Esther Wallace, National Project Manager of Children’s Day, writes:

I escaped a life of paper wars and power struggles in the legal world to help children rather than work with adults acting as children.

As National Project Manager I manage the Children’s Day website (along with every aspect of the nationwide campaign to encourage New Zealanders to celebrate and cherish our children). Hence my interest in Webstock.

I hope to learn ways to keep my website fresh and innovative.

Imagine free wi-fi in Wellington. Or indeed other cities in New Zealand. Mike Pearson of GOVIS fame has such a vision. Along with some others he’s set up TheFreeNet Aotearoa. The idea is to build a free community wi-fi network using the Meraki Mesh devices.

Webstock is proud to be a sponsor of this initiative and we’ve donated $5,000 towards the purchase of mesh devices. This is one of those ideas that’s potentially transformative to a whole community. Who knows where it might evolve to, but it’s certainly a wonderful initiative and one Webstock is fully supportive of.

There’ll be more detail coming in the next weeks, including the opportunity to be given free devices or purchase them at cost. Stay tuned here on the Webstock blog, or join the Google group to keep in the loop.

As of writing this post, we have 20 tickets still left for Webstock. They’re available on a first-come, first-served basis, so if you’re thinking of attending and still haven’t registered, please do so. We’d hate for you to miss out!

Thank you to all those people who have submitted images to our Webstock Freedom photo exhibition.

Images have come from Webstockers and friends close to home, and also from far away, including Richard’s marvelous Gormley and Ralph’s toy camera images.

So what does freedom mean to you? We’ve had some interesting interpretations. There are, of course, a fair number of blue skies and beaches, which our country has in abundance.

Big mean motorcycles have always meant freedom, zooming out on the highway. A slab of merakis for freeing up the net. Dogs and children and dogs with children. Butterflies and fluffy little ducks.

We’re free to have our asses whipped at cricket, and free to drink beer.

A little sex in the city is always a freeing experience, and one can only wonder how the red corset helps Mike to be free! 🙂 Perhaps he’s going to hang it on the bra fence!

You’ve given us some wonderful images here. We thank you, and best of luck to all the Webstockers in the competition for a Nintendo Wii.

Taffy wrote:

Age: 28 yrs

Designation: SBEC Information Officer

My responsibilities include maintaining our clientele database, website and also designing the webpage.

I hope this Webstock Conference will enable me to explore more acquired knowledge in this field.

My other interest includes outrigger canoeing, aerobics and tennis.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the organising committee for accepting our submission to attend and looking forward to meeting all the participants.