We're in the closing hours of the conference and should point you to the reams of great content we've captured for posterity:

A Fast Company Blogjam for which a team of bloggers have been reporting on the proceedings. Also tune in there for pointers to a great series of podcasts by Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson.

Heath Row and his Squidoo team have created a super set of lenses on the major themes and sessions of the conference.

The expanding Flickr set of the entire event.

Suw Charman's reporting live in Strange Attractor from the Future of Web Apps, a conference that's convened many leading lights of the Web 2.0 world as well as some 800 others for a day-long discussion of emerging and future Web apps.

Among those whose remarks Suw's shared so far: Joshua Schacter of del.icio.us, Tom Coates of Yahoo!, Cal Henderson of Flickr.

[Reposting this from the Media Hub]

Corante Hubs and the Corante Network are, as we've spoken to here and here, an attempt to extend Corante beyond its walls, meet media where it's increasingly at (the edge), draw attention to the insights, intelligence, and analysis of talented thinkers and writers across the blogosphere, and serve readers and users with editorial and tools that help them track and understand industry developments and emerging trends as well as save time.

In our hubs, e.g. , that's expressing itself through the editorial coverage and commentary you see on that page - again, intended to distill, explain, and synthesize the writings of our contributors and others about the respective field - and its marriage with tools, either homegrown or in partnership with technology partners, that add value.

Among those we've added to date: the merged "raw" feed from MySyndicaat you see at the bottom of that page (it's got more functionality coming), the related posts feature from Waypath you see attached to blog posts, and the category cloud in the right column that was developed for us by Bud Gibson and his company, The Community Engine.

The new widget, as of yesterday: search, powered by Rollyo, that allows you to search just the blogs of our contributors. We've been working with Dave Pell, the brains behind Rollyo (Davenetics too), to customize it to our needs. Its intent: to reduce the load of having to search the entire Web for relevant coverage by limiting it to trusted sources. Check it out and let us know what you think - we're still tweaking a few things and would love your input on how to make it most useful.

And in general... we've got lots of ideas about how best to serve readers both in the hubs and out on the partner blogs and are currently working on other features we'll be adding to the mix. But we also want to hear from you - please send us your ideas and suggestions - you can do so by leaving a comment here or sending an email to us at -UPDATED - hubfeedback@gmail.com.

Dennis Kennedy pulls together recent articles and resources he and his Between Lawyers colleagues, as well as others, have published or contributed to which explain and discuss how Web 2.0 services might be used by the law profession.

Today we go live with a major new initiative and important new direction from Corante that has us reimagining what Corante is and will be. Months in the making and informed by years spent playing and working in this space, the Corante Hubs and the corollary Corante Network have Corante partnering with scores (and eventually hundreds) of the blogosphere's most interesting and insightful commentators on specific topics in a loosely joined editorial offering (and business model) we believe will keep readers up to date and ahead of the curve while saving them the time we all find so scarce these days. Our first areas of coverage: web, media, and marketing.

Congratulations to Corante contributor Carl Zimmer for being named a finalist by the National Academy of Sciences for the Newspaper/Magazine/Internet category of its 2005 Communications Awards..

It is, as Carl notes, another step forward for the mainstream perception of blogs: "It’s nice to see that blogs are taking seriously by the likes of the National Academy of Sciences." It's also not the first coup for Carl's blogging: earlier this year he was named the winner of the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s 2004 Science Journalism Award. If you're not familiar with Carl's blog The Loom, please take this opportunity to tune in - he's one of the most talented and perceptive science writers around.

Tune in to the first installment - "Podcasting on Windows: Introduction to Podcasting" - of our new ongoing series on podcasting today at 1pm EST. Hosted by Stowe Boyd and Greg Narain, today's show provides an intro to podcasting on Windows with discussion of equipment, audio software and standards, formatting and editing, preparing for download, and promotion. Greg will also provide detailed examples from his well-known Beercasting show.

