Mega Hash 2008

The extended trail system was very creative, placing falses on true trail to facilitate the channeling of prey into the fisherman's net.



The extended trail continued the trail towards south to reach the powerline clearing (check mark), descend it a bit, then continue south to the western side of the Poets Corner apartments, managed by Union Real Estate, crossing a few deeply rutted ravines in typical hasher style, with markings were in white paint. Then, a second powerline, descending that, to the creek below and a big B mark on a tree, with cave nearby. Two black garbage bags with the loot. The extended trail then continued north following the creek, with several checks, and reconnected with the hares's true trail.

Curiously, Sherpes found the beer stop NOT by following its intended directionality, but backwards (small yellow dots). He was back from the pack, the FRB already ahead on the extended trail, then saw DJ returning back, and when Sherpes pointed to a False mark on a tree, DJ said "someone is f..ing with my trail. True trail goes that way...". A check below at trail intersection, and going straight down towards the creek, a second check. Sherpes and Hairy Squatter went left (south) traveling parallel to the creek, yelling On-On at every mark. Eventually, Hairy Squatter returned after hearing DJ's calling for Hash Back ("1" on map). At the intersection of the powerline and creek, Sherpes could see three hashers very high above hillside along powerline ("2" on map, red shirt suggests it was newboot geologist) and yelled "Check" to them, but never to see them again (they too were called back by DJ). Sherpes found the beer stop, small cavern on an overhanging cliff was the obvious spot to hide the staff, climbed up, and well hidden, two black bags, typical B stop, opened the garbage bags and displayed the loot, and waited waited waited for the others to arrive. (never happened). Then, trying to figure out what was happening, found trail marks on the other side of creek and followed it, finding the Poets Corner apartments, adjacent streets, top of two powerlines, recconecting with the hares's true trail, returned to mystery beer stop thinking by this time, the pack was there (wasn't), met ATVers, offered them a beer (they kindly refused), waited again, scouted trail and other falses, then, speculated a theory that the two falses (yellow "F" on map) were too close to each other and that basically the entire pack shortcutted the entire beer stop trail, and eventually decided it was time to move on, and found trail (and tons of falses) that lead to model airplane field.

That undeveloped area of South Park is called Sleepy Hollow, well known by one of the hares.

The eagle trail to the turkey rendezvous was 7.5 miles. From South Park, then into the southern area of Jefferson Memorial Park, went by an artificial turf soccer field, then reached the tallest cell tower on top of a hill.


The Turkey trail was 4.5 miles long


Pit stop from the 1950's



First beer stop

Abbandoned school


Ancient lone gravesite near the tallest cell tower




Second beer stop







Near the department of energy labs

Recconecting with the turkeys





Mystery beer stop





This is typically DJ's beer

Model Airplane field

South Park beer stop, but yinz didn't leave any bear

View of beer stop location with tortilla chips back carried from previous beer stop


Online photo album

Pod Camp

Podcamp


Meet and schmooze with other PCPGH3 early birds while learning about AlphaLab, Pittsburgh’s newest startup incubator! Beverages provided by Erie Brewing Co.

About PodCamp
PodCamp is a community UnConference for new media enthusiasts
and professionals — bloggers, podcasters, YouTubers,
social networkers, and anyone curious about new media. The
first PodCamp was held September 8–10, 2006 in Boston,
Massachusetts...and, two months later, Pittsburgh hosted the
world’s second PodCamp. Since then, PodCamps have been
held around the world, from California to Sweden and Ireland
to South Africa.
Why “PodCamp”?
PodCamp follows the unique open-format tradition of Bar-
Camp, in which the attendees create the schedule. And, since
“podcasting” was the buzzword surrounding web audio and
video in 2006, it was applied to the event’s name. Despite this
grammatical limitation, all types of social media creators — including
bloggers, designers, photographers, programmers and
animators — benefit from PodCamp Pittsburgh.

