I attended last year along with Alex Stanhope to live tweet and Facebook throughout the event on an official capacity for Silicon Beach. So there we were sat at the front with our laptops glowing merrily in the theatre and snapping away on our cameras.

I had high expectations for the event and they were exceeded. I wasn’t aware of how much my mind was going to be blown by all the amazing inspirational speakers we had the pleasure of listening to and meeting over the 2 days.

So without further a do I’m going to share with you some of my highlights, along with pictures and some of the videos and links that the speakers shared with us throughout the event.

Digital innovation.

Kicking things off was Shane Walter from Onedotzero who are a moving image and digital arts organisation. They shared with us some of their projects such as interactive video installations at the V&A and live visual art for the U2 and Rolling stones concerts.

He succinctly said “the size of a bar tab is a measure of success” referring to the after drinks parties at some of their installations.

His talk was all about innovation and learning and how “If you don’t do anything new you don’t progress”

Rough Diamond

Nicole Yershon works for Ogilvy in London. Her argument is “How do we educate our children to take their place in the economies of the 21st century?”

Out of this company created this beautiful project called Rough Diamond which is about ‘fostering new talent in today’s digital age”. They partner with other organisations to give young people a chance in a digital working environment. A truly inspirational project which Sarah pushes this model for other businesses to take on because people don’t need to ‘reinvent the wheel’, it works and they’ve proved that.

“If you want the talent of the future working for you, you need to give something back and MENTOR”

Find out more about their work here: http://sellorelse.ogilvy.com/2012/04/19/the-rough-diamond/

Moving SEO out of the silo

James Carson took us on journey of SEO, showing us that it doesn’t have to be that complicated.

“SEO is not magic, there are no guru’s, wizards or ninjas” – SEO should be nested in the project from the very start.

This is a genius example of how a brilliantly executed idea can drive traffic – The History of Dance Music

Brew Dog was another case study – they are a relatively small brewery but most people in the audience had heard of them because of their brilliant marketing campaigns.

James champions everyone being involved in the SEO process “No more disconnected SEO. It’s the responsibility of an entire organisation.”

“Make marketing noble”

There was so much inspirational and important information throughout this lecture that I’m itching to watch this one again! Allister Frost led us on a mind blowing exploration of neuro marketing and how advertising and marketing effects us psychologically to get us to buy products.

“Marketing has moved from scarcity of spectrum to scarcity of attention”

He discussed the power of positivity enforcing a product i.e. the smile in Amazon showing A-Z which gives you a little smile when you notice it for the first time.

His talk was geared around the idea of “making marketing noble” and to “Think honourably. Are you acting in the best interest of your client AND your customer?”

“An idea that can be marketed”

I think this was my favourite talk – Ash Amrite and Johnny Watson from DKLW LOWE took us through a case study of how they took a rather blah video for Halfords and created an ‘idea that can be marketed’ as opposed to ‘a marketing idea’ – a quote which I think will stay with me forever. They shared with us a detailed process into the Tour De Francis campaign which put Halfords back on the map as a serious cyclist resource.

Check out this awesome documentary:

Duel Screens

Social Media and Television – we all watch TV and we all (at least all of us in that room) were keen social media affionados so this talk really spoke to all of us.  Tiffany St James and Gemma Went presented to us fascinating statistics of people who use social media and a 2nd screen to enhance their television viewing experience, and really showed us how television is changing in a big way, giving us a flavour of the future. A staggering 60%+ of us use social media to accompany our TV watching.

The future of the future

A fascinating exploration of the ‘Future of the future’ – Paul Bainsfair shared with us his thoughts on where he thinks technology is heading in the future. We got to view some brilliant videos which I will share with you below. We also heard straight from the horses mouth, someone who has genuinely had a session on Google Glass, which perked up many ears in the audience!

Play time

Syd Lawrence runs a company called We Make Awesome Sh – the link being wemakeawesomesh.it which is both a great name for a company, and also an amazing idea. Syd described it as just ‘fucking around with technology’. They come up with some amazing ideas just by playing in the work place and as a result have never had to pitch for a project. This talk left me feeling inspired to put more time aside to spend time with my team members coming up with ideas and experimenting with technology… so watch this space!

