I had the privilege of attending the Alt.Net conference last weekend in Austin.

What I experienced was a happy collision of contrasts: mastery and inexperience, idealism and pragmatism, hope and frustration.

During the conference, the cause lacked coherent expression — though JP Boodhoo, who has a touch of the poet about him and can evoke the beating heart of it. Dave Laribee and others are very articulate in their blogs.

Still you can infer a group’s intent from its actions and over two days here’s what I connected with:

• Fellowship: Alt.Net is a loose affiliation of master developers who attract others (like me) who wish to learn.
• Shared Values: These developers aspire to excellence and independent judgement. They embrace passion, courage and honest reflection (articulated by JP). They seek to apply the handiest tool to any given situation and deliver value to their customer.
• Common Cause: These developers want to bring innovative tools, concepts and practices to the .Net platform whether they arrise from within Microsoft, an open and independent developer community, or other platforms. They are calling on Microsoft’s to introduce these innovations to the larger .Net developer community — or at minimum — to not hinder their use by those who wish to adopt them.