Guide to the 2011 Online News Association Conference

By Andrew Gibson

Some of digital journalism's most innovative minds, including Facebook + Journalists Program Manager Vadim Lavrusik and NPR social media strategist Andy Carvin, are in Boston this week for the 2011 ONA Conference, which runs through Saturday. Below are a few ways you can take a virtual seat at the conference:

• Check the official conference website for scheduled events and speakers. (If you click on an event, you can get its official hashtag.)
• Follow the #ONA11 hashtag on Twitter. A collection of all tweets with that hashtag is also available via Twapper Keeper.
• Follow @ONAConf on Twitter.
• Read Douglas Jones' Storified account of the conference.

ONA Mizzou President Melanie Gibson is also at the conference, so you can check her tweets for updates.

And, take note of this: Laura Hibbard, ONA Mizzou founding president and current Huffington Post assistant social news editor, is speaking at the conference Saturday at 3:30 p.m. CST. Laura will share what she learned about community building through starting ONA Mizzou. Another Mizzou presenter is Samantha Kubota, MU journalism student and KOMU-TV Web editor/producer. She'll speak Saturday at 2:30 p.m. CST about what she would change about the digital-journalism industry.

You'll be itching to be in Boston after seeing the agenda. There's always next year, right?