LaunchPad Coworking: from the ground up at SXSWi

I am sitting on the floor of the Austin Convention Center, observing as Julie, Tori and Tina meet with our structural poet/architect Murray Legge talking about possible floor materials and lighting for the space. Since we spend a lot of time talking to each other (and to you all) about the great ergonomic chairs LaunchPad Coworking is going to feature, you might think we’d have our butts in just such chairs. Or at least that we’d be draped over the couches at the IKEA display set up where you enter the building. But no. We are purposefully plunked down here, out in the open, along a busy corridor. We are transparency in action, flipping through tons of drawings. Anyone is welcome to pop by and take a look.

Admittedly, getting out the door this morning was a bit of a challenge. Not just the miserable weather. But just the whole sense of overwhelming SXSW invariably brings. I mean, there are eighty billion people in town, two hundred million panels, and — wait, as I write this, two cows on cell phones are walking by talking on cell phones and playing kazoos — well, all manner of nuttiness. Just trying to pick what to do can make you hyperventilate if you’re not careful.

I actually kicked my SXSW activities off last Friday night at the Coworking Meetup at the Hotel San Jose on South Congress. Now that was fun. We’d received around fifty rsvp’s before the party but, as I drove there, I wondered if some of those people might do the old last-minute opt out, too tired from flying in and/or too eager to hit the bars. I needn’t have been concerned. More than twice the number of respondees showed up and the courtyard of the San Jose was totally buzzing. I met coworkers from all over — Alabama, San Francisco, Paris and, of course, right here in Austin.

In fact, that was an especially fun part for me. While some of us at LaunchPad see each other regularly — I, for example, cowork during the week with Julie and Tina — not all of us often gather in the same place at the same time because we’re off doing our own tasks that we need to do to get ready to build out and open the space. So I actually had a chance, at the meetup, to catch up with Murray and Tori, too.

Now I’m just chilling, watching. Any chance of hyperventilating is gone. It’s great to people watch. I did a little butt smooching, but not much — Heather Armstrong of Dooce.com won best blog in the Bloggies, which I attended today since they were conveniently held where I was eating lunch. So I went up and gushed at her, trying my best to be the hip, non-cloying gusher, and not considering until afterwards that my teeth were coated in cheese from the panini I hadn’t quite finished eating. But I think if anyone can handle cheese covered teeth, it would be Heather.

Next up we have the Core Conversation on coworking today at 5, which I’m looking forward to. It really does help the whole coworking buzz grow from the inside out when we get to gather together from all over the place and swap ideas.