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A search for Conference on world Affairs lands lookers on dead link for most of the day. The schedule was not there and was only recently put up. That foul-up had to render the first day useless.

The first day of the conference was nearly void of CU students once again. Most of the attendees were grays in their 40s, 50s and 60s.  This again brings into question: is the conference relevant?

The All a Twitter panel discussion in the UMC was attended not by Boulders Twitter SM startup crowd but by mostly older people who were not exactly tweeps.  This session was not what one would have expected. It was not start-up Boulder week, not Ignite Boulder and it wasn’t Twitter.

The panelists were an interesting mix too: Mark Frauenfelder Ross Haenfler Andy Ihnatko Sanho Tree .  Sociology professor Ross Haenfler said he stopped tweeting and compared it to drug addiction and himself to a recovering addict. He then went on to say that most people on twitter waste enormous amounts of their life on social media. Not a glowing endorsement of TWitter or SM.

Boing Boing founder and Boulderite Ross Haenfler was certainly the biggest web superstar to attend the panel. Though Boing Boing significance and contribution was  lost on the audience, it was also lost on the conference.  He seemed concerned about the significance of multiple uses of tweets.

Andy Ihnako Chicago Sun times Geek reporter  also talked about how twitter wraps around your mind and has the potential to enslave.

Sanho Tree is a leftist Fellow and social activist. He talked about social activism on Twitter.

The tone of this session was politically leftist with continuous barbs thrown at conservatives who use twitter. So much for CU chancellors new policy of fair and balanced.  All of the panelists criticized main stream media for not covering the news. None of them could explain the business side of Twitter.  They also seemed oblivious to the fact that Television and News papers lost their foothold to online advertisers such as Google and Facebook

The one saving grace of this panel was to point out just what a waste of a persons life Twitter can be. They couldn’t stress how addictive Twitter and Facebook are and impossible to manage. This was a surprise, but not to the gray attendees. Seemed they seen it all before in a younger life.  And the young? They were nowhere to be seen.  One would have thought the room would have been packed with 18 to 34 year olds. Maybe they were studying or at work. Maybe this panel should have been held at night in a bar or coffee house.