For more information on the show and info on how to tune in see this page. [Also, the show's sponsored by GoToMeeting - visit the page above and you'll find info on how to get a free trial for 30 days.]

Join Corante and the leading lights of the social software and social media space for an intense discussion of the overarching themes and underlying technologies that are driving the massive uptake of people-centered, user-driven, individual-connecting applications, communities, content, and services.

The Symposium on Social Architecture, to be hosted at Harvard University on November 14th and 15th, will host many of the movement’s leading developers, entrepreneurs, thinkers, and analysts in a series of lively panels, interviews, talks, and informal events designed to dig deep into the issues driving the ‘social revolution’. Among those who will be participating: Clay Shirky, David Weinberger, Stowe Boyd, Jeff Jarvis, Marc Canter, Mary Hodder, Kevin Marks, and Ross Mayfield.

To find out more and register (space is limited so sign up now), click through to the website for the Symposium on Social Architecture.

Derek Lowe, in signing off for the Labor Day weekend: "It’s easy to forget that scientific research is (like many other things) one of the brightly colored dabs of paint that make up the very thin veneer we call civilization.

"There’s a lot of stuff underneath, and a lot of it is ugly. It’s the Hobbesian state of nature down there, a struggle for food and water and territory. Being able to think all day for a living - well, that’s a huge outlier exception to the way the vast majority of human beings have had to live their lives. What’s happened to New Orleans has been a terrible reminder of this truth. It’s taken just a few days for the Lord of the Flies to become mayor in a special election there, and the same thing could happen anywhere else on Earth.

"Let’s hope that it never happens to us. Be grateful that you have the weekend to enjoy in peace and sanity, and consider giving something to help pull those people out of the water, out of the mud, and back to the dry land of the 21st century..."

Marty Schwimmer, whose Between Lawyers colleague Ernie Svenson lives in New Orleans and has been reporting on his experiences and reactions on his blog, took it upon himself to investigate how authorities might come by the additional helicopters that are needed to plug the breached levees. His findings here...

Vin Crosbie introduces the newest addition to the Rebuilding Media roster of commentators on the disruptive forces at work in the media industry: Ben Compaine. Ben is a consultant, entrepreneur, policy wonk, academic, and author of numerous influential books and articles including "Who Owns the Media: Competition and Concentration in the Mass Media Industry", winner of the Robert Picard Award for Best New Book in Media Economics.

Ben has been studying the media industry and its impact on society, culture and regulation since 1978, is a noted expert in communications theory, policy, and practice, and has published extensively about media ownership and competition. We're thrilled he's aboard and point you to Rebuilding Media where his blogging will begin shortly...

Ross Mayfield, longtime contributor to Many-to-Many and co-founder and CEO of Socialtext, has announced the release of its Wikiwyg, an open source what-you-see-is-what-you-get editor for wikis you can read more about here.

Stowe addresses, in this post at Get Real, the confusion that's arisen about the Portland, OR event on podcasting that Corante is no longer associated with.

Stowe, in a piece entitled "Social Architecture: The Foundation of The Blogosphere", lays out his latest thinking on the emerging infrastructure of the Social Web and refers to the event Corante will be hosting in Boston on the topic in November.

Says Stowe, in wrapping up the post: "The continued growth of the Blogosphere will make its social architecture even more of an global asset that it has already proven to be. We will continue to witness enormous technological innovation, with dozens of new Flickrs, Technoratis, and De.licio.uses appearing in the next year. As more writing (and other media, like audio, video, and photography) is generated on an ever widening range of topics, more and more machine-generated analysis of human social gestures, and the gestures themselves, will play an increasingly important role in making sense of the Web. Without these techniques, the explosion of the Blogosphere will overwhelm our traditional information-based approaches.

"The criticality of these activities will cause friction on technological, societal, and economic levels, and as so those of us who are most interested and involved in these discussions may have a significant impact on the future direction of the socialized Web. The planned Symposium is intended to bring together thought leaders, practitioners, and entrepreneurs in the arena and to explore the various threads making up the discussion about social architecture."

