As the webmaster of SYTYCD.com, which is a dance fan blog, I had the pleasure of being part of a really fun event. ‘So You Think You Can Dance’: Guinness record-setting Dance Dance Revolution event.

The mission was to perform the largest simultaneous dance mat routine in history, a la Dance Dance Revolution. To set a new Guinness World Record, “SYTYCD” needed at least 100 people to participate in a dance pad performance for at least five minutes.

My cousin and I were there to cover the event and be part of the Guinness World Breaking Record!

DDR and “SYTYCD” enthusiasts were gathering at the Nokia Center. One hundred dance pads were assembled, and some solid prizes awaited the dancers: a video game console, a dance video game and mat, a 23-inch LCD flat-screen television and a year’s supply of Wrigley Extra gum. We both walked away with the DDR mat which we both have yet to try.

The atmosphere was great, everyone was pumped up and ready to go, even though it was about 100 degrees outside and really sunny.

People from Guinness stood by, waiting for the event to begin. Access Hollywood, E!, Local Radio Shows, and Fox 11 News were also covering this history making event.

As the Hosts of the show arrived along with several dancers from previous and this season’s show, paparazzi began shooting tons of photos and taking video of them.

You can view the video from the event by clicking here.

We were also able to snap a few photos and interview several dancers. Overall I was glad to experience this publicity stunt to promote the premier of the show.

We also had a chance to catch up with Rob, a good friend of ours, and spent the day roaming around Hollywood. We had lunch at the famous Ivy and then walked around Beverly Hills Park during the annual Art Festival. The next day we drove down to Santa Monica to enjoy a nice day on the pier.

My first experience of Los Angeles, was awesome and I can’t wait to go back! Next stop is San Diego and San Francisco.

I drove up to Brooklyn Polytechnic in New York to attend the Podcamp NYC 2.0 this Saturday. This was my 2nd Podcamp, since I attended and helped out with Podcamp Philly last year. I personally love the idea of Podcamp and that its very laid back and has that “unconference” feel to it. I signed in approximately around 10:30AM and checked out the schedule to see which sessions I would be interested in.

As the day progressed I met several interesting people in the new media sphere, exchanged business cards and enjoyed the atmosphere of this event. I did bump into several friends from Philly that I knew and it was great catching up and and finding out what they were up to.

Attending Podcamp is like walking into the Best Buy store, you see all kind of gadgets and the latest technology. I must have seen dozens of iPhones, Apple Macbooks and even those new Nokia n95′s that several people were streaming live from. At one point my iPhone could not even login to the EDGE network because of so many iPhone in the area! Overall, it was awesome being in the middle of it.

Walking around the campus you can’t help but notice small “cliques” hanging out and chatting with each other. It would have been nice to have a introduction type session where each person, whether they are a newbie to Podcamp or a veteran, introduce themselves and tell a little more about what they do in the new media.

The sessions I attended were:

11AM – Affordable PR using New Media for Non-Profits.Chris Penn & Maria Thurrell

1PM – Chris Brogan, Laura Fitton, and Roxanne Darling: Finding Your New Media Voice

2PM – Relationships 2.0- WankerGirl & Ms. Something

3PM – Chris Penn- New Media Marketing

4PM – Drew Olanoff- “bringing it all together”. Using social media as your toolkit and not a distraction.

I would have to say that I enjoyed the day and would go again next year. My main goal of Podcamp NYC 2.0 was to check out how it was organized and get some tips for this year’s upcoming Podcamp Philly 2.0. I am involved this year as an organizer and invite everyone to attend.

See you in September!

You can see the photos I took at Podcamp NYC 2.0 on my flickr stream.

This Saturday, I will be attending PodCamp NYC 2. I am taking a ride there with Bill Rowland, a friend of mine who runs an interesting podcast show: PhillyFoodGuys.com. Since both of us are involved in organizing PodCamp Philly 2, this would be a great experience and a great place to network with the industry folks.

I am looking forward to the trip and meeting some people face to face that I only interacted with online. If you are working with podcasts, blogs, social media and any of the web 2.0 technologies, then PodCamp is the perfect “unconference” for you!

Here are some photos from last year: http://flickr.com/search/?q=podcampnyc

I will be posting some photos after the event.

We met Jim, the blogger and moderator of 2pointhome.com, who hooked us up with a Flip Cam that we used to produce this Viddler Video. Please visit their website to see the great things they are doing for families in need of technology makeover.

We also snapped a few photos that can be viewed on our Flickr.