No, Coolfer isn't @ SXSW. There was an unfortunate, unavoidable change of plans, but I'm still using the old graphic.

Billboard.com's Melinda Newman has an article on Neil Young's "touching" keynote conversation yesterday. Young spoke of his creative process and how it has changed over his career. "Now, there are big breaks and [then] it's just like a dam bursting," Young said. "I used to write a song every day."

There have been a ton of articles about how British acts have used SXSW to gain a foothold in U.S. market, but this one at the Telegraph is the best yet. It offers further proof of what everybody knows but too few practice: You have to play to Americans if you want them to buy your album.

MP3.com has done a good job of covering panels at SXSW. This article is on a music and technology panel with Eric Garland of BigChampagne, David Pakman of eMusic, Jeremy Welt of Warner Bros Records and some others.

Music bloggers, sorry to have to call you out, but where are your posts from Austin? A check of my regular reads shows only Frank from Chromewaves has made an effort to post from SXSW. Frankly, it's a little embarassing. We're the wired generation, not the I'll-blog-when-I'm-back-to-my-desktop-at-home generation. If you don't update regularly it's not a blog, it's just another website. I know you're out. I know your drunk. I know you're tired. But just blog already.

The good news is that Austinist, The Austin American-Statesman, the Village Voice and Done Waiting's SXSW blog have regular posts from Austin. Even the NY Times' has a special SXSW section (which by itself blows away music bloggers' combined coverage to date).