Rules that Govern PodCamp
The PodCamp Foundation specifies 6 rules which govern
what may or may not be called a PodCamp:
1. All attendees must be treated equally.
Everyone is a rockstar.
2. All content created must be released under a Creative Commons
Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 license (a
copy of this license is provided on the next page).
3. All attendees must be allowed to participate (subject to
limitations of physical space, of course). Please be courteous
to attendees from all levels of social media experience,
and do not monopolize sessions.
4. All sessions must obey the Law of 2 Feet — if you’re not getting
what you want out of a session, you’re welcome to walk
out and do something else. It’s YOUR event! (Just be courteous
to others while exiting the session.)
5. The event must be new-media focused — blogging, audio
podcasting, video on the net, etc.
6. The financials of a PodCamp must be fully disclosed in an
open ledger, except for any donor/sponsor who wishes to
remain anonymous.

Day Zero

Friday, October 17: Meet-n-Greet!

WHERE: AlphaLab
WHEN: 6 - 8 PM
ADDRESS: 2325 East Carson Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15203 (map)
PARKING: Street parking in the area
NOTES: Finger foods and drink available... Meet and schmooze with other PCPGH3 early birds while learning about AlphaLab, Pittsburgh's newest startup incubator!

Beverages provided by Erie Brewing Co.
[edit]
Day One

Saturday, October 18

WHERE: The Art Institute of Pittsburgh
WHEN: 9 AM - 4 PM
ADDRESS: 420 Boulevard of the Allies, Pittsburgh, PA 15219 (map)
PARKING: Street parking in the area

8:30 AM: DOORS OPEN

Light breakfast (coffee, juice and muffins / bagels) available. Bottled water provided by Sportsocracy

The Mentor Lounge (430) Will be open all day.

The WearPittsburgh Loungy Lounge (431) If you need to get away from the action for a few, chill out here (and enjoy the designs of local Pittsburgh t-artistes).
[edit]
Day One Sessions

9:00 - 9:50 AM: Opening Keynote/Welcome. Location: The HUB

Session Planners: Please keep your audiences in mind when planning your sessions. If you're leading a "basic" session, start from the ground up; if your audience is more advanced than you expected, you can always switch gears. Likewise, if you're leading an "advanced" session, make sure the information is well ahead of entry-level. Please label your session and give details in the description, to help attendees.

10:00 - 10:45
The HUB (440) — Social Media: Diversity & Activism We'll look at the different types of diversity in social media and see how they're best presented (with comparisons to conventional media). Also, best practices will be given for getting started in advocacy and activism in social media. Jason Cable
ROOM B (435) — Intro to Blogging: What IS a blog? How do you create one? How do you build and sustain an audience? What makes a great blog? Hosted by Cynthia Closkey and Mike Woycheck of Pittsburgh Bloggers (BASIC)
ROOM C (434) — Podcasting 101: Alex Landefeld
Podcasting is essentially having an interest in producing an audio or video recording of whatever level to be distributed digitally to audience members who use computers or portable audio/video devices to follow your show. Learn to identify an idea that can be produced episodically, learn how to produce that idea, and learn how to distribute your produced audio or video program. Like blogging and other forms of digital self-expression, you're never too old, too young, too experienced or too inexperienced to produce a podcast... all it takes is doing it! (BASIC)
ROOM D (421) — Memory Matters: Making Media That Sticks There are several principles of making things memorable. Jonny will go over those principles and will lead a discussion about ways to work with those principles to make your audio or video media memorable. Jonny Goldstein took second place in the North American Memory Competition in the playing card category and has been making memorable media since 1999.
ROOM E (420) —Making Social Media Visible Michael Munz (Blogs, Videos and Images) Find out how to make your efforts seen and optimized for search engines and consumers.'

