Possible Conference Speaking Sponsorships -- 2011

Question

We're evaluating the feasibility of sponsoring a member of the webmasters community to speak at a conference in 2011.

Speaking is a relatively big "ask", so this needs to be planned many months in advance. Let's get started!

We'd like the community to establish where ...

What relevant webmaster conferences are coming up in 2011 that have open speaker slots or calls for papers?

... and then who.

Which members of the community are strongly interested in being sponsored by Stack Exchange, Inc to speak at one of the above conferences in 2011?

To be clear, the speaker is free talk about anything he or she wants so long as it would be roughly on topic for this site -- with a quick acknowledgement of support from Stack Exchange and a mention of the community here.

Answer 1

PubCon Las Vegas - November 8-10, 2011

From their recent email soliciting speakers:

Today we are accepting speaking proposals for PubCon Las Vegas in November (Nov 8-10).

http://www.pubcon.com/session-proposal.cgi

Last years Las Vegas was our highest rated and regarded show ever. Over 2500 attendees over the 4 days. By all the feedback we heard - it rocked. It is a great time for all of us to be in Social Media and Search. We plan, expect, and hope to grow by a significant amount this year. We are planning some new special things this year

PubCon is primarily search (SEO/SEM) and social focussed in terms of topic, SEO seems to be a hot topic here on Webmasters.

I'd nominate John Conde - but he might not appreciate it (not that I know either way)

Answer 2

I cannot attest to great conventions as I've not been to ANY. But I do know that there is a huge number of them. Having someone represent us would be a great way to not only increase the number of people who come to this site to learn, but the number of people like John Conde (who I'd nominate to attend) who would come to this site and share a wealth of information.