They’re here!

Sir Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the Web and Rosemary Leith, Director of the World Wide Web Foundation, have landed and we are very please to announce that the TBL Down Under Tour officially kicks off tomorrow!

The TBL Down Under Tour is presented to you by iinet with support from ACS, CSIRO, linux.conf.au 2013, University of New South Wales, University of Technology Sydney, University of Melbourne, NICTA, City of Sydney, Gold Coast City Council, Griffith University, Regional Australia, InternetNZ, Google, auDA and HotHouse. A big thank you also to supporting organisations dLUX and Partner & Prosper.

We have 8 events lined up including public lectures on a variety of topics in Sydney, Wellington, Canberra, the Gold Coast and Melbourne, and though tickets for all the public events sold out very early, we will announce any extra tickets 24 hours before each event if available, except for the Gold Coast who have a healthy waiting list to look after

Due to the incredible demand, we are also happy to announce that several of the events will be live streamed, so you can tune in wherever you are! Several groups have already planned to book out lecture rooms in Universities around Australia and New Zealand to tune into talks of interest. If you do this, please let us know so we can give a shout out to your event.

Remember, each public lecture has a different theme, so you may want to tune into more than one talk!

Check out the updated schedule of all events including what Sir Tim will be talking about at each, any updates and we’ll add the livestreaming details as we get them.

If you happen to tweet or use other social media about any of the events, please use #tbldownunder so we can say hi and have a good online discussion going throughout the tour. Be great to hear your feedback to Sir Tim’s ideas about the Web, open data, open internet and open government!

Just quickly, an enormous thank you to everyone who has been involved in bringing this together! The events coordinators have all worked exceptionally hard as have the wonderful sponsors. We hope you get the most of this special opportunity to hear from one of the most influential people of our time. It is a good time to reflect on the importance of the Web, which has touched us all and continues to shape the fabric of society as we know it.

After all, the Web has become the greatest enabler in history of a free, empowered, democratic and prosperous society.

It is worth noting, we and the event coordinators are not allowed to publish video footage from any of these events apart from the CSIRO event and Wellington lecture. iinet are also doing a special interview with Sir Tim featuring Simon Hackett, Stilgherrian and a mystery guest which will be available on their website.

So do make sure you tune in to the livestream where possible!

Cheers,
Pia and Jan