I'm off to @media 2007
Having attended the last two @media conferences, I found it hard to resist registering again this year. The event, aimed at web design and development professionals, has grow quite considerably from its first appearance in 2005 and now shows in San Francisco, Hong Kong and London.
I was completely wowed by my visit in 2005, as I had just started exploring table-less design with CSS, and hung on the speakers' every word. I'd found the whole event very inspiring. Many of the attendees had already taken the step to designing without tables and were really utilising CSS, but there were still plenty, like myself, just dipping a toe into the waters of content/presentation separation and moving on from hybrid sites.
Listening to reknown designers describing their working methods was a real plus to me. Not only do you pick up the odd useful tip and absorb inspiration, you also comfortingly find that they are often challenged by the same issues as yourself. It helps to realise that problems faced are often universal and that really, you're pretty much on track with the way you're working!
Two years running I have been impressed by the presentations of Robin Christopherson who works as an IT Instructor for the RNIB. It was a real wake-up call to see someone blind tackling a website and was a fantastic opportunity to witness first hand, the accessibility issues you read about and try to implement, but don't necessarily fully appreciate. Furthermore, Robin was an excellent speaker, so I'm a little disappointed to find that he's not appearing this year. However, its equally good to hear different presenters and I'm sure accessibility will continue to be a hot topic.
For more information on @media 2007, including the speaker list, visit www.vivabit.com/atmedia2007. I will be certain to report back on my findings!