Wow, I can’t believe it. ASAE & The Center’s 2007 Annual Meeting has come and gone. In many respects it seems like a blur. That’s not to say that I didn’t get a lot out of the entire conference experience, especially many of the Thought Leader sessions and a few of the Learning Labs, but it wasn’t only about the “official” part of the conference.

I had the opportunity to meet, hang-out with and get to know a number of folks (bloggers) that I have only known in the virtual sense. That served a number of purposes for me. First, it made me realize that regardless of who you work for (association, vendor, AMC, consultant, etc.) your position, or your personal thoughts and opinions, we are really part of something much bigger than any one of us. I also realized that it’s thanks to folks like Jeff DeCagna, Jamie Notter, Ben Martin, Zach Wilson, Fred Simmons Mickie Rops, Greg Fine, and the countless other folks who really are working at all levels to advance the association field / profession. Finally, I realized that despite our growing dependence on technology to facilitate discussions, relationships, community and communications, nothing solidifies a relationship (professional or otherwise) like actually meeting someone and interacting to them in the “real world”.

I have a lot that I need to reflect on from the conference, not the least of which is all of the great ideas that I need to put into action, or figure out how to put it into action. I also have to get back into the blogging routine and hope to use the past weeks experience as a perfect reason to do so.

Thanks to all for such a great experience.

Apparently the association blogosphere is growing pretty fast and that is a great thing. However, with any type of growth come challenges. One of the biggest challenges is keeping track of who is actually blogging. To that end, Fred suggested that some type of blogroll be created and BMart and myself both agreed.

Not being one to simply sit around waiting for a solution to be created, I took it upon myself to scour the blogs that I read regularly, take a look at their blogrolls and see where that left me. So far, I have complied a list of almost 30 bloggers that have made themselves known in one way, shape or form. However, I know there are plenty more folks out there blogging on some aspect of associations that should be on this list as well, therefore lets call this a work in progress.

I am maintaining the list via del.icio.us and therefore can make the list available as a reference and RSS feed with little effort. Additionally, I have also collected each of the associated feed links for each of these blogs and have that available as well as an OPML file that you can import into the feed reader of your choice. I am also making this list available via HTML with and without the website information. I think I have all of the bases covered, but if I am missing a format that you may want/ need so you can include the blogroll on your website/blog let me know.

Additionally, should there be demand, I’d be happy to create a widget so you could simply add it to your site/blog with ease, however the syndicate javascript below should work in most instances.

• Del.icio.us Blogroll
• Del.icio.us Blogroll RSS
• Blogroll (HTML) - load the page then click file > save as to save the html file.
• Feedroll (HTML) - load the page then click file > save as to save the html file.
• Blog & Feedroll (HTML) - load the page then click file > save as to save the html file.
• RSS Feeds (OPML) - right click on the link, click save as.

Finally, if you want to syndicate the del.icio.us feed that I am displaying above without the styling simply include this javascript on your page where you want it to appear:

 
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://del.icio.us/feeds/js/associatedknowledge?count=30;
title=Association%20Bloggers%20Blogroll"></script>
<noscript><a href="http://del.icio.us/associatedknowledge">Association Bloggers Blogroll</a></noscript>
 

To adjust the style of the blogroll to match your site review the styling guide from del.icio.us.

Now it’s up to all of you to either recommend folks (via a comment) or point folks to this posting and have them comment themselves. Please be sure to provide not only the blog/bloggers name, but also the url for the site and the url for their RSS feed. Upon receipt, I will then add them to the list. It would also be pretty awesome if folks could notify me as bloggers decide to discontinue their writing or urls / feeds change so I can update them as well. My goal here is to do nothing more than make sure the Association Bloggers Blogroll is as complete as possible and available for any/everybody who wants it.

Just a note to let folks know that I am going to be out of the country for the next week. I am off to participate in one of my employers Leadership Meetings and Global Congresses in Budapest, Hungary.

This will be my first time in Europe so I am quite excited. I am sure there will be plenty of opportunity to see some really historic locations, take some great pictures and make some lasting memories.

Since I am trying to keep the blog tied into technology, here is a great tool that can be used personally and professionally. I was able to create a map of my flight information to Budapest using Google Maps using the My Maps capability. To use it simply go to Google Maps and then click on the Create Personalized Maps button.

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