Back from a business event with some new inspiration…

I’ve just got back from a business event, and meeting some really cool people and hearing about some really cool things. Everyone agreed not to report or blog about any of the topics discussed to allow openess at the event, but I will say that there are loads of great things going on in the near future.

What I can talk about are two of the things that really struck me on my trip home.

1. I really need to kit myself out more effectively for the ‘digital nomad‘ role on trips. I’ve held off getting a smartphone for various reasons, but I’m more and more convinced about how much easier it will make my life. The other tool I’m really interested in is a netbook of some description. Notetaking etc is far more efficient when I can type away on something small and unobtrusive, whether it’s an Asus or one of the netbooks being launched by other manufacturers.

2. Amongst all the cool things happening in the wide world of the web, it’s sometimes easy for me to forget to mention some of the great work I’m involved with. I’ve tended to avoid blogging too much about my day job in detail, because I don’t want things I write to be coloured by whether I’ve had a good or bad day at work, or to refer to things I can’t discuss in full because of business reasons. But at the same time, I definitely want to mention things like Tim on Car Magazine not only encouraging the start of live review blogging from the road test of the new Ferrari California,  but also using Twitter to update with the latest news from the test.

I was out of the office on Friday when the liveblogging began, so I can’t reel off the facts and figures to show whether it drove a huge amount of inbound links or visitors to the site – but what i do know is that it’s a great example of using the most approrpiate tools to convey the excitement and thrill of being a journalist lucky enough to test a Ferrari.