As an example of some of the cool things Syd has spent his time making, instacat is one of them and here’s a couple videos of some others:

Digital/Physical

Next up Andy Bell who talked us through some of his fascinating projects. The latest one being Foldable.me, a project funded and launched through Kickstarter. He explored the top 10 social media campaigns of 2012 and also told us that “Boredom is cool…. people want peace and quiet” as there is currently a “surplus of stimulus” which we “take for granted”.

It was during this talk that I suddenly became very away that not only was I sat listening to a talk, I was tweeting, Facebooking and checking out links on multiple devices as well as taking photographs.

Lastly what I remember from the talk was the discussion of Digital / Physical, where the best user experience & marketing tactic is gained through providing users with a physical experience along with their digital one. This is where Foldable.me and Stickygrams.com came into their own.

“Spending happy time looking at birdsong”

A surprise speaker of the day, Patrick Bergal from the BBC Radiophonic workshop – any audio nerds will know this name. Here Patrick talked about his Chirp App which sends information through the power of audio. A little chirp here and if you have the app, you can receive information through the sound. I think this is one of those things you have to try to believe! I did like the comparison of the chirp noise to being ‘R2D2′s love child’ – thanks Alex!

To download the app head over to http://www.chirp.io

How to Kill Creativity

Dave Birss talk on ‘how to kill creativity” with potentially the most quotable talk of the 2 days!

Dave stated “Creativity is not magic… it’s a process, and there are steps” and that “The process within a company defines the output more than the people”

So I’m just going to share with you the 10 steps of what not to do if you want to be creative:

#1 F**KING BRAINSTORMS!…. Brainstorms have been proven to be the least effective way of coming up with creativity….. brainstorms suck” Sitting around a table with limited time to think of something stifles creativity.

#2 “Only use people with expertise”

#3 “Eliminate criticism” Dave points out that criticism drives you to do better.

#4 “Don’t define what success means”

#5 “Don’t waste your time with research” Always research! The more knowledge about the subject, your client and the audience the better.

#6 “Don’t trust things like ‘gut’” This is one thing I’ve always done, is trust my gut. It’s gotten me out of some tricky situations a fair few times before.

#7 “Think what your boss would buy” Your boss isn’t your target audience.

#8 “Don’t give people time to slack off” This was one of the overriding themes of the weekend – creativity is best when it has time to breathe.

#9 “Make creativity a secondary priority” This refers to the fact that often the priority is the deadline. Ryan David on Twitter said “@davebirss talk at #sb12 was true this morning. “The ideas must be ready by 5pm!” Great ideas dont just appear within set time constraints..” too true.

#10 “Require proof of future success” Dave talks about clients who produce a brand new brief and then require proof that you have done something similar in the past to prove you can do it. This is a sure fire way to kill creativity as you will just end up creating what’s been done before.

Learn to collaborate

Liri Anderson’s talk was all about global change and global impact and the fact that “The companies doing well today are the ones being “unselfish” in their approaches to their customers and clients.” She also stated that “Organisations need to be agile, innovotate and relevant to survive”

What was really interesting was the theory that we are a ‘culture of perpetual crisis’ as that businesses & brand are being driven forward by this fear of failure.

She also made a huge point of the importance of collaboration ‘successful people will be the ones who learn to collaborate’. I also found the idea of taking risks and not being afraid to fail interesting, especially when she revealed that large company ‘Gore-tex’ ‘celebrates failure with champagne’. Whether you succeed or fail you will always learn something which will drive you on to make better things next time.

Humanity needs an upgrade

A rather deep talk about technology and the way that humanity now wants an ‘upgrade’ not a ‘reboot’. Alan Moore described how ‘technology only succeeds when it meets fundamental human needs’.

