Upon entering Auditorium 1 for the NCMR opening remarks this morning, the first thing I encountered was a giant lumbering polar bear. I instantly knew this was going to be a fun day.

The remarks were kicked off by a local Native American leader (sorry, I didn’t catch his name/tribe) who led us in prayer in his native tongue whilst holding an eagle feather.

At this point, I’m fairly certain media moguls around the world were quaking in their boots.

Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak and Senator Amy Klobuchar were both listed as speaking this morning, but they just had recorded video messages (lame). Rybak explained how he actually had more experience as a journalist than a politician. Then he jokingly encouraged attendees to spend A LOT of money while they were in our city.

Here’s a shot of Klobuchar with a quote COMPLETELY out of context given the conference’s focus:

Josh Silver, Lawrence Lessig and Robert McChesney all had stirring, enlightening and passionate speeches about the breakdown in our current mainstream media system, governmental regulatory systems and the big corporations who lobby to keep archaic, backward laws and legal monopolies in place. Standing ovations all around.

Then Keith Ellison actually showed up in person to speak.

His actual quote here was, “Lots of crazy stuff that goes over the Internet.” I’m not sure why the closed captioning person typed “sburnt.” Maybe she sneezed.