PHP Conference in DC

[jlleblanc]

Hello everyone,

We're holding an inaugural PHP conference ( http://www.dcphpconference.com/schedule.php ) here in Washington, DC on October 19-20th. Our goal is to get more government agencies, non-profits, and NGOs to use PHP (on which Joomla is based) and other open source tools instead of things like ColdFusion (you'd be AMAZED at how much of that is still floating around out here!). More and more often, we're hearing statements from government officials stressing the need to move to open source and open standards. We feel that this conference will be highly influential upon the fence-sitters.

Also, we have sessions for PHP developers who are interested in contracting for the government. The General Services Administraton will be presenting on how to put together a proposal in such a way that you can bid on these contracts. Some of the top names in PHP will be present as well, including Rasmus Lerdorf and Chris Shiflett.

Several of us (myself included) have put money into this to help make it happen because we so strongly believe that the public sector is ready to switch to open source software. There are several ways you can help us make this happen. If you keep a blog, we'd appreciate every link we can get. If you know of any company that would like to sponsor the event, let me know. And of course, if you'd like to attend, register today!

[jlleblanc]

The conference is only three weeks away! If anyone out there is planning on attending, email [email protected] so I can get a head count of Joomla people. If there are enough of us attending, I might be able to arrange a BOF session.