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The Unheard Word

One woman's slightly skewed views

Web Essentials ’05

I’ve been back for a week now and couldn’t let the occasion go by without remarking on it (along with zillions of others). Because WE05 in Sydney was, truly, a remarkable conference.

Firstly the line-up of international speakers was impressive. From Molly Holzschlag (I want to be like Molly when I grow up!) to Derek Featherstone (whose web accessibility smarts are second to none, and who is such good fun too) to Tantek Çelik (who had a heap of informative things to say about web standards and Web 2.0 and who, after all, gave me a Technorati t-shirt!) amongst others, it was an awesome opportunity to learn and be challenged.

The Australian contingent gave the international speakers a run for their money (so to speak). Lisa Herrod gave a wonderful presentation on usability testing, specifically eye-tracking. I really appreciate that kind of thing because for many of us, we just don’t have the facilities to do our own in-house testing so it’s really interesting to get a feel for how it’s done when it’s done properly. Russ Weakley also gave an excellent — and amusing — presentation on liquid CSS layouts.

The whole crowd was just fantastic. It was a fun event, and informative, but more than that, it was exciting and motivating.

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4 Responses to “Web Essentials ’05”

  1. Molly E. Holzschlag Says:

    What a nice post 🙂 It was so much fun to meet you at the conference, and to socialize a bit as well. I chatted with Stephanie the other night, another fantastic Web woman. The world truly grows small. Nice blog, btw!

  2. Vicki Says:

    Aw Molly, meeting you was the highlight of the conference for me. 😀 I hope you felt the conference was worthwhile from your own point of view.

    Stef is awesome. Yes it’s a small world and ain’t that great? 🙂

  3. Lisa Herrod Says:

    It really was a great conference wasn’t it? and what a great sense of community.

    Thanks for the kind words, I had so much fun presenting there, and meeting up with new and old friends was wonderful.

    I think we’ve started a tradition after just 2 WE’s Vicki… See you there next year for a hat trick! 😉

  4. Vicki Says:

    Well, Lisa, now I’m looking forward to seeing you when you’re in Perth for your speaking engagements. But for sure, let’s make it a hat trick with WE06!