“10% of the UK population don’t have access to a bank account, so have to rely on pay day lenders” As a case study Alan talked about www.fairfinance.org.uk which is so successful because ‘true innovation is doing things for the collective good’.

To find out more about Alan’s theories check out his website http://www.no-straight-lines.com/

Shareability vs Discoverability

A great opener from Nick Darken; ”I’m not in the listings – hoping this is your Tom York moment & you’re all thinking ‘f**king hell Radiohead are playing!”

Nick spoke of shareability and how it should be more about discoverability.

This was a brilliantly entertaining and educational talk, which introduced us to his project The Condescending Corporate Facebook Page which is hours of fun. He also spoke about the virility of things like Gangnam Style and how fundamentally, there’s no real reason behind its shareability, it was just a good idea.

He argues that “If you can express a concept and make it marketable to your mum, it’s more likely to have shareability”

As a case study Nick showed us Giff Gaff and talked us through some of the ideas that did and didn’t make it, which is always fascinating, and the story that led him to come up with The CONtract featuring K-Orville, which went viral. He says “Put discoverability first, and then make it shareable.”

As a final quote, Nick left us with this: “Act like a start up, not like an agency… improve, evolve and innovate”. Something we can all learn from.

“It’s okay to say no”

The last talk was much anticipated. Steve Price from Plan B Studio started with 1 minute of awkward silence to show us that 1 minute is longer than you think it is. He spoke about how it’s okay to say no – to projects, to clients, etc. And that “As an industry we are very guilty of constantly chasing our tail, forcing ideas instead of giving them time”.

And as a final quote, Steve left us with this: “Nobody goes to their grave wishing they’d spent more time at work”.

What I’ve taken away.

I think Alex tweeted this and it sums up the weekend perfectly:

“Five words you might like to consider taking away from #sb12 this weekend: play, disruption, collaboration, education, change.”

What we’re going to do at Starboard is allow more time for creativity and to play with new technologies and ideas.

I already can’t wait to get started and have many ideas already so hopefully the new site will be full of new ideas and some inspiration.

Thank you Matt for putting together such a brilliant weekend that will have inspired the next chapter of Starboard Media.

P.S. Sorry if I’ve forgotten anyone I wrote this a while back and didn’t quite get to finish it!

It was my first time but I was welcomed into the group of regulars instantly. The idea behind it is to turn up and get creative, simple as that! Organiser @MissKendalJames brings along all the materials and you can just get stuck in. I’m very much used to ‘drawing’ behind a Mac, but it was good to get away from the screen and just let the creative juices flow.

Check out a few pics of what I’ve created over the past few weeks, and the group doodle at the end of the session. The first time I went the collaborative doodle theme was sea life.

Why not come along to the next one? They happen every 1st & 3rd Monday of the month, at the Registry from 7pm-9pm. Burgers are 2-4-1 and drinks are cheap so come on down and get doodling!

Starboard are looking to hire! We’re looking for a Middleweight to Senior backend developer.

What you’ll be doing.

• We build a lot of WordPress sites which require custom plugins and modifications.
• We also work on some complex e-commerce sites which require the backend to be designed, developed and maintained.
• Occasionally we develop custom CMS’s so this skill is desirable.
• You’ll be working alongside the Creative Director to respond to client briefs.
• You’ll be meeting with clients along with the Creative Director, and often working with outside companies on projects.
• You may be responsible for delegating work to a junior developer if needed.

Essential skills:

You’ll be highly skilled in the following:

• PHP
• WordPress
• HTML
• CSS
• jQuery

Where is it based?

Our office is based right in the heart of Southsea, on Albert Road.

The hours…

This is quite flexible. Essentially you will be hired on a freelance basis, and a weeks work could be anything from a day to full time, dependant on workload. At the moment we are looking at about 20 hours a week (2-3 days).

Getting down to business… the pay.

We pay day rates, which will depend on experience. This will be discussed during our meet and greet. Please send your day rate expectations when applying for the job.

What’s it like working for Starboard?

