive Path; Founder, Foodspotting
• Luke Wroblewski, Author, Web Form Design
• Cennydd Bowles, Author, Undercover User Experience Design
• Paola Antonelli, Senior Curator, Department of Architecture and Design, The Museum of Modern Art
• Jeremy Clark, Senior Experience Design Manager, Adobe
• Erica Eden, Senior Industrial Designer, Smart Design, and Co-Founder, Femme Den
• Karin Fong, Partner/Director, Imaginary Forces
• Jonathan Harris, Artist, Computer Scientist, Designer and Founder of number27
• John Maeda, Artist, Author, Computer Scientist and President of the Rhode Island School of Design
• Su Mathews, Senior Partner, Lippincott
• Marije Vogelzang, Eating Designer, Owner and Founder, Studio Marije Vogelzang and Proef
• Kristina Halvorson, Author, Content Strategy for the Web

Breakout Sessions

While keynote addresses are typically the "meat" of conferences, breakout sessions should not be treated lightly as fillers or as if they are any less important. A keynote speaker may talk for 15 minutes or 2 hours — regardless, you’ve got to have plenty of high quality material available to fill up the rest of the time in a meaningful way. Again, your goal should be to not waste anyone’s time.

As mentioned before, it’s a good idea to plan your conference around the messages of your keynote speakers. Use your breakout sessions to supplement the information given out (or not given out) during the keynote address. Do you anticipate that people will want to learn more about a certain subject? Create a breakout session for that purpose then.

Let’s say your conference is about photography and your keynote speaker will be talking about how to take great photos. You might have a breakout session on picking the right camera or equipment.

Whatever you do, your choices of material for your breakout sessions need to make sense. It’s better to give people some free time to catch up on sleep or do some sightseeing than make them sit through a boring speaker or topic for 2 hours.

Properly Promoting Your Event

Let’s get this out of the way first: if your target audience is designers, by no means can your website and marketing materials be construed as poorly designed–for obvious reasons. You’re a creative person, so get creative with your marketing materials.

As you are well aware, the internet offers cost-effective marketing opportunities. As such, you need to put a lot of effort into making your website not only a place to register but a good resource as well. It’s a well-known fact that TED makes every talk ever given at the conference available for free online. This might seem counterintuitive in terms of ensuring that people attend the next conference — if you can see it free online, why shell out the dough? — but it actually has the effect of generating more interest.

The Adobe MAX website has a convince your boss section of the site that contains tips on how to get your boss to send you to the conference along with a generic template you can copy and paste and send via email.

Items Your Conference Website Should Definitely Include

• Information about featured speakers
• A schedule of events
• An easy way to register
• Location/venue information

Sponsorship information

Aside from a great website, how you decide to reach your target audience is going to depend largely on the type of people you are trying to get to your conference. If you are part of a large national organization, it might be fairly easy to let people know about your conference via email. If you are a work-at-home freelancer, you may need to get extra creative or spend some decent money to create awareness.

Creating Networking Opportunities

Networking opportunities are a top draw of design conferences, and as such, creating excellent networking opportunities should be a top priority of any conference architect.

Luncheons, dinners, picnics, banquets and other ways to get people to eat together are always great ways to facilitate networking. Not only do meals give people a little extra time to spend together, but the food gives people a nice break from any potential table mates that talk too much. When people leave to find food on their own, that’s one less chance to meet and greet new people.

Tours are another great way to get people to interact in a casual atmosphere. Many design conferences take people on tours of local advertising agencies and creative shops. Not only does this inspire attendees by showing them cool working environments, but it allows them to sit next to someone they don’t know on a bus and strike up a conversation (Oh no, I hope that guy doesn’t sit by me…).

Providing snack and refreshment stations is another great way to facilitate networking. Put a hydration station at the back of each breakout session room or setup a pastry table in the main lobby. The more chance encounters you can create, the better.

Accommodation and Venue Considerations

Picking a great geographic location and venue are crucial to creating a great conference experience. Pick a location that’s got an element of entertainment to it: the beach, a ski town, a city with plenty of attractions — stuff like that.

Don’t pick a place where the main attraction is a farm with a little gift shop. Make sure people will have something fun to do; either during their downtime or in case people want to stay a little longer for some vacation time. Oh yeah, make sure to avoid crime-riddled neighborhoods so people can walk around as many won’t have cars and will have taken a shuttle from the airport.

To save money, it’s a good idea to hold your conference in a nice hotel so you don’t have to rent a separate venue. Read reviews and get recommendations. Just because a hotel was once rated with 4 diamonds doesn’t mean it hasn’t since deteriorated. Many hotels are set up to specifically attract conferences and have the facilities you’ll need including plenty of space, large screens and projectors and sound systems, but double-check to make sure they can provide everything you will need. It’s a good idea to make sure your hotel has a 24/7 airport shuttle as well–I say 24/7 because some hotel shuttles won’t run during the early hours of the morning.

