After a brief holiday lull, things are shaping up to be a pretty Big Ass Ridiculous Week for ROFLThing-NYC. We’ll be debuting our shirt/swag for the event (including the reintroduction of an old favorite from our original conference in April), steaming forward to opening registration by the end of the week, and announcing a few more featured attendees and sponsors (as well as our final mystery empty panel slot).

Most importantly though, we’re actively looking for volunteers to help out day-of the conference. If you’re interested, drop a comment on this here post and we’ll be sure to get back to you. Benefits include free swag, free registration, and access to a little get-together that we’re doing for our guests the night before the event.

Also, since prereg demand is looking so high for tickets, we’ve decided to let the people on our early reserve list know about ticket launch in advance of the official launch on our website. There’s a chance we’re going to sell out fast even with that round — and we will only be adding names to this list today and tomorrow – so if you want to get in on it, be sure to drop us at line at tim AT roflcon DOT org in the next 48 hours.

I’m geeking out about this, but just spoke to MIT Media Lab member and all around badass Drew Harry earlier this week, and glad to report that ROFLThing-NYC is going bringing all that hot Backchan.nl action back to our event.

If you missed out when we used it in April, Backchan.nl is a nifty little tool that lets everyone in the audience dynamically drop questions and vote up or down stuff while the presentation is going on. It was used varyingly to cause fun trouble at the original conference (see above: dammit, Randall), and we’re pumped to have it back. If you’re really into reading about it in more depth, there’s also a really sweet paper (pdf warning) written by the good folks at the Media Lab about it.

Drew’s also looking into potentially putting together some similarly cool stuff for the afterparty, we’ll announce them as we get the deets work out.

Rocking. Two announcements today! Nothing like a day of banner accomplishments.

On January 24th, all the events for ROFLCon-NYC (talks and the ensuing party) will be at Santos Party House on 100 Lafayette Street in Manhattan. Be there.

It also has a disco ball. We cannot promise that we will not use this during the party. Liberally.

• Middlesex (loungy bar, apps, mid-size)
• Miracle of Science (semi-swanky bar, food, smallish)
• Asgard (irish bar, food, big space)
• Middle East and Zuzu (same venue as concert)
• Hi-Fi Pizza (ALL AGES! cheap food, cheap beer)
• Enormous Room (loungy bar, not enormous)
• The Field (irish bar, food, mid-size)
• Tavern in the Square (swank sporty bar, mid-size)

Here’s a map of some of the cheaper noms, courtesy of ROFLSponsor Yelp:

Click on the map for deets, and feel free to use the forums to recommend your favorite local foodz as well.

• Live video feed at ustream
• Guest bloggers – analyzing the talks and events, and giving you the inside scoop on the memes
• Photos in our Flickr group
• Twittering from @ROFLCon (follow us!) and a stream of #ROFLCon tweets
• Hanging out on bright kite (thanks, Martin! direct message your email @ROFLCon for an invite)
• Backchannel #roflcon on irc.freenode.net

12 hours till registration opens!

[update - sorry for the broken links earlier!]

…Oh, and the best part? We should have enough Brawndo on hand for everyone attending.

[update] And be sure to follow @hashtags and include #roflcon in your tweets about the conference. The tagged tweets will be aggregated at http://roflcon.hashtags.org (thanks @afarnham for the spiffy URL!).

Many of you have e-mailed the ROFLCon team or mentioned that you wanted to come on our registration page. In the hopes that we could get in as many people as possible (one of the big reasons why we moved this whole operation to MIT in the first place), we’ve been actively putting people on a waitlist. We’re finally firming up our attendee numbers this weekend, and will be sending out yea or nays today. It possible we’ll be missing a few names due to some data loss, so if you don’t hear back — it’ll be safe to assume that we weren’t able to swing some spaces.

This is our first year, but us ROFLCon peeps are actively considering setting up events like this in the future, so if you’re interested in knowing what we’ll be up to next, shoot us an e-mail with “Update List” in the subject heading to roflcon AT gmail.com and we’ll subscribe you to our low-traffic e-mail update hotline.

