New Media Expo’s Tim Bourquin

The Expo has a new name this year. What are you hoping to convey with the name “New Media Expo” and who is the event geared toward?

The event is still very much for podcasters. But over the years, Podcast and New Media has become redundant – a bit like calling a show the Book and Publishing Expo. We’ve also added a lot of content and sessions for people who are creating video podcasts. We wanted to ensure people knew we were a convention for both audio and video content. Bloggers are also an important part of the show and New Media certainly includes blogs.

For the first time, the Expo is being held in Las Vegas. What does the new location bring to the table?

Las Vegas is much easier to get to for folks from the East Coast and cheaper as well. Since we’re having the show during the summer, it also offers people a place to take a quick vacation if they want to combine it with attending the Expo. Our room rate at the Hilton next door is $115 which is only $10 more than we had in Ontario. Having the Expo in Las Vegas will allow a more national audience to attend easily instead of being more West Coast-centric. It also adds to the credibility of podcasting and new media as a growing industry.

What can you tell us about keynote speaker Gary Vaynerchuk of Wine Library TV?

Gary has a great story to tell because he’s used podcasting and new media to the fullest to build his notoriety, his business and his personal brand. He’s also a fantastic speaker. His passion for his show and online media will be an inspiration to anyone who wants to create content and promote it to their audience.

What’s new in the exhibit hall this year?

We’ve got quite a few new companies this year including Mackie and Sony Creative Software. Attendees are going to be able to evaluate and demo all the important hardware, software and services they need to create great content.

Advance registration for the exhibit hall and keynotes is free, so why should attendees also register for the conference sessions?

We’ll always offer a free registration choice because I wanted to ensure the show is available to anyone on any budget. However, for those content creators that want to take their shows to the next level, we wanted a more in-depth educational conference that will allow them to do that. There are free workshops in the exhibit hall so even attendees that opt for that will get education. But at $399 for three days, the conference is a lot cheaper than most tech-related conferences so it’s a great value.

What advance resources are available to this year’s attendees?

I’ve always said that some of the best reasons to attend the Expo are outside of the Expo – meetups with other podcasters, hallway conversations and parties. We try to foster those as much as possible by having a Wiki, message board and twitter feed that attendees can follow to find out what’s going on at the show. Sometimes a random conversation with a fellow podcaster between workshops can make the entire trip worthwhile for them, so we try to make those happen as easily as possible. You can find all those tools here.