I was intrigued with the A Web Afternoon mini-conference the moment I saw it pop up online. Not because it was organized by the super-friend like powers behind the Atlanta Web Design Group (BTW Atlanta has one of the strongest communities i’ve been to in regards to web design). but mostly because of the format. A half day, with 3 full presentations surrounded by lightning style talks. The angle was mostly towards inspiration, they even produced a video to capture the vibe:
The mission as stated on the A Web Afternoon website sums it up very well and they really delivered on this:
A Web Afternoon is a mini event intended to inspire and educate people who love the web. Think TED, but for the web. Both speakers and attendees will be people from a variety of disciplines, but who all share a common passion for making the web a better place.
Here’s the run-down of (Not All Sorry) the speakers:
Faruk Ates
Co-creator of Modernizer and former Apple UI designer.
Denise Jacobs
Author of the CSS Detective Guide, co-author of InterAct with Web Standards
Ben Friedman
A partner at Iconologic and former AIGA Atlanta President
Leslie Jensen-Inman
Co-creator of Make Awesomeness, creative director of InterAct with Web Standards
Theo Rosendorf
Author of the renown Typography Desk Reference and Creative Director at Matador.
Michael Mogill
Entrepreneur, Photographer, Founder of ATL Nightlife and Reboot Music.
Todd Schnick
Marketing strategist, radio show host, and editor of the 40in240 Mini-MBA e-book project.
What the hell is this post about?
We put on events here at UnmatchedStyle and this past year while planning our ConvergeSE conference we shared a similar desire to really focus on the inspiration aspect of what we do as well as delivering on the education part. If you love this stuff as much as I do you saw the outpouring of love for Brooklyn Beta – I didn’t get to go to that but I sure followed it through twitter (how could I have missed it?). A Web Afternoon had that same feeling, strong community, shared knowledge, inspirational info. Something I just can’t get enough of.
If anything, this is just a rally cry to go get involved in your local community. If you don’t have one, go start one. You only need to find one other person who loves the same stuff you do to get started.
Well said, Gene. (It was great seeing you there, by the way.) I love how compact and inspiring this mini-conference was. I left feeling refreshed and not a bit overwhelmed. I hope there will be more events like this. And soon.
yeah. we need more of this stuff. thanks for being a part of it…
@Chris – You too man, always good to see you. The wheels are already turning in my head…
@Todd – Was damn glad to be there!