Thanks,

Tim

Directions

Travel by air or train:
You can take a taxi to/from ROFLCon (cost about $35 from Logan Airport
or $20 from South Station) or use public transportation. MIT is
located at the Kendall/MIT subway station on the “Red Line”, which
runs direct to South Station (cost $2): from there, you can freely
transfer to the SL1 (“Silver Line”) which serves all the terminals at
Logan Airport.

The official ROFLCon area map

Google map for Friday morning registration/panels

Google map for Friday afternoon registration/panels.

Travel by car and parking are covered below the fold.

Travel by car from the Massachusetts Turnpike (Interstate 90):
To reach MIT from New York and the mid-Atlantic states, the best route
to MIT will be via Interstate 90 (I-90), also known as the
Massachusetts Turnpike or MassPike. From the New York City metro area
and points south, take Interstate 84 to Interstate 90. From
upstate/western New York, take the New York Thruway to the
Massachusetts Turnpike.

Follow I-90 east to the Cambridge/Brighton exit (exit 18). After
paying the toll, follow the signs to Cambridge. Proceed through the
stoplights at the intersection. You will cross the Charles River via
the River Street Bridge. Continue straight on River Street for about
7/10 mile to Central Square (the next major intersection). Turn right
onto Massachusetts Avenue and follow Massachusetts Avenue for about
7/10 mile. After you cross the railroad tracks, you will be looking at
MIT – the Great Dome and academic facilities are on the left, the
dormitories and athletic facilities are on the right.

Travel by car from Routes I-93 or I-95, or the Southeast Expressway:
To reach MIT from Rhode Island, Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, the
best route to MIT will be via Interstate 93 (I-93), sometimes referred
to as the Central Artery or the Southeast Expressway.

From I-93, take exit 26, and follow the signs to Back Bay along
Storrow Drive west. You will pass two left-hand exits, one for the
Longfellow Bridge/Kendall Square and one for Back Bay/Copley Square,
before reaching the left-hand exit for Route 2A/Massachusetts Avenue.
Make a right at the end of the exit ramp and cross the Massachusetts
Avenue Bridge. As you cross the bridge, you will be looking at MIT -
the Great Dome and academic facilities are on the right, the
dormitories and athletic facilities are on the left.

Parking

Parking in Cambridge and Boston is generally not an enjoyable
experience. Whenever possible, park your car at the hotel at which you
are staying, and use public transportation to get to the MIT campus.
If you must drive to the campus, there is both on- and off-street
parking available, but most public parking is not very close to the
center of the MIT campus (unless you arrive early in the morning or
late in the evening).

There is metered parking on Massachusetts Avenue for short stays and
evenings/weekends, as well as a number of lots at which you may park
for a fee. These include Vassar St. Public Parking at the corner of
Massachusetts Avenue and Vassar Street, University Park / Star Market
Public Parking, and the Marriott Parking Garage on Ames St. and
Broadway.

Pay Lots:
Massachusetts Ave. & Vassar St. Lot
139 Massachusetts Ave.
617-258-6510
Open lot, on the corner.
$ 12.00 7:00am – 2:30pm
Free 2:30pm – 7:00am, Monday through Friday
Free Saturday and Sunday

University Park (near Le Meridien Cambridge)
55 Franklin Street (enter on Green St.)
617-621-8023
From the MIT campus, head down Massachusetts Ave. toward Central
Square, left on Sidney St., left on Green St.
$ 6.00 Up to 1 hour
$ 9.00 1 – 2 hours
$12.00 2 – 3 hours
$15.00 3 – 4 hours
$18.00 4 – 12 hours
$20.00 12 – 24 hours

Kinney Systems
617-225-2988
4 Cambridge Center
Enter on Ames St., or Broadway, in Kendall Square, under the Marriott Hotel.
7 Cambridge Center
Enter on Ames St. or Galileo Way between Main St. and Broadway, near Kendall Square.
10 Cambridge Center
Take Broadway to 3rd St. to Binney St.
$ 8.00 Up to 1 hour
$16.00 1 – 3 hours
$22.00 3 – 24 hours