11:00 - 11:45
The HUB (440) — Success! (Blogs, shows, podcasts): Justin Kownacki will moderate a panel of bloggers and podcasters discussing different criteria for success in new media, ways of measuring success and how to achieve it. Panelists include DJ G & John R. Carman of The G Spod, Rachel Butera of thatnight.net + Should I Drink That + Rich Westerfield, owner / blogger of Aldo Coffee and more.
ROOM B (435) — Blogging 201: Blogging Best Practices: For those who've been blogging a while (and beginners who want to see what's ahead). Is your blog as good as it can be? How can you attract more traffic? We'll count down the key features that every blog should have, and cover tips for getting readers and keeping them coming back. Presented by Cynthia Closkey (Big Big Design and My Brilliant Mistakes) and Mike Woycheck, co-founders of Pittsburgh Bloggers
ROOM C (434) — Branding Your Podcast: This session will cover how to create and maintain a brand for your podcast (or blog). Presented by Norman Huelsman who manages the visual communication for The Art Institute of Pittsburgh.
ROOM D (421) — Text-to-Voice software Discover how speech technology can generate on-demand podcasts and generally benefit any content by making it instantly available in audio format. Local company Cepstral will demo their new SaaS platform, VoiceForge and explain how TTS voices add value to dynamic applications, mash-ups, blogs, chat, mobile devices, and more.
ROOM E (420) — Meet/Share/Learn-o-Rama This session is designed for you to meet other PodCamp Pittsburg people, share your interests, skills, and questions. Facilitated by Jonny Goldstein

Noon - 12:45 PM: LUNCH

1:00 - 1:45
The HUB (440) — Social Media Business Plans: Aaron Tainter and Alan Veeck of Meakem Becker VC, Meredith Benedict of AlphaLab, Julie Morey of ElasticLab, more TBA
ROOM B (435) — Taking your Audio to the Next Level (Advanced): David Fisher presents tips and techniques to separate your Podcast from the rest of the pack in terms of audio fidelity and workflow.
ROOM C (434) — open
ROOM D (421) — Video Compression Best Practices with Dr. Dave Mansueto: Loveable media swashbuckler Dave Mansueto of Libsyn and Wizzard Media explains what to do (and not do) to make your video look better than anyone else's (except the people who also attend this session).
ROOM E (420) — Podsafe Music: DJ G & John R. Carman of The G Spod will explain what it means to be “podsafe”. Musical artists will learn how to increase their audience and sales by licensing their music as podsafe, and podcasters will learn how to use podsafe audio for free in their shows.

2:00 - 2:45
The HUB (440) — Wrestling Mayhem Show & Should I Drink ThatAfter the Mayhem that ensued last year, who knows what will go down this year as the two shows discuss their Grassroots beginnings and where it's taken them over the last couple years.
ROOM B (435) — Worth a Thousand Words: Photography 101: Michael Fulk covers how to take better pictures even without those fancy cameras (though it can't hurt to have one) and use them to give your blog some color.
ROOM C (434) — Using Analytics: Andy Quayle
ROOM D (421) — Optimizing Video for the Television Viewer: Mark Cavicchia, Founder/CEO of Pittsburgh's WhereverTV explains how to get your videos ready for the big screen, where average viewing sessions are measured in hours, not minutes.
ROOM E (420) — Feedback: The Good, The Bad and the Ugly: Justin Kownacki tackles the ups, downs, pros and cons of comments, ratings, feedback and the trolls who make the web go round -- and how you can learn & benefit from them.

3:00 - 3:45
The HUB (440) — SEO and Social Media: Jeffrey Donenfeld of Morpheus Media
ROOM B (435) — Which Web 2.0 Tools to Use for What: John R. Carman will give you a “cheat sheet” of the best social media tools for different types of online communication.
ROOM C (434) — Making It On Your Own - Want to make a living producing new and/or social media? Speak with people who have done it themselves. Rob Blatt and Walt Ribeiro
ROOM D (421) — Blogging for Interaction with Family and Friends: Norman Huelsman If your family is like mine we are spread out all over the country. My nephew is in Indiana and we can't get enough photos, my youngest brother is in his first year of college and we need a way to keep tabs on him as well as track his athletics, and I'm here in PGH wondering how I'm going to make 20 phone calls a week to keep up to date. I'll share how I started a blog for my family and how we are using it to keep up with each other.
ROOM E (420) — Podcast Hosting and your Blog - Discuss media hosting options that work with your existing blog (Wordpress, MovableType, etc...). Session attendees encouraged to discuss how they host media with their blog. Session hosted by Angelo Mandato of RawVoice

04:00
The HUB (440) — Closing Remarks for Day 1

04:45: CLEAN-UP (Let's be good guests and pick up after ourselves!)

