Ignite Detroit – A Real World Event For The Digital Age

If you haven't heard about Ignite yet, you probably will soon (well, technically you're hearing about it now). It's a growing global phenomenon and it came to Detroit two nights ago. I had the chance to go to Ignite Detroit and I have to tell you, it was an exhilarating evening. It was both entertaining and enlightening. If one comes to your city, I highly recommend you go. If you live in Detroit, the next one is in 6 months.

What is Ignite? Well, as their slogan "Enlighten us. But make it quick" proclaims, it's an evening of short presentations. Fifteen speakers get up and speak on whatever it is they're passionate about. Each speaker is given five minutes to make their presentation. A PowerPoint slide show put together by the speaker illustrates their points while they talk. The trick is, each speaker submits 20 slides that auto advance every 15 seconds. This keeps each speaker's presentation moving along. Speakers submit topics. Half the speakers are chosen by popular community voting online. The other half are chosen by the team running the event, to make sure they have a well-rounded program.

 At Ignite Detroit, we had some amazing presenters and presentations. We had the head of GM's social media, Chris Barger, present on how much he loves 80's hair bands and what businesses can learn from them. We had the co-founder of the Internet sensation site, Texts From Last Night, Ben Bator, talk about how they took a simple idea and turned it into a huge deal, not only with big name advertisers on the site, but a book deal and a TV show deal with Fox. University of Michigan student, Ryan Doyle, who has founded a charity call Live to Give, talked about the future of non-profits and how they need to give back to the individuals who donate to them. Charlie Woolborg gave a very funny, yet thought-provoking bacon-filled rant on how we've become a sound byte society. Presentations went from serious and scientific subjects like Mellisa Hui's presentation on how the food we eat changes our DNA to seriously unscientific subjects like Dave Murray's hilarious presentation on how the world will really end in 2012, with the rise of the cats. Dave's presentation had me laughing so hard, tears were streaming down my cheeks. He was voted the top presentation of the evening, by the way. The evening ended with Hajj Flemings, who helped orchestrate last summer's Brand Camp Detroit, giving an insightful presentation on reeducating the disposable worker, especially interesting for those of us here in Detroit. Once the Ignite Detroit presentation videos are uploaded, I'll link to them here. In the meantime, you can see videos from Ignite globally here. (photo by Jenni Murray)

Tickets for the event were gone in just over six hours after they became available. And this was with no advertising at all, just social media buzz. It helped that main sponsor, GM, made it possible to get the tickets for free, but that's still very fast. And they probably could have given out another 200 – 300 tickets if the Magic Stick in downtown Detroit had the capacity. I took some of my advertising friends who aren't into social media and hadn't heard of Ignite before. And they loved it, too. So, if you get a chance to attend an Ignite event, I suggest you do. You can find out dates of events around the world on the Ignite site. Locally, Ignite Ann Arbor and Ignite Lansing are next week as part of global Ignite week.

Brandon Chesnutt and his merry band of organizers did a fabulous job bringing Ignite to Detroit. If you'd like to bring Ignite to your city, here's a page on the Ignite site that tells you how. Or you could probably contact Brandon and ask him about how they did it.

This is just one example of the new kinds of events that are popping up all over, as a result of the connected digital world we all share. Contrary to popular theory, the Internet has not made us all sit in front of our computers alone. It's given us new ways to connect and come together in the real world. I can't keep up with all the events. This week alone, I had Ignite Detroit on Thursday, there's a meetup with social media rock star, Shannon Paul today, there's a send off tweetup for the Chevy SXSW Team Detroit in the Ren Cen on Monday, my regular Tweetup called Tweetea on Tuesday and an LLC launch party on Friday – all with people I consider friends who I didn't know a few years ago, before tapping into the Detroit Social Media scene.

It also has meaning for brands who are looking to gain customers. There are all kinds of new opportunities for companies to get involved and sponsor events like this. Or to have a presence in these strong online communities. You just need to keep your eyes open for what's going on and what's the next big thing. Or just ask someone like me.

Mike McClure, still soaking in the Ignite Info.