We like to think of ourselves as a friendly, approachable company where you can feel part of a team. You’ll be working on a diverse range of projects from startup companies to large corporate sites. We also have our own hack afternoons to work on personal projects, just for fun.

We work in a creative office space with other design & development companies, so there’s lots of creativity floating around and fun to be had. There’s plenty of socialising and opportunities to network.

How do I apply?

We’re not interested in CV’s, they’re boring.

Email Joanna, at hello@starboardmedia.co.uk with some examples of projects you love/loved working on, describe your skills and let us know your day rate expectations.

Look forward to hearing from you, and hopefully working with you!

What you’ll be doing.

We build a lot of WordPress sites which require custom plugins and modifications. We also work on some complex e-commerce sites which, if you have the experience, you’ll be working on too.

Essential skills:

• PHP
• WordPress
• HTML
• CSS

Desirable (but not essential)

Where is it based?

Our office is based right in the heart of Southsea, on Albert Road.

The hours…

It’ll be on a part time basis, and potentially full time basis during busy periods. It really depends on workflow, so it may well suit a student looking for a bit of extra cash, or a freelancer who has other work on the side. We’re pretty flexible!

Getting down to business… the pay.

We pay day rates, which will depend on experience. This will be discussed during our meet and greet.

How do I apply?

We’re not interested in CV’s, they’re boring.

Send us an email to hello@starboardmedia.co.uk with some examples of projects you love/loved working on and list your skillset.

Look forward to hearing from you!

Welcoming new team members

In June we expanded from just myself and Chris and moved into new office space at Port 57 (on Albert Road). We also welcomed 3 new team members; Dave, our project manager and video editor, Lewis, our super brilliant camera operator and Jackson, our junior front-end developer.

Dave (Project Manager)

Jackson (Junior Developer)

Lewis (Camera Operator)

We launched some amazing client sites and also got to work on some really exciting film projects this year.

Websites

The following websites we either launched, built or worked on (there were dozens of others too but they are under NDA).

• The Chambers
• Nviro
• C4 Film
• Compare the Kit
• Metrotile (launching soon)
• Auction Your Motor (launching soon)
• Low Carbon Construction (launching soon)
• Hear 4 Youth (launching soon)
• Youth Business International (build only)
• Portsmouth Freelancers Meet
• Urban Gallery
• The Amber Rose Tea Company
• Garbos Hairdressing (build only)
• Rob Roy Films

Film

As well as working on client projects we also produced a few of our own videos this year too:

• Web Expo Guildford
• The Day of the Rabblement live sessions
• DV Mission – The Pepperdine Method
• Forward Foundation – various videos 
• Trafalgar Halls Challenge
• Bonzos 1st Birthday
• Spirit of the 40s
• Operation Market Garden
• Laser Quest Promo

Lewis at Web Conference Guildford

Trafalgar Halls

Spirit of the 40s

The Day of the Rabblement shoot at the Wine Vaults

Other projects

We also got to work with some local companies, conferences and events doing marketing and photography:

• Southsea Fest (band photos & social at The Wine Vaults and The Atrium)
• The Wine Vaults (social media and photos)
• Channel 4 Film and British Culture Conference (social media and photos)
• Barnaby Rudge rehearsals (photo shoot)
• The Day of the Rabblement (photo shoot)
• MGB 81 and RAF HSL 102 (photo shoot)
• Silicon Beach

Kevin as Hugh in Barnaby Rudge

RAF 102

The Day of the Rabblement

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy…

There was plenty of fun to be had at Starboard this year for myself and the team too.

July saw the annual PF Meet summer BBQ which is hosted by ourselves. We hosted a geeky pub quiz and BBQ which was really good fun as you can see from the photos.

PF Meet Summer Quiz

August we were celebrating 2 things. First off was Starboard’s 5th birthday! We hosted a small party which was also our office warming. Along with that, we celebrated the Olympics with our fellow office dwellers; Bonzo, and even got to hold the Olympic Torch.