Saturday, October 18: Dinner

Location: Red Star Tavern
5:30 to 9 PM


Saturday, October 18: After-Party???

(All information TBD)
[edit]
Day Two

Sunday, October 19

WHERE: The Art Institute of Pittsburgh
WHEN: 9 AM - 4 PM
ADDRESS: 420 Boulevard of the Allies, Pittsburgh, PA 15219 (map)
PARKING: Street parking in the area

8:30 AM: DOORS OPEN

Light breakfast (coffee, juice and muffins / bagels) available. Bottled water provided by Sportsocracy

The Mentor Lounge (430) Will be open all day.

The WearPittsburgh Loungy Lounge (431) If you need to get away from the action, watch the Steelers game or enjoy an espresso from Aldo Coffee.
[edit]
Day Two Sessions

9:00 AM: Opening Keynote/Welcome

10:00 - 10:45
The HUB (440) — Panel: It's Not Better to Burn Out than Podfade Away (How to Avoid / Recover from Content Creation Burnout): Three of Pittsburgh's longest-running web shows, DJ G & John R. Carman of The G Spod + The Wrestling Mayhem Show + The cast of Something To Be Desired help you plan for long-term success and offer tips on getting back into production after a looooooong break. Plus, we'll be debuting the first episode of STBD's sixth (!) season, so come laugh with a live audience!
ROOM B (435) — LinkedIn 101: Get Started and Build Business Tim Hindes and Blake Imeson
ROOM C (434) — Usability and Utility. What are they, how are they related and why both are important to providing value. Presented by Carol Smith, Lead Consultant at Midwest Research and Joshua Smith, Lead Developer at Dix Communications.
ROOM D (421) — Taking Better Photos (entry to intermediate): David Fisher helps entry level photographers and bloggers overcome photo challenges through use of proper technique, settings and photo editing software.
ROOM E (420) — OPEN

11:00 - 11:45
The HUB (440) — Old + New, Unite! Using Social Media in The Arts: Panel feat. Mike Cuccaro of The Black Sheep Puppet Festival, Kim Chestney Harvey of The Pittsburgh Technology Council + TBA
ROOM B (435) — Social Networking/Media 101: Jennie Roth, Dawn Papuga and Missy Sorg
ROOM C (434) — Blogging on a Budget: How to Get Your Voice Distributed for Free: Alex Landefeld + TBA
ROOM D (421) — Building IRL (in Real Life) Communities w/ Virtual Tools Jason Head of Refresh Pittsburgh will talk about some of the online tools used to organize, manage and communicate with members of Refresh Pittsburgh, a local web design and development user group in Pittsburgh. With the exception of our in person meeting, all group management is done virtually.
ROOM E (420) — WordPress Session: John R. Carman will give an introduction to WordPress blogging software, explain the differences between WordPress.com & WordPress.org, and teach you how to get started with your own WordPress blog.

Noon - 12:45: LUNCH

1:00 - 1:45
The HUB (440) — Sports, Olympics and Running Mates: Mark Rauterkus
ROOM B (435) — Social Networking/Media 201 (ADVANCED): Jennie Roth, Dawn Papuga and Missy Sorg
ROOM C (434) — Constructing Blog Posts and Content: At Least How I Do It Chris Brogan. Step by step on how I am able to put up 2-5 blog posts a day consistently every day. (BASIC-ish)
ROOM D (421) — Live Streaming & Technicalities - building Sponsors, Community as F/T job [Walt Ribeiro http://www.WaltRibeiro.net] of Ustream and Revision 3 goes through the ins and outs of networking, building Community, Sponsors, technology, live streaming, and Viral Marketing. How I grew my online business Step by Step from the Bottom up
ROOM E (420) — Search-Engine-Friendly Blogging, or How to Be #1 in Pretty Hats: Basic search engine optimization (SEO) for WordPress, with applications for other blog tools as well. Want your site to be the number one search result in Google for "pretty hats"? I will tell you how I worked my magic. Key truths and misconceptions about SEO, plus five simple steps you can take to improve your site’s search ranking overall and for your most important searches. Presented by Cynthia Closkey (Big Big Design and My Brilliant Mistakes)

