From best to not-so-best, what follows are panel ratings from the 2008 SXSW Interactive Festival according to feedback forms completed by attendees at the completion of each session. Each panel title is linked to its description on the SXSW website.

Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scoring system, with 5 being the most favorable rating and 1 being the least favorable. Panels NOT listed on this page received 10 or less total feedback responses.

Also posted below are the average ratings for each day of the event. The figure in parenthesis indicates the rating for the corresponding day of the 2007 SXSW Interactive Festival.

A brief word of caution: these ratings are by no means a foolproof or scientific method of evaluation. For many sessions, one registrant will say he / she absolutely hated the panel, while the next registrant will say that the session at hand was their favorite presentation of SXSW. Perhaps this very wide range of ratings is attributable to the diverse range of people who attend the event. One improvement we plan to implement in 2009 is to better label whether sessions are geared for beginners, intermediate or experts in the given topic.

Please feel free to comment on what your favorite panel at the 2008 SXSW Interactive Festival is by emailing interpanels@sxsw.com. Your feedback is always valuable for us in continuing to improve the event.

Friday panels - 3.81 (3.65)
Saturday panels - 3.92 (3.82)
Sunday panels - 3.92 (3.64)
Monday panels - 4.15 (3.72)
Tuesday panels - 4.20 (3.55)

Average overall rating for 2008 - 4.00 (3.68)

Individual panel ratings after the jump.

