This year, we bring you another new feature. All event pages for which an event-specific hashtag is available now tell you what hashtag to use, and give you a one-click Twitter search for that hashtag.

We hope you find this useful! If you have any other suggestions for improvement, or if you would like to help in development of the site (or donate to support its development), we would love to hear from you.

All you need to do is to publicise the IGF Community Site igf-online.net, through a microblog (eg. Twitter or identi.ca), Facebook or Google+ post, or a post on your own or a qualifying third-party blog. Tag your post with igf11 and then collect your free book in Nairobi while stocks last – it’s as simple as that!

You may use your own words in your post, but if you are looking for a 140 character example text, you may copy and paste this one:

Attending #IGF? Its Community Site at igf-online.net has a chat room, blog and wiki page for each event, plus calendar and news feeds #igf11

Nonetheless, there may have been some legitimate accounts deleted. If your account was one of these, I apologise.  A backup of your account is available and it can be restored on request. Otherwise, simply create a new one or login with your OpenID.

1. Begin at http://igf-online.net/.  The menu bar that runs across the top links you to all the official and community resources you need for the IGF.  If it’s not in your preferred language, try switching to French, Spanish or Russian from the Language menu (we’re still seeking Arabic and Chinese translations).
2. Click the « Info/Wiki » menu and the « Calendar » item, which will take you to the IGF week by default.  If you like, switch from « Week » to « Day » view using the controls on the right hand side.  You can subscribe to the calendar in software such as iCal or Sunbird using the « Subscribe » link.  Even non-official events can be listed here.
3. Click on any event displayed in the calendar, then click again on the link in the small window that opens up, to load up a dedicated blog page for that event.  As you’ll see, three links are already included in the blog post: the official workshop description, a link back to the calendar, and a wiki page for the event.
4. You can contribute information about the event (such as a report, feedback, or questions) in one of two ways: by simply replying to the event blog post, or by editing the linked wiki page.  (If you want to be sure the event organisers see what you write, it is best to drop them an email pointing them to it.)
5. In either case, you’ll need to log in to the blog or wiki before posting to it.  The easiest way to do that is with an OpenID.  If you have a Google or Yahoo account, you already have an OpenID!  If not, there are many places to sign up for one – see http://openid.net/get-an-openid.  Or, just register on the Community Site itself.
6. Say that you have something to blog about that doesn’t relate to a specific IGF event.  No problem!  If you have a blog of your own, drop me a link to it – I’ll add it to the aggregated RSS feed which is available under the « Feeds » link from the « Info/Wiki » menu bar.  If you don’t have one, blog on the Community Site itself!  Just click « Site Admin » once logged in.

On the right of this page you will find an automatically-updated list of headlines of blog entries and articles about the IGF gathered from around the Web. Click on the headlines to read the stories in full, or to browse through them and their sources in depth you can use igf-online.net’s separate RSS aggregator.

Even better, you can add the same aggregated feed of articles to your own Web site, portal such as iGoogle, or desktop RSS aggregator, by using this link. And if you think there’s a blog or other news source about the IGF that we’ve missed out including, please contact us and we’ll be more than happy to add it.

What is an OpenID? It is a system which allows you to identify yourself to multiple Web sites using a single username and password, but without needing to share your password around to the administrators of all of those sites. It is bit like Microsoft’s Passport service, but based on open standards.

If you are an existing user of services such as AOL, LiveDoor, LiveJournal, Orange, Technorati, Vox or WordPress.com, then you already have an OpenID. If not, then it’s easy to get one for free. Technical users can even set up their own Web site as the home of their OpenID. All this information and more is available at the OpenID Web site.

Today’s tip tells you how you can subscribe to a live calendar of IGF events in your desktop calendar program, such as Apple iCal, Mozilla Sunbird, Google Calendar, Novell Evolution, and using an open source plugin, Microsoft Outlook. Or, you can just view the calendar online.

So, how do you do it? Simple! This link is all your calendar program needs (or this one, if the last one didn’t work). You should just be able to click on it for it to open in your calendar program, but if nothing happens look for a « Subscribe » option in the program and paste the link in there.

You may notice that not all of the events in the official calendar are included in the online one yet. This is because this is a volunteer effort, to which you are invited to contribute if you have some free time. Please contact us for more information on how you can do so.