2:00 - 2:45
The HUB (440) — Rust-Belt Bloggers discussion: Panel discussion among anyone concerned with the economic development of the shrinking cities within the Rust Belt region. See also the Rust Belt Bloggers group. Featuring Jim Russell of BurghDiaspora. Facilitated by Cynthia Closkey (Big Big Design and My Brilliant Mistakes)
ROOM B (435) — OPEN
ROOM C (434) — Design: What can it do for you?: This session will discuss some basic design principles (with examples!) that you can use to help improve your site. We'll also talk about why design can make a difference for your site. No design experience required. Presented by Val Headthisisportable
ROOM D (421) — OPEN
ROOM E (420) — The Art Institutes: Social Networking Strategies - Jamie Sterling & Kimberly Blackstone, EDMC.

03:00 - 3:45
The HUB (440) — Revision 3 live taping with audience! [Walt Ribeiro http://www.WaltRibeiro.net] of Ustream and Revision 3 will record his Revision 3 show 'Your Weekly Music Lessons with Walt' live, and he invites any and all to join in and be a part!
ROOM B (435) — Political People, Process and Problem Fixes with a Wiki Tour and Tools: Mark Rauterkus
ROOM C (434) — Using Twitter in Business: Justin Kownacki outlines several ways you can maximize Twitter for promotion and conversation without coming across as Just Another Brand.
ROOM D (421) — OPEN
ROOM E (420) — OPEN

04:00
MAIN / PANEL ROOM (440) — CLOSING REMARKS (No other sessions will be scheduled)

04:45: CLEAN-UP (Let's be good guests and pick up after ourselves!)
[edit]
Want to Request a Session?

If you're interested in learning about something that ISN'T covered by a session already on the list, add it here!

And if you want to present but aren't sure what people are interested in, get ideas here! (If you do a session listed here, please remove it from the "Requested" list so no one duplicates your great idea!)

Desired Sessions:

"Open Source Content and Tools" including Creative Commons Copyrights
"Social Media in Higher Education"
"Moving from a Free Site to a Paid One"
"Grass Roots or Mobile Production (Audio/Podcasts/vlogs)"
"Media Press Kit Workshop"
"Panel: The Future of Social Media"
"New Media Successes in Collective and Individual Activism"
"What is RickRolling and So Can You"
"Starting Your Own Website From the Ground Up"
"What's the deal with Second Life?"

Just Nate's Birthday Hash

Another fine day in the jungle of Wilkinsburg, on a trail 3.8 miles long, laid by Just Nate with the help of Finger Food. Online photo album.

Another day with the gang


True trail


Cardiac Hill road


Lunch


Those are not natural teeth


Hairy Squatter observes






20/20 peach flavored innercity's favorite beverage found


First Beer Stop






Les belles de l'arrêt de la bière


What do these two have in common ?


hint... hint...


Nutty Naughty


Angular Perspectives


Almost the last climb...


... but instead of beer, we found a nonchalant Whiff



Nobody saw this mark


The last beer stop


The head source of Pine Nuts's favorite creek
Norton said last time he was here was in 1951, "I was a thin boy, 11 years old, I could fit more easily then" ["where does it go?"] "What do I know? do you remember exactly what you did 50 years ago?"


Which are stagmites and which are stalactites?


Where to go?


Attempt to escape from Alcatraz ...


... but the prison guard and his dog await him !


A third of a mile long