My topic for An Event Apart

When I was invited a few weeks ago to speak at An Event Apart Atlanta (which recently sold out by the way), I had no idea what I was going to talk about. I'm anything but a regular convention speaker, so I didn't have a ready-made presentation to dig up, or much of anything to immediately pull from. But I gave it extensive thought -- including the interests and technical acumen of the target audience, what topics I would feel the most assured and comfortable speaking about, and of course what would make an engaging, informative presentation -- and at the end of the day I found it: "Off-hours Entrepreneur" (working title).

Everyone involved in web development has seen the flurry of entrepreneurial activity online over the past year, from Ajax to Web 2.0 to all the little web services companies with funny names. Chances are most attendees of An Event Apart have considered using their education and talent to go it alone, but have resisted the urge to jump out of the 9 to 5 and lose all the security, benefits, and other accouterments of a full time gig.

I found myself at a similar crossroad in early 2005. I hit on an idea for a photo gallery Flash application that would be simple to use, customizable, and feature-rich. I had developed plenty of Flash content in my career, but I had never built a component from scratch, nor did I have any experience selling software online. I already had a very comfortable full time job, but I plugged ahead anyway in my spare time at night, on weekends, and over vacations, and came up with SlideShowPro, and my life was turned upside down.

My session won't be about Flash, building components, or really all that much about the product itself. It'll focus on the things you don't see -- the ups and downs, the mistakes, the quiet successes, and everything I learned in the process. I'll discuss ways to avoid the potholes I fell into, methods for keeping your sanity, how to keep your users engaged, ways to ensure success, and what you can expect by dipping your toe into the off-hour entrepreneurial waters.

I'm pretty jazzed about the presentation, mainly because so much of the behind-the-scenes craziness with SlideShowPro has been seen by only a handful of people. It'll be my chance to share a lot of real-world experience with my peers, and hopefully inspire a few to try it themselves.

For those not attending, I intend to share my presentation here on the site (most likely in PDF form) for others to download. But for those of you who got in, I'll see you in April.