Top 3 takeaway posts from #SxSW

So as I am sure you know, we were busy bees at ASAE’s Great Ideas conference and at NTEN’s Nonprofit Technology Conference which occurred back-to-back a few days ago, so we did not (and have not yet been able to) attend SxSW, yet again.

We did, however, talk to lots of people who did make it this year, all of whom were saying it was still an amazing conference despite some rumblings that it has got too big and overwhelming.  And of course there have been a TON of posts from all kinds of people analyzing what they did and saw there this year.  I’d like to share my three top takeaway posts, of course from the point of view of what I found worth a read as someone who was not in attendance.  I will say that I have been underwhelmed by most of the “shiny new tools” I’ve seen launched (Group texting? Yawn. That’s so 2007 [Txtmob] and 2008 [Mozeo]) so these posts have very little in the way of tool talk.

See what you think.

• First, this nice slide deck – with audio – from Chris Carfi:

• Next, a really interesting article from the Guardian, about a key theme, the blurring of boundaries between online and in real life:  SXSW 2011: The internet is over

• And last but not least, a quick look from SmartBrief at three emerging trends from the conference.

Did you go to “southby”?  Should we try harder to get there in 2012?  Please share your experience in the comments!