A key cornerstone of BlogHer's approach to conferences is to invite you and our entire community to participate! Here are some way in which you can join us:

*Open calls for speakers, session ideas and recommendations on same. (In other words, even if you don't want to speak, please forward us the people you would love to hear speak.)

*Room of Your Own sessions:
It's inevitable that the official BlogHer schedule will not include every topic of interest to BlogHer attendees. If you want to fill a hole, then propose a Room of Your Own session. These are sessions proposed and planned by BlogHer attendees. We provide the room, the A/V, the coffee...and the promotion. You provide the content. In 2006 we had so many Room of Your Own session proposals we put it to a community vote. The top 6 were added to the schedule. More on the Room of Your Own concept is here.

*Birds of a Feather (BOF) sessions:
We set aside open time and blank clipboards and let people self-organize into groups. This post describes how we did it at BlogHer '06. Previous popular topics have ranged from "Mommies who use profanity in their blogs" to "Single bloggers" to "The Ethnorati" to "Flickr users" to "Food and Drink bloggers." Anything literally goes...you can form a group of 2 or 22 around your topic. It's a great way to break the ice and find like-minded individuals in the crowd.

*BlogHerships and volunteerism:
For each conference we provide blogherships (free conference registrations) in exchange for being an official conference live-blogger. This is a great option for bloggers who could not otherwise afford to attend. Other volunteer opportunities have included graphic design, IT consulting, audio production, sponsor, speaker or volunteer "wrangling" and so on. Some people were able to add their efforts to their CV; some people were able to learn or improve their skills; some people were able to meet a posse of people they would not have connected to on their own. Everyone was able to feel like they were a part of making BlogHer happen.

*Feedback, feedback, feedback:
Here at BlogHer we throw a lot of ideas out there and see what sticks. Subscribe to our conference newsletter or conference topic and keep track of what we're thinking as we plan the event. Let your voice be heard! (Provide subscribe links.)

If you have an opinion, we want to hear it!