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Why the hell not. I've not been to one of these people-talk-at-you events before, and I might as well test my sea legs at a free one before I started forking over hundreds of squids for Rails conferences.
Straw poll: If someone says to you that they're a 'web developer', what does that mean to you? Does it mean that they write HTML/CSS, or JavaScript, or does it mean that they do server-side programming? Or is it just a vague term that requires clarification?
It usually means that they don't know what they're talking about, they thought it'd be easy to knock some HTML or Flash out for a living and they're doing something like that in their part time for a small number of local companies that don't know any better.
This definition comes from many years of having to deal with these people. And a number of bitter experiences where potential customers have gone for a cheap "Web Developer" instead of us, and I've seen their web sites turn into non-dynamic Front Page nonsense.
I'd go for Web Application Developer. There's a lack of emphasis on the HTML/CSS side of things there so maybe "Web Application Designer." ???
The word "Application" is what I'm looking for.
However, personal opinion, YMMV, etc.
It almost always requires clarification. Front end? Back end? Both? Hand code? FrontPage monkey? ASP, PHP, JSP, CFM, Flash, Rails? etc? Databases? Standards and accessibility? Seasoned professional or bedroom hobbyist? Write your own JS or have to resort to 3rd party libraries? Do you actually know what AJAX is?
I'd expect a web developer to have server-side knowledge at the very least. If you want to be taken seriously, this is an absolute minimum. And, I'd expect you to be able to explain the code you used - it's fine to use libraries but, you need to know how the code works so you're not left high and dry if/when something dies.