I'm going to be away for a few days. I have a feeling that this may start a storm! I'm attending the Mobius conference run by Microsoft. The conference is being held in Paris and accomodation and travel is paid for by Microsoft. So if I'm a bit quiet for a few days you' know why. Read full story for more.

The Mobius conference is a long running Microsoft tradition where they invite webmasters from various Mobile related websites and blogs to be shown Microsofts latest offerings and discuss the mobile sphere in general.

When I got e-mailed being offered a place my first impressions was.. hmm Microsoft, but on reflection I thought that I couldn't turn down an opportunity like this (and as someone said to me think The Register, 'Integrity - we've heard of it!'). Seriously though it interesting that MS have invited Symbian and Palm sites, and I'm sure it will be a learning experience for some. I am well aware that people on both sides are ignorant of what the other gets upto. In smartphone terms Europe is Symbian stronghold and it hasn't really established in the US yet. I'm looking forward to showing my P800 off!

Its going to be a great chance to meet with other webmasters (such as Michal from My-Symbian, Pocket PC Thoughts, PDA Geek and others) and learn about Microsoft's plans.

I do realise that some people will not agree with my taking part. However I think that not only is it important to have a broad perspective on the coming (or happening mobile revolution) it is foolish to ignore one side or the other.

Anyway I'm open to debate on this issue, and of course if anyone has any questions of things they'd like raised please post here or e-mail them to me and I'll do my best to get them answered. I'll update to the site here only in summary where relevant, but since I'm not sure what the connectivity is going to be like we'll see. The best bet will be to check out my (currently poor) blog which I can post to more easily, and I'll probably talk about things more generally.

Anyway the only way to go is full disclosure so I'll be letting you know what happens. The first of these is that Microsoft is paying for my Paris flight this afternoon.

Rafe