Read it all here...

Neurotech expert and longtime Corante contributor at Brain Waves, Zack Lynch has announced the debut of Neurotech Insights, a paid, semi-monthly newsletter covering the neurotech industry. Geared towards investors, analysts and industry execs, Neurotech Insights surveys market developments, reports on clinical trials, analyzes recent deals, and profiles interesting companies and individuals in what he says is a $100 billion market.

Learn more about the report from Zack himself and be sure to catch his offer at the end of his post for how to get a discount on the annual subscription rate.

Today we launch a new blog - Future Tense - that will examine and explore how the modern work “place” is evolving and adapting to new trends, technologies, and economic factors.

Future Tense, authored by a handful of closely read thinkers and practitioners in the broad, industry-spanning “space,” will discuss the trends and pressures that are forcing employers to rejigger the way they think about the workplace, manage projects and staffs, encourage collaboration and innovation, support a decentralized workforce, motivate and reward employees, build morale and foster teamwork, design physical spaces to accommodate a mobile and transient workforce, etc.

Future Tense's co-authors: Elizabeth Albrycht, a 15-year veteran of high technology public relations practice and a co-founder and co-producer of the New Communications Forum; Jim Ware, cofounder of the Work Design Collaborative and the Future of Work program; Regina Miller, formerly of Vodafone and founder of the consultancy The Seventh Suite; Jim McGee, a director at Huron Consulting Group, founding partner of DiamondCluster International, and co-author of Managing Information Strategically; and Dave Desforges of Sun Microsystems' "Work From Home" initiative.

It's a critical topic to be exploring and we're thrilled to welcome aboard some of those best qualified to tell and track the evolving story. Among the themes they'll be touching on: gradual retirement, the rise of the free agent, ad hoc team formation, the decline of hierarchical management structure, geographic distribution, the need for a flexible workforce, the need for long term “employability”, the creative class, urban trends, collaboration technology, project processes, physical design, contract work trends, management challenges, outsourcing, and much more.

Drop in at www.corante.com/futuretense and please let others know about it who'd find it of interest.

Arieanna Foley provides a rundown of her favorite moments from this year's just-wrapped Gnomedex while Matt May runs a 15-minute interview with organizer Chris Pirillo.

Tune in to Strange Attractor for Suw Charman's coverage of various talks and panel discussions taking place at Kevin Werbach's annual Supernova conference, currently underway.

Among those whose remarks she's passing along: Kevin Marks of Technorati, Greg Lloyd of Traction Software, Janice Fraser of Adaptive Path, Jonathan Schwartz of Sun Microsystems, Caterina Fake of Flickr, Mena Trott of Six Apart, Evan Williams of Odeo, and Chris Anderson of Wired. More here...

Ernest Miller points to numerous commentaries of the LA Times' wikitorial experiment, now shuttered, and says: "Reporting that the wiki has been shut down is the easy part. Letting people know whether the experiment was otherwise successful is the hard part, and no one in the traditional press seems eager to confront it..."

Suw Charman's made available the PDF of the first of her case studies from her Dark Blogs project. As Suw explains, the case study examines the implementation of an enterprise weblog software solution for a large European pharmaceutical group and discusses the reasons why blogs were chosen, their integration with other business systems, and the editorial process, launch and promotion, and training and adoption of the tool for a competitive intelligence project.

Over to Suw for more info and for a link to the PDF...

Clay Shirky concedes he got it wrong the other day in his posting "Wikipedia, Authority, and Astroturf", revisits some of the issues first floated in the original post, and notes follow-up reactions and commentary.

Clay Shirky provides an intro and pointer to his latest essay "Ontology Is Overrated: Social advantages in tagging."

Says Clay: "Though much of it is not about social software per se, I try to extend the argument that the 'people infrastucture' hidden in traditional classification systems is an Achilles' heel for systems that have to operate at internet scale, and that the logic of tagging overcomes that weakness."

