The team made it back in one piece, no snow storm can stop the likes of our Raincity expedition. After days of music and booth hopping we need a quick recap on the event and how others enjoyed themselves.

One of Raincity's biggest footprints left was the sheer epicness of the swag we handed out. When comments like "Where I can buy the Vancouver's Raincity Studios t-shirt??? It's fantastic..." are being thrown around you know someone did something right. tcritic.com agrees in Drupal Vader and RoboGames.

I discovered that it’s actually based on the Drupal logo and was just some schwag that the Raincity Studios team (a drupal based developer/community builder) put together for SXSW. I wish they would sell the damn thing, it’s awesome.

So as March continues to lumber toward us, Raincity has been making preparations for the big event in Austin.

One thing I'm curious about is the artists that will be performing. I don't know many of them and I need some people to rattle off lists of say 5-10 artists that they would rather die than miss, so feel free to throw in your two cents.

I have noticed after studying the bandlist is that Vancouver is sending a legion of bands to Texas. In all, I've found ten bands from Vancouver alone are going to the event.

• Bella (Vancouver BC)
• Black Mountain (Vancouver BC)
• The Choir Practice (Vancouver BC)
• Destroyer (Vancouver BC)
• Jeremy Fisher (Vancouver BC)
• Dan Mangan (Vancouver BC)
• Marianas Trench (Vancouver BC)
• No Kids (Vancouver BC)
• The Pack A.D. (Vancouver BC)
• Pride Tiger (Vancouver BC)

Ace photgrapher Kris Krug has used SXSW as an opportunity to take some cool shots in the past and will be again this year.

Another list of must see bands going to SXSW is underway at SxSW Insider community. SxSW Insider is totally worth signing up to stay in the loop and make friends with the Raincity clan - Scales, KK, DaveO, Roland and our pals coming from Vancouver and beyond.

After the success of last year's eLiberatica the organizers are going ahead with an 08' version.

A number of volunteers have come together with the drive to improve business in Romania. Open source and free software is cost effective and very flexible in the business world. The benefits companies gain from the ever changing world of open source however can also draw them back. The developments and trends in the field are changing so fast that its a struggle to stay up to date.

eLiberatica is bringing the latest changes and developments to the companies and professionals of Romania. The event will be held in the capital of Romania, Bucharest. The conference is going to focus on three major concepts that are hit hardest when they're not as flexible as others.

• Business adoption - how to make/save money and gain profit using Open and Free Technologies without falling behind
• Government, administration and public schools - decision factors on how laws around copyright, licensing and technology will change and the importance of Open and Free Technologies
• Professional growth participating in the FLOSS (Free/Libre/Open Source Software) community.

Over the past year or two, Raincity Studios has teamed up with the Lullabots to build and theme unique Drupal sites for several high-profile and up and coming Sony BMG artists.

Drupal themeing has long been Raincity's calling card and we've certainly enjoyed contributing our skills to connect rock stars with their fans and vice versa. While we are still working along on some more Sony projects, here are a few we've rocked out in the past while.

Ozzy Osbourne

When we were asked to build a site for Ozzy Osbourne the guys were stunned and honored. The end result was to have fans that love Ozzy Osbourne have a haven to reside in for all their Ozzy needs. Fans can review events involving Ozzy. Any announcements or rants from the man in black will be posted there. There is even a place to research hidden meanings in the lyrics.