Starboard & Bonzo with the Olympic Torch

In October we took part for the 4th year in the DV Mission 48 Hour Film Challenge. No awards this year but we did have a lot of fun making our first B-movie! We had a all new team this year with first time director Josh Hibberd and first time actors Dave Walsh and Lisa Reeve. We of course had James, who has appeared in every one of our DV Mission films!

Our film set

DV Mission Team (left to right) – Lisa, James, Jo, Josh, Dave and Chris

Xmas upon us and we held the PF Meet Xmas party, as well as our first annual Xmas office party, which was a blast. Here are the Starboard team all together:

Team Starboard (left to right) – Jackson, Chris, Jo, Lewis and Dave

What’s next?

Well, first off Starboard has a new logo:

We are also working on a new design for the website, which is being completely rehauled, so look out for that. There are also plans to start writing films to enter in film competitions, and we may even be filming a charity swim across the Channel later in the year so watch this space!

As some of you know, every year we enter the DV Mission 48 Hour Film challenge right here in Portsmouth. This year we mixed things up a bit and entered as Starboard Media (we usually team with Mad Dogs Productions but they were unavailable). For those that don’t know, DV Mission is a huge challenge, whereby 20+ teams start on Friday at 5pm, are given a title of a film, a genre and a line of dialogue, and are given until 5pm Sunday to submit the film ready for the premiere.

The 3 obstructions this year were:

Genre: Creature Feature
Title: The Pepperdine Method
Dialogue: I’ve got 99 problems.

We decided to go down the B-Movie creature feature route, much in the vein of War of the Worlds, The Quatermass Experiment, Them! etc. Ours turns out to be an outright spoof and there are plenty of references to dodgy b-movies in there, see you can spot them!

The Pepperdine Method – 50′s B-Movie Spoof (DV Mission 2012) from Joanna Eyre on Vimeo.

Cast & Crew

This year we had first time actors; Starboard’s very own Dave Walsh, Lisa Reeve and our lovely James Jones cameoing in it (he has been in all 4 DV Mission productions so far). This years production was directed by Josh Hibberd, and filmed by Starboard’s camera man Lewis Porter. Starboard’s creative director Joanna took on the role as Producer, and the writing was a team effort.

Equipment

We went for minimal equipment this year, just one Canon 60D, a Zoom Recorder with a Seinnheisser radio mic for audio and a couple of dedo lights. The footage was edited in Premiere CS6, with green screen and SFX produced in Motion, and grading done in Final Cut X.

Location

Huge thanks to Action Stations at Portsmouth Dockyard for allowing use of the Ops room – it was the perfect location!

Here are the results of my social media endeavours & real life socialising over the conference:

(Blog post on the things I learnt to follow…!)

Adam Brown as Barnaby Rudge

In rehearsals.

Langdale.

Marissa Rowell as Martha Varden.

Kevin Brewer as Hugh.

Stagg.

Leigh Cunningham and Nick Rickard as Dolly and Joe.

Chester & Lord George Gordon.

Dora.

The play runs at the Kings Teathre on the 9th, 10th and 11th of August 2012. You can buy tickets here.

If you have multiple emails or departments on your site and you want the user to be able to select from a drop down menu which email / department to send the email to, then this is the solution.

PLEASE NOTE: You will need both the latest versions of WordPress and Contact From 7 for this to work, or you may get form field errors.

The solution

This is the tag you need, separating each email and department name with a pipe. I.e. sales|sales@domain.com

[select recipient "General Enquiries|contact@domain.com" "Technical Help|technical@domain.com" "Support|support@domain.com"]

In the Mail details below, where it says To: you’ll need to add <[recipient]>

And voila! The user should now be able to select an email to send to from the form.

You can follow TDOTR on Twitter and on Facebook.

Fixed Rates and Chartered Souls (7/8) – The Day of the Rabblement (live sessions)

Soul Traders Drum – The Day of the Rabblement (live sessions)

Cultivated Earth – The Day of the Rabblement (live sessions)

Figurines of Glass – The Day of the Rabblement (live sessions).

Kelly Welly – The Day of the Rabblement (live sessions)