Cover page images (keys)

How can W3C help the Social Networking Industry?

Dominique Hazaël-Massieux <dom@w3.org> Mobile Web Initiative Activity Lead

W3C Workshop on the Future of Social Networking

Barcelona, Spain, 15-16 January 2009

W3C: Leading the Web to its Full Potential

Consortium, 420 members, from industry and research
Founded and directed by inventor of the Web, Tim Berners-Lee
Standards: XML, HTML, Semantic Web, Web Services, Accessibility Guidelines, Privacy …
Cooperation between MIT, ERCIM, Keio
World-wide offices, including Brazil, China, India, Morocco, South Africa, ...

W3C Mobile Web Initiative

MWI sponsors

Goal: bring Web to mobile
Created in 2005 (early days for mobile Web)
Results
- "Mobile Web Best Practices" W3C standard
- mobileOK W3C standard
- mobileOK checker tool
- Mobile Web for developing countries
- ...

What W3C brings

a well-tried process to make consensus emerge
technical expertise from a dedicated staff
Members from a wide range companies, research institutions, across a large number of countries
a clear set of IPR rules
a proved infrastructure to facilitate on-line collaboration

In practice...

	Working Group	Interest Group	Incubator Group
W3C Staff Commitment	Strong	Light	None
Charter	Needs reviews from W3C Membership	Needs reviews from W3C Membership	Only need 3 W3C Members to agree
Deliverables	Standards, tests, tools, guidelines,...	Tools, guidelines, ...	White papers
Meetings	Weekly on the phone; 3/4 times a year face-to-face	Sometimes teleconf, usually just mailing list and IRC	Weekly on the phone; sometimes one or two face-to-face
Participation mode	Reserved to W3C Members and Invited Experts, but can work in public	Can be limited or not; work in public	Reserved to W3C Members and Invited Experts, but can work in public

How can W3C Help?

with one more working/interest/incubator groups?
by coordinating existing efforts?
by staying out of it entirely?

Let's try to answer during these two days!