SXSW 2012 Party Directories

It’s just a couple weeks until the next version of SXSW hits the pavement in Austin, Texas. I still believe this will be a huge “badgeless” year and I keep betting that SXSW officials will eventually not allow access into the convention center at all without a badge.

If you are looking for parties, here are three great guides to help you find free beer, free bbq, free networking, etc. If you aren’t going to have a badge, make sure the parties you are interested in will allow badgeless access. And if you will have a badge, make sure it is with you when you head out to the parties so you can get into the clubs and bars.

Gary is the master of Gary’s Guide and he has an in-depth list of parties around Austin during SXSW. You will easily spot Gary around Austin as he wears a suit with a bright red tie.

Social event guide Lanyrd has an event guide as well. Their event guide includes parties and all other events during SXSW.

SXSHHH has a party guide for all of the free and unofficial events – they charge $5 for the list. RSVPster will register you for every party for $20 – so basically you will take a slot for every party even though you won’t go to most of them and you will block someone else from going – blah on that.

Republic of Austin has a party guide and all of the parties they have listed are badgeless events.

Lastly here’s a link to the official SXSW party directory. My guess is that all of these events will require an official event badge.