The Web and Beyond very successful

As the program-co-chair I am happy to report that this year's SIGCHI.NL conference The Web and Beyond was very successful!

We had over 600 registrants (more than UPA! and more than the IA Summit!), most of them showed up, and we had people register at the door. When the conference was supposed to start, we still had people waiting in line outside the Tuschinski Theatre, so we started a little late.

Jared Spool and Jesse James Garrett each gave excellent keynote speaches and after lunch we had a wonderful set of parallel sessions.

In the one I moderated, I tried to give as much room as possible to the two participants. Bill Scott, curator of the recently launched Yahoo! Design Pattern Library showed the groupings behind their collection. Martijn van Welie, long-term writer of Web Design Patterns focussed on reasons why what Yahoo! is doing isn't really new, but worthwile still. In the discussion it became clear that both pattern collectors would like to see more co-operation, and that both encourage other designers to document their work in the same fashion.

The attendees came back together for the closing keynote by Steven Pemberton who claimed that Web2.0 is the culmination of work that was prepared by W3C members for years and years.

In the closing panel, our guest futurologist Justien Marseille from The Future Institute was somewhat overpowered by the quick and witty replies by both Jared and Steven, but the overall feeling was one of anticipation: future online applications will have better user experiences if we follow the speakers' recommendations.

I thank all presenters, all SIGCHI.NL volunteers, but especially my fellow organizers: Boyd de Groot (my program co-chair), Tjeerd de Boer (chairman of the committee), Vera Sjardijn (location manager and more), Corné Verbruggen and René Vendrig (on-site registration), Rob Willems (volunteers), Diurre Okma (side events), Bram Donkers (sponsors), Elma Wolschrijn (PR), Arjen Liefting, Kars Alfrink and Jeroen de Bruin (Website), Yohan Creemers (online registration), Martijn Klompenhouwer (SIGCHI.NL website), and others. It was a lot of work, but it was worth it!

Pictures will be posted on Flickr, using the tag "twab2006".