The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is to open an Australian office, providing local organisations with direct input into the future direction of the Web.
The consortium, which was created in 1994 to promote and develop the Web, will operate an office in Brisbane from later this week.
Last year Brisbane hosted a major international conference for the consortium and Tim Berners-Lee, who created the Web and heads the W3C has visited the city more than once.
The office, which will be situated at the Cooperative Research Centre for Enterprise Distributed Systems Technology (DSTC) at the University of Queensland, which has been involved in several major Internet projects including the development of a national University search engine.
It will be launched by Queensland's Deputy Premier Jim Elder at a breakfast at the Brisbane Sheraton on Thursday and the opening will be attended by W3C 's European-based Head of Offices, Bob Hopgood.
The W3C is an international industry consortium jointly run by the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science (MIT LCS) in the USA, the National Institute for Research in Computer Science and Control (INRIA) in France and Keio University in Japan.
It provides a wide range of services including a repository of information about the Web for developers and users; reference code implementations to embody and promote standards; and various prototype and sample applications to demonstrate use of new technology.
There are now 11 offices around the world with six in Europe and others in Israel, Morocco, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the consortium has more than 410 members.
Officials said the office would provide Australian and especially Queensland companies with an unprecedented opportunity to influence the future development of the Web as well opening a range of commercial opportunities.
