WDS08: WebDirections South 2008 Program

Event: I owe Maxine Sherrin and John Allsop a lot you know:

Have your say in the Web Directions South 2008 program

Every year the Web Directions conference brings together a group of expert speakers who have been working on interesting projects and finding ingenious and practical solutions to those same challenges the attendees face in their own work.

This year we’d love your help with finding out who those experts are.

If you can spare 5 minutes to fill in our survey with who and what you’d like to see at Web Directions South in Sydney this September we’re really keen to incorporate your ideas into the program. And yes, we certainly want to hear about it if you would like to present something yourself!

The survey will close on April 9.

Discuss the results

But that’s not where it ends. You’ll be able to keep an eye on the survey results as they come in, though you will need a Google Account to get into this page.

And then on Friday April 11, between 9am and 3pm AEST John and I will be around to discuss the survey results via the “Discuss” tab on that page. Swing by some time, we’d love to hear from you.

Maxine was the first event-guru to contact me and ask me to speak, when I moved back here to Australia. Since then, thanks to her, I gave presentations at both WebDirections 2006 (wd06) on “social networks and user generated content” and WebDirections South 2007 including running a workshop on building social networks and also presenting on mobile social networks.

I seriously can’t thank Max enough for cajoling, bullying and handholding me into that first conference. She gave me confidence in believing that maybe, just maybe, businesses might become interested in what the knowledge I had gained over the years and that maybe people would be interested in what I had to say.

That week in September 2006 was a huge week for me – I had written and was presenting my first courses for the University of Sydney on online communities and marketing. But the highlight was the WD06 Web 2.0 family *group hug!!!* who are now my friends on Twitter and Facebook and who I see at networking events and other conferences. (grumbles: can’t run, can’t hide :P) Of course I went on to you know, do keynote presentations in Saudi Arabia of all places, but none of it would’ve happened without Maxine Sherrin.

In conjunction with Damien Smith from Channel Ten Digital and Lisa Holt from Telecom New Zealand, I can’t think of two more supportive influences than Maxine and John. So, please, go support webdirections South (WDS08) 2008!

And no, I’m not saying this so ppl will vote for me to speak. In fact right this minute I can’t think of any suitable subject. *laughs* I just wanted to say it from my heart, ok? 😛