I thought I'd be writing more from this conference, after all it is about software development! But the facilitator, Gunner, is more focused on people putting down their laptops and gadgets and having interactive group discussions. Gunner is a character of the first order, everyone seems to know him and he makes me want to get to know him after only a few minutes. A good facilitator is rare. A good facilitator with a sense of humor and a relaxed style is gold.

There are 105 people in attendance and everyone has participated in good cheer so far. We are all here because we are interested in social change and recognize that computers and specifically the web, will play a very important role in change. The change that most people seem to be tackling is something more than just incremental changes it seems(although these are important). The change people are talking about is a more systemic and fundamental shift from information control from the few to the many, as the paradigm of the web suggests. The web is getting pretty mainstream, after all President-elect Obama has taken to youtube weekly! But practically, the internet is still the realm of geeks and privileged consumers of novel content(to generalize a bit!). The huge media conglomerates are still very much in control of our situation.