Training and Conferences: the Good and the Bad

Before last year I had never been to a conference or workshop to do with the web. Thinking back, that's really quite bizarre but I've learned everything I now do for a living for myself. The community around web standards provides a wealth of articles and opinions giving hints, pointers and tutorials so I never felt the need...

Then last year I was invited to attend the Carson Workshops session with Joe Clark. Despite not learning much in the way of new techniques I loved Joe's approach to the subject and thoroughly enjoyed the day, despite the unholy 8:30 start. Then came Search Engine Watch where I was exposed to the world of PPC advertising and proper, high-level SEO and online marketing. All new to me and all good stuff. Towards the end of the year, and brought to life in record time, November's d-construct was a winner too. The introduction to the Flickr API from Simon Willison was great and I was blown away by how far Flash has come since I was last involved in it.

Those were the good... All were either reasonably priced or paid for me and I felt all were worth my while. Not so for the NN/g Usability Week. 2 days and £800 later I felt disappointed, disillusioned and let down. The User Experience course was very basic and while Tog's insights were always entertaining and often valuable, they were too few and far between. Having done UX for a living for a little while now, I was hoping for more than the bare-bones basics. I think that will be the last of the high-priced training courses I bother with. It just doesn't seem worth it.

There are 2 smaller affairs coming up that I am very excited about though. First up is the Carson Workshops Seminar on 8th February and 2 days later, on the 10th, it's clear:left's AJAX training day. I'm expecting big things from both... Ryan Carson has, yet again, managed to wrangle an impressive set of names; this time all of them in the same room at the same time. Clear:left's workshop is intended as a grounding in the use of AJAX, covering everything from scratch. So far my experience with AJAX has been limited to the JPSpan framework and I'm looking forward to a peek under the hood.

Oh, and I'd better not forget to mention @media 2006 either! I have my ticket and I'm raring to go. The line-up is top and I'm looking forward to putting some more faces to names.

It seems like the UK training scene is alive and well!

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