Miss Nicole Jensen

Over the weekend I attended 10thousandgirl’s new life and financial planning workshop for young women. It kicked arse, so I vlogged about it. The second video contains more lifestyle tips and info I learned from the event, while the first video is an outline of the event itself. Forgive me, I did forget a lot between Saturday and now!

My HUGE thanks go out to the 10thousandgirl team (specifically Tara Grimshaw, Anneli Knight, & Zoe Lamont), Jo Baker, ING Direct, Napoleon Perdis Make-Up Academy and Opportunity International Australia. I owe OIA a massive apology as I completely forgot to mention their presence at the workshop entirely.

Cool things to check out:

I’m off to BTUB now. Catch you all another day!

Hi there, readers! It’s been ages since I last wrote here due to a number of reasons of which I shall fill you in on now and then some things you can see from me this year.

Brisbane Twestival Local, September 2009

Oh, Christ! How this was a busy time for me. I wish I’d written about this earlier. But it pretty much went off with a bang and I’m still proud of how everyone worked well on it. My first major event as king pin and I think I did a pretty good job, despite my more natural outlook of criticising my hard work to the dickens.

March 2010 will see Twestival Global again, but due to the many activities I have planned for this year, I won’t be on board the committee other than to hand over the reigns.

Regarding BTUB and Brisbane Twitter social events, I am not likely to be organising any events or managing the calendar. 2009 was my year to volunteer and now I’m likely to not have any time for it. It’s been swell, tweeps, but I can’t do it any more.

University

In September I applied for a Bachelor of Business (Events) at Griffith University. In December I was accepted and so in March I shall start back at study after a year out of the lecture hall. Nice, nice! Rather excited actually and looking forward to it. My completed Diploma of Events Management means a year is taken off the BBusiness, so I’m only looking at a two-year outfit.

Employment!

Get this; I have a job! A job! Employment! And it is the best job I’ve ever had. (They know this already, so I’m not just talking it up here for brownie points) I’m the administration officer for Women in Technology, a winner industry organisation for women in the IT, biotech, engineering… any technology career path, actually. They do some pretty awesome things (for stacks of fantastic members who pay practically nothing for the networking opportunites), and I’m rather looking forward to organising the events and programs for this year. They even let me set up Twitter and facebook for them!

Moving house

After two years in St Lucia, I’ve now relocated to Stones Corner on Brisbane’s south-side. It means at least 50 minutes to work, uni and the boyfriend’s place; but at least it’s affordable and in a pretty cool area. Many thanks again to the miracle of my Twitter friends who spent one Saturday in December helping me move. That was EPIC and I will never forget the kindness of these people.

Internet Censorship

Here’s my political contention of recent months (even a year). The Australian Federal Government wants in your Internet on the premise of doing Australian families’ parenting for them. National mandatory Internet censorship (just think about each of those words: National. Mandatory. Censorship.) They plan to block websites which not only host illegal content but also “refused classification” content. This pretty much means content that is legal to view but is stuff that the government (or their stakeholders) don’t like. Not only is it a very scary thing for future governments and citizens to adhere to and control, but it’s going to be quite expensive, ineffective and… well, do you really want the government stopping your kids from getting useful information on how the world works?

I won’t blog all about this today, but for more information you can check out the amazing websites of Somebody Think of the Children, Electronic Frontiers Australia and the Brisbane filter opposition.

The LoveBuckles / Drumming

This is my boyfriend’s kicking band. They’ve had stacks of gigs lately, the most recent for my dear high school friend’s 21st in Coffs Harbour, NSW. It went OFF and I feel lucky that I was there to enable it. And go on road trip. And surround the sleeping drummer with a fort of milk crates. What a bunch of lads!

As for my own musical pursuits, I’m very happy to have my drums all out and shiny for practice. For someone who started in primary school, I should really be much better and I can’t wait to see improvements. You should come by for a jam one day!

And that’s it!

