Make Connections at Web Directions

For a good while now, Cam “the man in blue” Adams, and Tim “toolman” Lucas have been toiling away on a a killer webapp to compliment web directions, “web connections”. To prove the adage “great minds think alike” only a couple of weeks ago d.Construct’s, Backnetwork app went live too. The aim of both the apps is to help facilitate one of the really important but sometimes overlooked aspects of going to a conference - connecting with like minded people who share your interests and passions. To tell the truth, putting together conferences is really hard work, and if it were not for the fantastic people we’ve met over the last few years, from here, and round the world, I doubt we’d find the energy and motivation to keep doing it. And I do know others have got jobs, formed business relationships, formed fast friendships, and even found life partners (in some cases all three of these things for the same person) thanks to their coming along to our conferences. That’s worth all the tea in China to Maxine and me.

Web Connections is chock full of the latest webapps goodness, and particularly dear to my heart is its extensive use of microformats. There’s

• XFN for marking up your relationships with people - met, friend, acquaintance and so on
• hCard for marking up contact details
• hCalendar for event details
• relTag for tagging

and even an example of a draft proposal I have for a tagcloud microformat (it’s only a very early draft proposal, if you are keen on the idea, please join the conversation).

Plus, there is all kinds of google maps mashups madness going on in there too.

Right now, web connections is only open to Web Directions attendees and speakers. I think down the track it will open up some more. So just one more reason to get along to the conference of 2006 in Australia.

[tags]wd06, webdirections, microformats, webconnections[/tags]