Today’s post originally appeared on the National Conference on Volunteering and Service blog. Follow the NCVS blog for news about the conference!
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The 2011 National Conference on Service & Volunteering (NCVS) is nearly here!
It will be held June 6th – 8th in New Orleans – The Big Easy!
Thanks to social media, there are lots of ways you can participate online – whether you’re there or not!
<-strong>Facebook
“Like” the so that the official wall posts show up in your Facebook news feed.
You are welcome and invited to post thoughts, ideas, etc. to The National Conference on Volunteering & Service Facebook page. Especially if you know a good place to eat in New Orleans!
This year, we’ll be sharing the opening and closing plenary on Livestream, and you’ll be able to watch them on your Facebook page! Keep an eye out on the NCVS Facebook page for a link that you can share on your wall and watch!
Eventbrite
This free tool will allow you (or anyone) to organize an event around conference and invite anyone.
Want to host a breakfast to discuss the topic of your dreams?
Want to organize an affinity group meetup?
Want to suggest an after-hours meet up spot?
You can do all of this with eventbrite.
Check out what your fellow conference attendees are organizing so far.
Blogging
You are invited to write a blog post (for your own blog or as a guest post on ours) about a session you’re excited about leading up to conference or reviewing a session you attended afterward.
Blogging is a great way to share what you’re excited about and/or what you’ve learned.
The HandsOn Blog editorial guidelines are here and the National Conference Blog editorial guidelines are here.
If you write a post for your own blog, send us a link to it at and we’ll be able to share it
to hear all the official conference tweets.
Additionally, follow the conference conversation by . (The search bar is located in the right sidebar of your Twitter homepage.)
Each NCVS workshop session and forum is assigned a unique session #hashtag.
While the overall conference conversation will take place on the #NCVS hashtag, you can follow individual session twitter streams by searching on the unique session #hashtag.
Join the conversation by adding “#NCVS” to your tweets — adding that hashtag in your tweet is the way to have your tweet show up in the conference twitter stream.
You can also follow HandsOn Network ; Points of Light and CNCS
It’s super easy to follow twitter conversations using your cell phone so before conference, you might want to download a cell phone application for managing Twitter.
Want to follow conference speakers? How about conference speakers by focus area? No problem. Check out the and follow those that match your interests!
Foursquare
Foursquare at conferences can be fun. Want to know who’s savvy and in the room with you at any given NCVS session? Check-in using Foursquare and you’ll be able to see who else is at conference, and who you might want to meet!
Maybe you’ll even unlock a special badge!
Delicious
Delicious is a social bookmarking web service for storing, sharing, and discovering web bookmarks.
On Delicious, users can tag each of their bookmarks with freely chosen terms.
A combined view of everyone’s bookmarks with a given tag is available; for instance, the URL http://delicious.com/tag/ncvs displays all of the most recent links tagged with NCVS. You don’t just see the bookmarks that you’ve tagged, though. You get to see what other people have found that fits the same topic!
See all the great NCVS content saved to Delicious and add your own!
Flickr
Share your NCVS photos with everyone using the . You can upload your favorite conference shots photos by joining the group pool and then clicking on the link that says “Add photos.”
If you don’t have a Flickr account, it only takes a minute to sign up for one. All you need is a Yahoo!, Google or Facebook ID
YouTube
YouTube isn’t just a place for piano playing cats – why not record a video of yourself talking about your experience at NCVS, or Send links to your favorite NCVS videos and we’ll add them to our NCVS playlist on !
Send your video links to .
We can’t wait to see you in New Orleans – or online!
Storify is a way to tell stories using social media such as Tweets, photos and videos. You search multiple social networks from one place, and then drag individual elements into your story. You can re-order the elements and also add text to give context to your readers. At the end of each day, we’ll be sharing highlights from the conference. You can make your own social media story and share it, too!
WiFi
Unfortunately, there isn’t public wifi available in the Convention Center. If you have a smart phone, you’ll be able to use most of these tools from your phone. You might be able to use your phone’s connection to drive your computer’s wireless internet, but you’ll have to check with your service provider to find out if you have this option.
If you have a personal portable wireless internet hub it can be a great way to stay connected at conference, and meet some new friends!
Updated 5/18/11:
The National Conference on Volunteering and Service offers complimentary wireless service in all meeting rooms and lobbies. Please look for the SSID NCVS2011 on your wireless device.
In the exhibit hall, Starbucks has provided complimentary wireless service for all attendees and exhibitors. Look for SSID “NCVS” on your wireless device.
The National Conference on Volunteering and Service offers complimentary wireless services in all meeting rooms and lobbies. Please look for the SSID NCVS2011 on your wireless device.
In the exhibit hall, Starbucks has provided complimentary wireless service for all attendees and exhibitors. Look for SSID “NCVS” on your wireless device.
1. Facebook
5. Twitter
8. Flickr
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