Food is another consideration that many conference organizers don’t take into account. You’ve got to assume that people are going to have different needs when it comes to finding food in the surrounding area. It’s easy to think everyone who attends will want to eat what you want to eat, but the truth is you will have a wide variety of eaters: carnivores, herbivores and omnivores (and who knows what else). What does this mean?

Make sure there are plenty of restaurants within walking distance from your chosen venue to give people options.

Getting More Mileage from Your Event

Thanks to the internet, many events extend beyond the conference itself. As I mentioned earlier, TED makes every talk available in video format for free on their website. Why? It drives interest in the event and, in a sort of philanthropic effort because the conference is nonprofit, it allows people who are not privileged enough to actually attend the event in person a chance to learn.

If you wanted to take a different approach to event video, try selling access to it after the event has finished for people who either want to see it again or didn’t get to attend. If you plan correctly, you can setup a Flickr group and tell people to upload their own pictures for people to view both during the event and also when the event is over. Video and photos are both great ways to get more mileage from your event after it’s over. A lot of conference use Twitter hashtags (such as #ted or #fowa), which is great for following events in real time.

Related Content

• How to Stay Ahead of the Curve as a Designer
• 15 Biggest Internet Controversies of the Past Decade
• Becoming a Better Web Designer
• Related categories: Project Management and Web Design

About the Author

Chris McConnell is an entrepreneur, designer and author who co-founded the design firm Brandeluxe. He writes regularly on his blog, Freelance Review. You can connect with Chris on Twitter or LinkedIn.

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Are you an unemployed, funemployed or underemployed musician? Well, music collaboration platform Indaba Music has your back, as it has just launched an “Opportunities Marketplace” for band folk in need.

Indaba, which we’ve referred to previously as a “LinkedIn of music,” boasts more than 500,000 musicians, provides musically inclined folks with a place to build a profile, promote their tunes and collaborate with other musicians from around the world.

It also has a ton of contests and work-for-hire opps that can garner some serious pocket dough for bands. Twenty-six recordings sourced through Indaba Music have been released by major record labels, and unknown bands have scored the chance to collaborate with the likes of Linkin Park and Weezer’s Rivers Cuomo.

Now, Indaba is making it easier for bands to find opportunities by launching a dedicated platform on which musicians, brands, marketers and others can connect. Big-name artists can host remix contests (a staple of Indaba), A&R reps can find new content, those in the entertainment biz can seek out music for TV and film, etc. Think of it as a bulletin board in a coffee shop — with a lot better opportunities than the chance to play bass in someone’s mediocre synth/jazz band.

“Musicians now have even more ways to get discovered and earn a living using Indaba Music,” says Indaba co-founder Matthew Siegel.  “The core of Indaba is about collaboration and content creation, which can be a recreational activity; but in the case of the Opportunity Marketplace, we can also generate serious recognition and income.”

Right now, the Marketplace only features contests, but more opportunities will be added soon, we’re told.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, shulz

More About: Indaba Music, MARKETING, money, music

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We’ve been reading reports tonight that the popular European music service Spotify has hit yet another delay in making an entry in the U.S. market.

According to Billboard, Spotify’s negotiations with U.S. record labels have broken down and are “back to square one.” Apparently, the startup is still aiming for a 2010/early 2011 U.S. launch, but there’s no telling how long label negotiations could take or if they will be successful at all.

When we last heard from Spotify CEO Daniel Ek at SXSW 2010, he projected a Q3 U.S. launch and the unveiling of several new mobile applications. And while the service’s social and music features just keep getting better, the company is actually farther from a U.S. debut than they were this spring.

In Europe, Spotify operates under a freemium model. Users can get unlimited streaming music in an ad-supported interface. Users can also choose to pay for an ad-free experience that also includes mobile access. But elements of this model have been sources of contention for the major record labels stateside, notably Warner Music Group, according to Billboard’s sources.

In the meantime, Spotify competitors abound — Pandora in particular stands out as having been able to navigate political and record-label hurdles to keep itself operational and profitable. And Google and Apple are both rumored to be working on streaming music solutions, too.

Perhaps the larger question is whether American music lovers will still care about Spotify once it finally comes to our shores… if, indeed, it ever makes it here.

What do you think: Will Spotify’s leadership be able to play nicely with American record labels and launch their highly anticipated app in the U.S. this year? How about next year? Feel free to share your speculations in the comments.

