Day two here in Austin. I’ve attended a list of panels focussed on social networking. I’ve heard speakers talk about the do’s and don’ts, successful design and overall best practices. I took away a lot from yesterday’s first panel of “What Teens Want Online and On Their Phones”. The panel consisted of one speaker and about six teens ranging in the ages of 12-15. It was great to hear first hand what our (MTV Tr3s) target demographic  wants from the online world. I just ended a panel titles “Responsible Web Design”. It was lead by the leader of W3c and an Adobe dude.  Yes, dude. It skimmed the topics of proper mark-up and dove into some of the new elements in Dreamweaver CS3. Which I had no idea existed until now. Next, I’m going to try to find a chair in the 2:00 keynote with Mark Zuckerburg speaking. (The founder of Facebook.) Just some useless observations I’ve made since I’ve been here at the conference this year:

•  Tons of coffee stops along the way to your panel. Us designers/developers cannot function without our coffee.
• Avid Mac users. Even though one of the big sponsors of this year’s conference is Dell, the Mac users outweigh the number of PC users by a long shot.
• iPhones. Everyone has one. I feel that my Treo 750 is outdated compared to all of the walking iPhones this year.
• Blogging. An increase of blogging during conference panels is taking place this year. I’ve found myself peering over the shoulder of the person sitting within eye sight of me just to see what they’re blogging about and taking note of their blog title so I can Google that exact blog later. 
• Twitter. I sat beside a man in my first panel yesterday who left his Twitter open and Twittered every other 5 minutes. I, on the other hand, have only Twittered a few times here and there.
• Networking. I’ve networked with quite a few people here. Ranging from the cities of San Francisco to Philly. This conference is always a great networking tool.

After getting my big bag after registration yesterday, I found a spot in the Ikea sponsored  lounge and emptied the bag of its contents. I kept 2 magazines, a notepad, a guitar pick and a fortune cookie. Everything else - recycled. There’s a tremendous amount of vloggers here interviewing the attendees which is interesting to watch.Signing off … lunch time!