Stowe Boyd, after stumbling across some technical glitches at Technorati: "I have had a number of knowledgeable folks suggest that Technorati is having trouble scaling with the explosive growth of the blogosphere. It's a shame if it's true, because they provide an invaluable service, and with the growth of tags edging out blog categorization as an taxonomic mechanism, it is in the public interest that Technorati work. We are all coming to depend on it as a means of making sense of the world..."

See the comments for a response from Adam Hertz, Technorati's VP of Engineering.

Join Zack Lynch at Stanford Business School tonight where he'll be moderating a panel discussion between executives of several early stage companies in neuropharmaceutical discovery and development.

Among those who'll be sharing their perspective: Jeffrey Ostrove, CEO of Ceregene; David Summa, President and CEO of Acumen Pharmaceuticals; and Thorsten Melcher, Vice President of Discovery at Saegis Pharmaceuticals.

More info's available on Brain Waves, Zack's Industry Insider on neurotechnology.

Carl Zimmer: "Spring is finally slinking into the northeast, and the backyard wildlife here is shaking off the winter torpor. Our oldest daughter, Charlotte, is now old enough to be curious about this biological exuberence. She likes to tell stories about little subterranean families of earthworm mommies and grub daddies, cram grapes in her cheeks in imitation of the chipmunks, and ask again and again about where the birds spend Christmas. This is, of course, hog heaven for a geeky science-writer father like myself, but there is one subject that I hope she doesn't ask me about: how the garden snails have babies. Because then I would have to explain about the love darts..."

Today we launch another new blog: Between Lawyers. Authored by some of the blogosphere's best known law bloggers (sometimes known as blawgers) - Denise Howell, Dennis M. Kennedy, Tom Mighell, Marty Schwimmer and Ernest Svenson, Between Lawyers will take a long look at the issues raised when technology, culture and the law intersect.

Says the crew: "We take you behind the firewalls and conference room doors to show you how experienced lawyers deal with these issues and help you prepare for the new challenges we all face."

Of note as the site launches: several posts of on corporate blogging policies. Check out Between Lawyers and stay tuned - this is a talented group of observers of the legal profession and they'll be exploring a host of issues of interest to the blogosphere and the general technology sector.

John Hiler, who "penned" a bunch of much read and highly trafficked pieces a few years back about that chapter in the rise of blogs for Microcontent News, is back!

His first post follows up on observations made by John Battelle that compare Google and Yahoo's respective approach to media. Says John (Hiler): "The more I think about it, the more I'm convinced that what really separates Google from its peers is Journalism..."

Check out Microcontent News if you've never seen it before - you'll find dozens of articles, many of which are still very much relevant. And stay tuned - John's psyched to be back in the saddle and to pick up where he left off - analyzing the forces at work in the rise of blogging, social media, journalism and more.

The fourth in our Orb-sponsored series on the future of digital media features Gerd Leonhard and Dave Kusek, authors of the just-published book "The Future of Music."

Kusek and Leonhard, astute observers of changes afoot in the music industry, say the "record industry as we know it is dying, but the music industry is exploding," and envision a future in which a good portion of digital music is provided via a utility-type arrangement - like water or electricity -, for a flat monthly payment, rather than sold ‘by the unit’ (i.e. as single downloads).

Says Leonhard: "In this newly developing ecosystem there are hundreds of viable micro-channels and thousands of outlets that will give rise to an economic model that finally allows mid-level artists to survive, even thrive. Mass markets shrink and niche markets explode..."

And Kusek: "Artists have always had to work hard and that is not going to change. However, they can also work a lot smarter, and have a lot more control of their own careers and time and direct relationships with the fans..."

For much more see the interview. And if you missed previous interviews with Jeff Jarvis, Tim Wu and Hank Barry be sure to catch them as well.

We highlighted it yesterday after Donna Wentworth first posted about Jon Johansen's PyMusique, the "fair" interface to the iTunes Music Store he's developing. A day later and the item's attracted some 70 comments and counting.