More About: music, spotify, Warner

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U.S. Holds Fire in Google-China Feud: U.S. government officials and business leaders were supportive but wary of taking sides in Google’s battle with China, a sign of the delicate tensions between the growing superpower and the West.

Inside Scoop on Sony’s E-Reader: The wireless Reader Daily Edition is a much-improved model that could make it more competitive with Kindle, but its interface takes some mastering, says Walt Mossberg.

H-P, Microsoft Partner Against Rivals: H-P and Microsoft agreed to jointly invest $250 million over the next three years to develop inexpensive online computing services.

Music Price-Fixing Suit Reinstated: A U.S. federal appeals court reinstated an antitrust lawsuit against the major record labels over alleged price-fixing of Internet music downloads.

Silicon Valley Counsel Role Grows: General counsels at Silicon Valley companies are facing more regulations and pressure to boost transparency, disclosure and governance at their firms.

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Needless to say, MySpace is in a bit of a tight spot. The News Corp.-owned social network has been eclipsed in traffic by Facebook worldwide and may be close to losing its top spot in the U.S. And now, a management shakeup initiated by new News Corp. digital boss Jonathan Miller has seen the departure of CEO Chris DeWolfe and shuffling of president Tom Anderson’s role.

Entrepreneur Jason Calacanis, who sold Weblogs Inc. to AOL when Miller was in charge over there, came up with a list of ten priorities for the incoming CEO. He’s mostly right. But I think it’s simpler than that: MySpace just has to put entertainment at the forefront of everything it does.

Facebook has won the social-networking battle, not to mention the reputation for tech cred, and no amount of developer-friendly initiatives is going to win that back for MySpace (a clear exception: social gaming, which is likely responsible for why MySpace’s engagement metrics are notably better than Facebook’s).

But MySpace has tech cred of a different sort. MySpace Music, the company’s streaming audio service bolstered by investments from all the major record labels, is still a relatively new product but has been well-received. There are still loads of opportunities for this to grow more, from international expansion to merchandise and ticket sales. Some geeks are already impressed: When I was at Social Web FooCamp last weekend, one young entrepreneur told me that he didn’t use MySpace as a social network, but as a music search engine.

MySpace Music, and surrounding entertainment content, should be at the center of the brand. The company has the opportunity–and the muscle–to fill the void of a mass-market entertainment power that MTV once held.

The first rule is that when it comes to entertainment content, MySpace can’t settle for low quality or a poor fit. MySpace’s first forays into original programming were notable misfires. “Quarterlife,” which was distributed on MySpace as well as its own Web site, was a sleepy shoegazer better suited to the Sundance Channel. Faux-reality show “Roommates” was just tacky and poorly acted. Web audiences have become discerning enough so that they won’t settle for public-access quality.

A couple of months ago, I went to one of MySpace’s “secret shows” concerts, which featured singer Lily Allen at the Bowery Ballroom, a relatively small downtown venue in New York. I told one of my colleagues about it after the fact, and his response was, “Why does nobody know about these things?” If more people knew that logging into the right MySpace page at the right time could give you details about a cool free concert, I’m pretty sure there would be, well, more people logging into MySpace. There also wasn’t nearly enough wielding of the MySpace brand at the show itself. It was one of those situations where a handful of stickers could’ve gone a long way in free advertising.

MTV in its heyday (and still, to an extent, today) understood the importance of in-real-life events in maintaining brand loyalty. “Secret shows” and movie screenings are part of that, but it can go even further. When I was growing up in the ’90s, kids much cooler than myself would show up in Times Square to catch a glimpse of MTV’s “Total Request Live” taping or to the “Beach House” that was set up in a different seaside town each summer. More recently, we’ve seen the success of Yelp parties: Rent a venue, invite avid users, and just let them hang out. They’ll stick around online, too.

It’s also got to be easy to find this stuff. MySpace’s interface is so confusing to me that I’ve found it easier to discover new music through Apple’s iTunes Store. Right now, half the home page is taken up by ads and the rest pertains to content (“Final Fantasy XIII” and “The Hills”) that I have zero interest in. The site needs a real back-end overhaul, and maybe this is where one of Jason Calacanis’ recommendations can come into play: Make some acquisitions. There are so many content discovery and recommendation apps out there, a few of which must be hungering for a buyout.

If people can be confident that MySpace is a reliable hub for finding insidery information about the latest in entertainment–fresh new bands, movie previews, the fall TV season, great Web video–that could be enough to get its momentum back. It might’ve started out with the tagline “a place for friends,” but maybe the attitude should change to “a place to be cooler than your friends.”

But, obviously, that wouldn’t be the official tagline. Because then it’d be more like “a place for tools.”