Phew. That’s the essentials for a NJ.com update. As for this website in 2010, it will be updated and mainly used for video blogs and reflections of events/business stuff learned at uni and WiT.

Hello, readers! How is everyone today? Just a general update of the awesome things I’ve been up to lately.

Last week I was lucky enough to score a free ticket to Creative Drinks. My dear friend Hannah Suarez of Brisbane Creative Industries was the speaker of the evening and did very well. Her presentation is on SlideShare here and includes some helpful networking event tips.

Tuesday I was also in attendance at my favourite Brisbane events company Iceberg Events‘ Networx, Working the (Real & Virtual) Room. Director of Paragon Associates, Lisa Butler kick-started the evening with information on busting networking myths and emphasised that anyone can learn to network effectively. More friends of mine were speaking on the topic of working the virtual room (specifically Twitter) – in fact, the whole panel trio of Darryl King, Clare Lancaster and Greg Lexiphanic! Ignoring the occasional train screaming through South Brisbane, discussions of Twitter and social media run amok against a background of a Twitter projection of the #networx hashtag.

Yesterday I attended ANZ’s Small Business workshops discussing online marketing (specifically Google’s AdWords and social media) and brand awareness. The day was a good one and I met various new people interested in learning more about their businesses online. I was even outed as a secret live-twitter bug, which was a great example to those wanting to understand the scope social media can have. There are more ANZ Small Business workshops happening all around Australia until around November, so get in quick to enrol (they’re free too)!

Lastly, things are rolling faster and faster for Brisbane Twestival Local. Committee positions are being snapped up fast, bands and artists approached, venues scoped. We are hoping to gather the support of the voted-in beyondblue: the national depression initiative as our charity of choice to support, a charity I have long been a fan of.

Phew! I think that’s about it. Oh! And the BTUB Wine Night was a complete success as well. My first paid event as a freelancer. Feels good, man.

Looking for full-time employment has unfortunately taken a back seat to these activities. It’s a shame I’m having so much fun… well, no. Not really.

Local radio station b105 has organised for a party at the newly-rebuilt Victory Hotel for Brisbane Twitter users who register with them. This would be all fine and dandy if they had done a bit of research first.

I have been an active Brisbane Twitter Underground Brigade (BTUB) member since around August of last year. We have held at least monthly or fortnightly meet-ups in Brisbane under the intention of being purely a social group. There are hundreds of BTUB members and we regularly hold events for up to around 50 to 70 people at various venues around Brisbane, most notably The Ship Inn.

Not only has b105 refused to do any homework on the existing  lively and loyal Twitter locals, they also have tomorrow’s Vic tweet-up on the exact same night as BTUB’s Kevin Rudd’s Stimulating Package party, as arranged by myself and a friend, Michael Meloni, pretty much weeks ago after the previous BTUB was another success.

I write about Twitter quite often because I am not afraid to admit the wonders it has done for creating and connecting communities. Friends, business associates, families and more have connected 140 characters at a time since Twitter launched, and the 2009 explosion of interest in the online network has meant vast corporate activity, much to the mixed response of Twitter users.

Now whether or not b105 did not know how to search Twitter, Google “Brisbane Twitter” or even read some of their followers who are active BTUBbers, they have committed a rather obvious event management mistake; jumping into the bucket with competitors. Not holding your event on the same date as immediate competition is something they do not even bother to teach you in basic event management school because it is so damn obvious!

Secondly, not approaching anyone from BTUB for a bit of research was also silly. Trying to appear to their fan base as the thought leaders of a Brisbane tweet-up is extremely foolish. Surely there is no bureaucracy in BTUB, only more active members, and no clear forefront member to question, however this is no excuse for basic research on your target market. Numerous BTUBbers have contacted b105 in order to educate the radio station on the current local Twitter community, but I would like to know if anyone has heard any replies of yet.

I look forward to seeing how tomorrow night pans out.