Hutong Events: Under the Digital Influence

In the Hutong
Listening to Radio Pyongyang
1628 hrs.

For those of you who will be in Beijing in the next couple of weeks - especially those of you with membership in the American Chamber of Commerce in China - you might want to set aside the afternoon of September 19th.

At the Renaissance Hotel Ballroom, AmCham China will be hosting two panels of people talking about digital marketing, the online scene, and the business of blogging.

With the sole exception of yours truly, the panelists on both panels are superb.

The first panel, on China's Internet scene, includes:

• Sam Flemming, CEO of CIC, the company that brilliantly decodes and mobilizes online word-of-mouth for companies in China. In short, he's the guy that did what the guys at Technorati couldn't with Chinese blogs and the insanely popular bulletin-board systems.

• Andrew Lih, who is probably the leading expert on online collaboration in China specifically and globally. Don't let his pedigree in the ivory tower (Columbia and Hong Kong University) fool you - this is a guy a real feel for the subject at the ground level.

• Matt Roberts, who will be moderating, and who comes to his current employer (About.com) from venture capital firm BlackInc and a stint as the chief rep of Dow Jones China. Matt has been exploring the underside of Internet in China for years, and my recent conversations with him have only underscored that he is one of the truly knowledgeable thought leaders on the subject.

• Me.

The second panel will cover off on the business of blogging, with four professionals who blog talking about the affect it has had in their business and careers, and how to blog wisely both generally and when covering the issues surrounding China. That team consists of:

• Dan Harris, better known to most of us as ChinaLawBlog.com and founding member of law firm Harris & Moure pllc. People who read Silicon Hutong will tell you I am not a fan of the legal profession generally, but Dan is in that pantheon of attorneys who exemplify the genuine value of legal counsel.

• Chris Devonshire-Ellis, from tax, accountancy, and business consultants Dezan Shira & Associates, who runs china-briefing.comBu and 2point6billion.com and exemplifies in his profession what I am trying to do in my own - raise the practice to a level that transcends simple operational excellence and turns that functional area into a competitive advantage.

• Will Moss, Director at Burson-Marsteller in Shanghai and celebrated author of Imagethief.com, where his funny, insightful, and highly readable posts put the rest of us to shame.

• Jeremy Goldkorn, (moderator) founder and archduke of media site danwei.org and founder of The Standards Group. Haymarket and other industry publications notwithstanding, danwei.org is without question the best window onto China's new and traditional media industries. Even if you don't care about the media business in China in particular, danwei is a cultural thermometer for China in a form we foreigners can understand and appreciate.

All of this will be followed by a party (naturally.)

For details, check out the event site here.