PGHRoots to Netroots Nation

You may have read about Netroots Nation from some of the other bloggers in Pittsburgh recently.  The annual Netroots Nation will be held in Pittsburgh this year from August 13-16, 2009.

Netroots Nation originated as the Yearly Kos in 2006 as a place for bloggers from the DailyKos to meet and share.  I remember reading about it in the Post-Gazette and even watching some of the panels on C-Span.  It made me realize that blogging can lead to the creation of some powerful communities.  I continue to be amazed at how many people follow IheartPGH on a daily basis – last week IheartPGH gained our 2000th Twitter follower which  is just amazing!  When we started this blog back in 2006 I had no idea that it would become such a place for sharing so much great information about Pittsburgh.

I have been lucky enough to attend the past two annual Netroots Nation conferences in Austin and Chicago.  This is an awesome opportunity to share Pittsburgh with the national blogging community, politicians and press.  Last year I was sitting in the convention center listening to Nancy Pelosi answer questions from the audience.  I got up to take a little walk, get some water, when I returned Al Gore was on stage as a surprise guest.  In addition to hearing some excellent speakers – I have learned about some great webtools like ThePoint.com and Eventful (which both happen to have some ties to Pittsburgh) at previous conferences.

Check out an overview of the conference schedule here.

While the convention is still a few weeks away – there has already been quite a bit of buzz about Pittsburgh – check out this photo diary that has been posted about Pittsburgh.  I am also please that the Pittsburgh side has been working hard to share information with all of the visitors that will be coming to town.  Last week we launched PGHroots – a website just to share information around the Netroots Nation event (and hopefully to be used in the future too!)  Please help us add to the

content of the site by writing a review of your favorite local restaurant.  I have been wanting to create a directory of local businesses for a while now and I think this is a great start. Share your PGH favorites! leave a comment here or even write a post on your blog about your favorite Pittsburgh businesses.

Win A Free Ticket to Netroots Nation – check out the info on PGHroots and learn how you can win a free ticket to the conference.

If you are interested in helping with Netroots Nation please join the PGHroots google group and join the conversation.

Some additional blog posts about Netroots Nation…

• Netroots Nation roll call (dailykos.com)
• DFA/Netroots Nation Launch ’09 Scholarship Competition (mydd.com)
• 30 days to Netroots Nation (dailykos.com)