In my recent post describing how I got into web development I wrote that I’m in the verge of some big changes in my life. The main one of them starts tomorrow. As of tomorrow, the above will be my professional email. Yes, you guessed it right; I’m joining the W3C team! Yes, the same W3C you all know and love 🙂 I decided to title this blog post with it, as I like how a 10 letter string manages to neatly summarize so much.
Working at W3C had been a dream of mine ever since I learned what a web standard is. As you probably know if you’ve been following my work, I’m a strong believer in open web standards. Even though proprietary technology might offer some short term benefits, in the long run only open standards can allow the Web to reach its full potential.
I’d like to especially thank the two people below (in chronological order). If it wasn’t for them, this dream would have never materialized:
- Oli Studholme: I still remember our IRC conversation back in January. I was telling him how much I’d love to work for W3C, but “I’m not that good”. He repeatedly encouraged me to contact W3C and express my interest, despite my strong reluctance to do so. “Don’t be like the 15 year old boy that is too shy to ask the girl out” was the argument that finally convinced me. He even asked around to find which person I should contact.
- Doug Schepers: If it wasn’t for Doug’s heroic efforts, this would have never happened. He believed in me from the start and did everything he could to for this to go through. He spent an incredible amount of time trying to help me, although I repeatedly bombarded him with a cornucopia of silly questions. 🙂 Over the course of these 6 months, he didn’t just become a colleague, but also a friend.
I will be part of the W3C developer relations and web education efforts, working a lot with Doug (aka @shepazu). In practice, this means:
- Help developers understand where standards are headed, and solicit early feedback on upcoming features.
- Help Working Groups understand what developers need.
- Help plan W3C developer events, including conferences
- Speaking about open web technologies at conferences and other events
- Writing articles and documentation about open web technologies
- Making demos and tools that demonstrate and help authors understand web standards
In addition, I will be helping with the design of many W3C-related things, as I will be the only designer at W3C.
As you can see I’ll be wearing many hats, which is exactly what I love about this role! I had many tempting offers from big US companies that offered salaries with more digits and a lot of perks. However, my heart wanted W3C and this role was practically tailored to my talents and interests.
I’m honored to be a part of W3C and I’m looking forward to helping out.
<voice type=”fangirl”>I have to admit I’m also really looking forward to meeting Sir Tim Berners-Lee in person! :D</voice>