BlogHer '08 Recap

I had the pleasure of attending my first BlogHer conference this year, on Friday, July 18th, 2008. After a full day of attending keynote sessions, meeting and greeting fella bloggers, attending break-out sessions, and allowing myself to be video-taped by 3-A-Day™ (a milk concern) and iReport (a CNN affiliate), I came away from the conference with a head buzzing with ideas and a canvas bag full of (almost) nothing -- thanks to the recycling room sponsored by Zwaggle. Because I wanted to use a vacation day from work and not take up one of my precious weekend days, I had decided to attend only the Friday of BlogHer, which was kind of short-sighted of me because some of the Saturday sessions, e.g., the infertility blogging session, interested me the most.

Nonetheless, I ended up attending three Mommy Blogging tracks:

MommyBlogging: Is MommyBlogging Still a Radical Act?
MommyBlogging: Public Parenting & Privacy
MommyBlogging: Mirrors: Ours, the Media's, Our Cultures' and Our Kids'

There was one session that was somewhat appealing, Who We Are: Introversion, Blogging and BlogHer, but ultimately I decided against going because, well, I’m rather extroverted, actually.

Of the three Mommy tracks, above, the one that I found most stimulating was the one on kids’ self images in the media: while the session touched on blogging a bit, it was more of an intelligent discussion about the negative body image messages children receive via the mass media. The speakers, which included the fabulous Glennia Campbell of Kimchi Mamas, were a diverse group of women representing multiple ethnicities and sexual preferences. While Honeybee is only four and has not yet formed any thoughts about her physical appearance, the session made me aware of some of the crap she’ll be exposed to in the near future. One mother couldn’t hold back the tears when she related a story about her tween daughter being terribly upset about not fitting into Abercrombie and Fitch’s size “L” jeans. At this, most of the moms in the room tsk tsked the questionable retailer, then proceeded to opine about how clothing companies are complicit in distorting children’s body images, leading to anorexia and other ills.

Over all, I found BlogHer to be a mediocre experience. I found the commercial aspects of the conference rather off-putting, and was surprised that most bloggers were there for the purpose of finding out how to make money by blogging. Or gain readership, or become more high-profile. Okay, maybe that was the whole point of the conference, and I just missed it; but, I am just a humble blogger who’s been doing it since April 2004, and have never once placed an ad on my site. I started out blogging to keep my friends up to date while I was pregnant, and the thing just grew from there.

Also – while sitting in the sessions, I couldn’t help but wish that I were up in the front of the room as a panelist, and not a member of the audience. As a blogger going on five years of experience, I feel that I have things to say and war stories to tell. The only thing I lack is commercial experience, which should be separate to the content, anyway. Maybe I’ll work on getting on a panel next year… that’d be awesome! (And, it doesn’t hurt that I know someone who just got a job working for the BlogHer network!)