Whew, everyone seems to want to do a Web Conference in March. There’s SXSW. There’s O’Reilly’s ETech. And now Microsoft enters in with Mix 06.

I’m speaking at SXSW and I’m helping out on the Mix 06 team.

My first question is “will Bill Gates let us put a back channel up during his keynote?”

After watching the interchange at Les Blogs between Mena and Ben, I’d guess not, but you never know. This isn’t going to be a PDC or a TechED.

So, why do another Web conference?

Well, my trip through Europe punctuated why. I kept meeting businesspeople who had bet their businesses on Microsoft’s Web technologies. From Reuters to L’Oreal to Heineken to dozens of other CTO’s and CEOs that I met who told me they are using Microsoft technologies and wanted a way to learn only about those (since most of the other events are heavily LAMP-focused).

Does anyone else find it ironic that the Microsoft conference is the one with both a blog and an RSS button? Next thing you know Microsoft will be adding tags, making deals with Firefox and getting along with the Web Standards Project, and figuring out how to do great maps and great search. Hmmm.

Anyway, what Web conference are you going to in March? Hope to see you there.

Do you live in Silicon Valley? Do you want to help user test a voice recognition system? OK, do you just want to see the car of the future? My friend Ajay Juneja is looking for guinea pigs. Er, voices. Send him email at userstudies@speakwithme.com if you’re in California and are interested.

Charles Torre took his video camera over to the Windows Vista audio team and got an in-depth look at the new audio stack.

The tour we got of F5 Networks is now up.

Scott Swanson talks about the MSN Messenger APIs.

And I just put up Michael Kaplan who is a developer working on localizing Windows Vista.