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Panel Ratings

Tuesday Keynote: Jane McGonigal - 5.00
MASH Notes: A Military Surgeon’s Videoblog from Iraq - 4.90
Monday Keynote: Frank Warren - 4.86
Tools for Enchantment: 20 Ways to Woo Users - 4.81
Magic and Mental Models: Using Illusion to Simplify Designs - 4.78
Make It So: Learning From SciFi Interfaces - 4.77
PMOG: The Web as a Play Field - 4.74
Hardware Mashups: Introducing the Long Tail of Gadgets - 4.72
Opening Remarks with Henry Jenkins and Steven Johnson - 4.71
Friend Me! Vote for Me! Donate Now! - 4.67
Everyone’s A Design Critic - 4.64
The Weird Turn Pro: Crowdsourcing For Creatives - 4.62
LOLWUT? Why Do I Keep Coming Back to This Website? - 4.56
Career Transitions: From DIY to Working for The Man - 4.55
Scope Creep and Other Villains - 4.55
Sponsored Panel: The Insiders Guide to Angel Investing - 4.55
Location-based Entertainment, Animating Overlooked Spaces - 4.54
A General Theory of Creative Relativity - 4.52
Content Boundaries, a 12-Step Program - 4.50
Human and Property Rights in Virtual Worlds - 4.50
Pimp My Non Profit - Real Non-Profits Kicking Ass with Online Technology - 4.47
Startup Metrics for Pirates: AARRR! - 4.47
The Web That Wasn’t - 4.47
Peas in a Pod: Advertising, Monetization and Social Media - 4.44
10 Tips for Managing a Creative Environment - 4.43
Behind the Scenes at the Onion News Network - 4.43
Building Portable Social Networks - 4.43
10 Things We’ve Learned at 37signals - 4.42
Social Network Coups: The Users are Revolting! - 4.41
How to Rawk SXSW: The Basics - 4.40
Social Design Strategies - 4.40
The Mexican Manifesto - 4.37
The Supercollider: A Hero of the Social Network - 4.37
Let’s Get Serious: Should Video Games Replace College? - 4.36
Online Advertising for Newbies - 4.34
Battledecks II - 4.33
Designing for Freedom - 4.33
Transparent or Top Secret: Pro Gridiron on the Web - 4.33
Sponsored Panel: Driving the Future of Consumer Electronics - 4.32
Browser Wars: Deja Vu All Over Again? - 4.31
Sponsored Panel: Going Social Now - 4.31
Quit Your Day Job and Vlog - 4.29
The Suxorz: The Worst Ten Social Media Ad Campaigns of 2007 - 4.23
What Teens Want Online & On Their Phones - 4.23
The Care and Feeding of Your Startup - 4.21
Does Tomorrow’s World Need Designers? - 4.18
Sexual Privacy Online - 4.18
What User Generated Video Means to Word of Mouth Advertising - 4.18
How Piracy Will Save the Music Industry - 4.17
Wireframing in a Web 2.0 World - 4.16
Content Management System Roundup - 4.15
The Future of Virtual World & Game Development: Rise of the Indies - 4.14
Catching up with Accessibility: The Basics Quickly - 4.12
Kill Your Mouse: Kinetic Computing Arrives Main Stage - 4.12
Respect! - 4.11
Sponsored Panel: Responsible Web Design - 4.09
Getting Unstuck: From Desktop to Device - 4.03
You Are Here: Gaming and User’s Geolocation in Web 2.0 - 4.03
Games for Change: Real World Games with Real World Impact - 4.01
Bootstrapping 101: The Basic Building Blocks - 4.00
The Science of Designing Interactions - 4.00
AJAX and Flash Mistakes: Lessons Learned Building SlideShare - 3.99
Sponsored Panel: Harness the Power of Social Networking on Your Intranet - 3.96
Just Over 50 and Not Dead Yet - 3.95
Awards - Do We Lose by Winning? - 3.94
Cyber Safety in the Interactive Age - 3.94
The 10 Commandments of Nice - 3.94
Redrum in the Rue Morgue’: Collaboration in International Communities - 3.90
Creating Findable Rich Media Content - 3.87
The Real Dragon: Understanding the Web and Digital Media in China - 3.87
Online Adulation: Use Don’t Abuse Your Fans - 3.86
The Art of Speed: Conversations With Monster Makers - 3.84
Accessible Rich Media - 3.83
Sponsored Panel: Monetizing Rich Internet Applications - 3.83
How Widgets Influence Music on the Web - 3.82
What Women Need to Succeed - 3.81
A Better Gun to Shoot Your Eye Out With - 3.79
Sponsored Panel: The Elephant in a Creative Designer’s Living Room - 3.77
Logos: Why They’re Irrelevant and Can Actually Hurt Your Business - 3.75
The Myth of the Rational Voter - 3.73
Transforming Hospital Systems: The Digital Future of Healthcare - 3.73
Building a Worldwide Climate Movement - 3.72
Design Eye for South By - 3.72
Filching Design: When the Shoe Fits - 3.67
SEO 3.0: Optimizing Search & Social for 2008 and Beyond - 3.64
Edit Me! How Gamers are Adopting the Wiki Way - 3.59
Life After the i-Phone - 3.57
Sponsored Panel: Managing Communities That Work - 3.52
Rome, Sweet Rome: Ancient Lessons in Design - 3.50
Taking Your Web Talent to the Video Game Industry - 3.50
How to Rawk SXSW: Achieving Geekgasm - 3.46
Sponsored Panel: Knowing the Audience: Improving Communication Between Artists and Fans - 3.44
Design is in the Details - 3.42
Sponsored Panel: The Web Agency: There Will Be Blood - 3.41
A/B Testing: Design Friend or Foe? - 3.38
Sponsored Panel: New Media Powering Entertainment - 3.33
Sponsored Panel: Increase Revenue by Mobile-Enabling Your Services - 3.27
Career Rev 342: Dabble Dabble, Toil and Kick Ass - 3.25
Following the Lifecycle of an Idea - 3.19
The Art of Self-Branding - 3.00
The Contextual Web - 2.98
Social Networking and Your Brand - 2.83
Social Marketing Strategies Metrics, Where Are They? - 2.55
From Frustration to Elation: Getting Emotional by Design - 2.42
Keynote Interview with Mark Zuckerberg - 1.69