I get rejected for plenty of stuff. Jobs, conference talks, fellowships. Sometimes, the organization doesn’t even bother with the bare minimum–a response email. The rejection comes when the event starts up and I’m not included, so I can pretty well figure out what happened. Sometimes I apply for something as a fluke, get a form email. And, well, there was no harm in trying.

But then sometimes, I really give a shit. I apply for something I’m excited about. I put a lot of effort into the application or talk proposal. I may even discuss my application with people involved with the organization. And then….a stock email rejection.

I am so excited to be heading back to the Allied Media Conference this year. And not just that, but I get to facilitate a session with Knight-Mozilla Fellow alum Gabriela Rodriguez while two of our current fellows Tara Adiseshan and Francis Tseng facilitate a session of their own.

I have only been to the AMC once before, but I’ve been wanting to get back ever since. Personally, it was an experience where I built relationships with activists in Philly during a long car ride, learned about political perspectives I never encountered in college, saw amazing art in museums and on buildings throughout Detroit, and generally had my assumptions and comfortable resting places challenged. It was the first time I had been to a conference that had personal and professional significance. Since then, I’ve encountered hints of the AMC spirit, such as from events with Aspiration Tech, who are facilitating the community technology network gathering on Thursday.

At the Mozilla Foundation’s annual festival for the open web, OpenNews organizes two tracks of hands-on hacking and building focused on journalism and data. The call for proposals is open till August 29, so get pitching!

What happens at MozFest?

MozFest takes over the Ravensbourne building in London for 2.5 days on October 24-26. Ravensbourne’s nine stories become home to a physical representation of the possibilities of the open web: from teaching to music, science to journalism, 1,000 participants dig deep into the content, code, and questions that drive the open web. Rather than slide-driven lectures, MozFest sessions are collaborative, interactive, and focused on uncovering new possibilities for what it means to work online, in the open.

The application deadline for the Knight-Mozilla Fellowship is this Saturday, August 16 at midnight. You may have already read the info on the website and caught up with what fellows have experienced, what next year’s news organizations have planned, how we’ve set up the program to be welcoming to a variety of life circumstances, and how this fellowship can reshape your career.

But you might still be thinking, could that really be me?

Yes, yes it could. If you apply. We often get asked “what makes an ideal applicant?” Over the past three years, we’ve found that what sets a candidate apart is evidence that, as OpenNews Director Dan Sinker puts it, they are a “creative problem solver.” This means, you’re someone who enjoys solving problems through code–whether that be with a captivating design testing the limits of your JavaScript skills or with writing a python script to parse a giant data set or with programming an arduino to monitor what the hell is happening in the back of your fridge. :o)