Says Johansen: "PyMusique is an interface to the iTunes Music Store that lets you preview songs, sign up for an account and buy songs. It is somewhat interesting from a DMCA/EUCD perspective. The iTunes Music Store actually sells songs without DRM. While iTunes adds DRM to your purchases, PyMusique does not..." Find out more and be sure not to miss the comments.

Corante contributor Zack Lynch shares some of the data gathered by his company NeuroInsights. A soon-to-be-released report from NeuroInsights claims that VC investment in companies developing treatments for neurological and psychiatric illnesses climbed 225% over the past five years to total $5.987 billion. For commentary and more info, check out Brain Waves, Zack's industry insider on the neurotech market.

Dominic Basulto interviews two of the major players - City Council Member Gail Brewer and Mark Levine of One Economy - involved in New York City's adoption of Resolution No. 669, an initiative that aims to provide provide low- or no-cost broadband Internet access to affordable housing residents throughout the city.

Says Levine: "If fully implemented, in New York City alone, policy changes influenced by Res. No. 669 could impact at least 30,000 low-income households over the next three fiscal years."

Zack Lynch notes some of the events and resources being highlighted this week as part of the Dana Foundation's Brain Awareness Week.

Dominic Basulto interviews Craig Plunkett about the potential (or not) of rolling out Wi-Fi on the commuter rails serving New York City. Plunkett: "I don't know if its a lack of will or concern, or the reservation of the MTA as a private hunting ground for firms represented by well-connected lobbyists, but in the three years I've been trying, I haven't met a single person that was even willing to champion the idea..." Go to the interview...

Tune in to Science and Society, our newest blog which has David Lemberg building upon his the Internet-based talk radio show "Science and Society." David's been interviewing some of the top minds in science since he launched the show in June 2003 and on the blog he'll be continuing his coverage of many of the same topics - the life sciences, physical sciences, planetary and earth sciences as well as discussing K-12 science education and the intersection between science and art.

Tune in to Science and Society to find out more and to get info on a knockout program scheduled for today that has him interviewing Dr. John Bahcall, recipient of the 1998 National Medal of Science and a professor with Princeton's Institute for Advanced Study, as well as Professor Martin Kemp, the head of the art history department of the University of Oxford and the director of research, Universal Leonardo, Artakt.

Zack Lynch, author of Brain Waves, our blog on neurotechnology, in in the process of gathering info for a report his company's putting together on the global neurotech industry. He's looking for feedback on his numbers - check out the data here.

With more and more cities exploring the idea of a city-wide and operated Wi-Fi service, Russell Shaw digs into the story of Chaska, Minnesota. The small city officially rolled out its municipal Wi-Fi offering in November and has already seen more than 10% of its residents sign up for the service. It's also attracting a lot of attention from big cities such as Philadelphia and San Francisco that are eager to hear what lessons it's learned.

For more on municipal wireless service, check out his interview with the network's manager in this second in our Earthlink-sponsored series on the Future of Wireless.

We've launched a new groupblog that should quickly prove an excellent forum for commentary on the ways in which branding's changing and adapting to evolving market forces such as the empowerment of the consumer, the rise of social media, broad brand saturation, and much more. Dubbed BrandShift, the discussion will be led by four outstanding commentators - Jennifer Rice, Andy Lark, Johnnie Moore and John Winsor - through the blog as well as a podcast series we'll be launching soon.

Well established bloggers all, they bring a vast diversity of experience and expertise: John's a consultant and author of "Beyond the Brand"; Andy's a well known brand and marketing guru and the departing VP of global communications and marketing for Sun Microsystems; and Johnnie and Jennifer are both highly respected industry strategists and consultants.

Check it out and stay tuned for great thinking and writing from Jennifer, John, Johnnie and Andy...

Alex Williams and Eric Rice interview Jason Meserve, multimedia editor for Network World Fusion and host for Network World Fusion Radio, and David Berlind, executive editor at ZDNet and creator of Berlind's Media Transparency Channel, about their experiences getting podcasting off the ground at their respective media companies. Listen in...