On Wednesday, an always worthwhile Internet-focused conference, the annual Web 2.0 Summit, kicks off in San Francisco.

The lineup for the three-day event is particularly good this year and it is also a perfect time to take the temperature of the Internet’s movers and shakers, given all the hubbub of late with the weak economy. (BoomTown will thus be there with the trusty–and shaky–Flip video, chronicling it all for future generations.)

Speakers will include bicycle champ Lance Armstrong, Yahoo (YHOO) CEO Jerry Yang, former VP Al Gore, Google.org head Larry Brilliant, Paul Otellini of Intel (INTC) and Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, among others, chattering away on a wide range of topics. (You can see the full schedule here.)

There’s also, of course, a passel of parties, including one on Thursday night thrown by MySpace Music. And it will–shades of Web 1.0!–feature an exclusive performance by Lionel Richie (and also DJ AM).

I am, I shall admit it and without irony, a closet fan of Richie. And why not, with so much infectious fluff to choose: “Hello,” “Say You, Say Me,” “Three Times a Lady.”

Most importantly, I will be curious to see if there will be “Dancing on the Ceiling” among the beaten-down start-up crowd. (See that music video below and ponder exactly why you know you know each and every word to that funkadelic song.)

Hosted by Tim O’Reilly and John Battelle, the Web 2.0 Summit is called “Web Mets World” this year. By that, BoomTown is inferring that its organizers think it is time for the Internet to grow up. But why don’t we let them speak:

The commercial web is now a teenager—it’s been fifteen short years since Marc Andreessen released the Mosaic browser. To put this in perspective, television as a commercial medium reached its fifteenth birthday in 1956—the year Elvis Presley made his first appearance on national TV…as we pondered the theme for this year, one clear signal has emerged: our conversation is no longer just about the Web. Now is the time to ask how the Web—its technologies, its values, and its culture—might be tapped to address the world’s most pressing limits. Or put another way—and in the true spirit of the Internet entrepreneur—its most pressing opportunities.”

And, of course, here’s Lionel:

Since BoomTown did an obsessive countdown after Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang last year unwisely promised a 100-day, top-to-bottom look at the company, with “no sacred cows” spared (as it turned out, they all were), I decided that–after the month-mark had passed since Microsoft (MSFT) made its unsolicited bid for Yahoo (YHOO)–it was time for a count-up!

Thus, Day 32 (we’re counting from Friday, Feb. 1, when the offer was made public)!

And, frankly, with the added Leap Day this year to add to Yahoo’s agony, this battle is getting about as exciting as Yang’s 100-day slog–with nothing really page-turning on the horizon since Yahoo’s board kicked Microsoft’s $31-per-share offer to the curb several weeks ago.

Now, of course, Microsoft is returning the favor by loudly prepping a proxy fight and trotting out Silicon Valley companies like TellMe to report that a Microsoft takeover is just hunky-dory.

“We are pretty much doing everything we were doing before–just a lot more of it,” said TellMe head Mike McCue to the Associated Press, with the cheeriness of someone with acute Stockholm syndrome and $800 million in Microsoft money.

And if happy, shiny, Windows-cash-gorged tech people don’t impress, according to several sources close to Microsoft, perhaps a little fear factor will work better.

Said these sources, there will be “three to four big-name CEOs” on its list of new board members that Microsoft must nominate in the next two weeks for its slate of directors to replace Yahoo’s current board.

BoomTown recently reported that the software giant was sniffing around for prospects in Silicon Valley.

But, sorry to say, I still cannot figure out what CEOs these are, despite a lot of effort to find out.

So, I started trying to figure it out myself, focusing on tech and Web execs, who are the obvious choices.

Nonetheless, after going over a long list of possible execs, none of the ones I considered seems likely to turn on Yahoo.

Intel? No, CEO Paul Otellini is on the board of Google.

eBay? No, that’s too big a move for the new CEO John Donahoe.

Sun? No, after Scott McNealy’s funny diatribes against Microsoft for so long, CEO Jonathan Schwartz simply cannot.

Dell? No, CEO and Founder Michael Dell has his hands full.

Amazon? CEO and Founder Jeff Bezos is sassy and lives up near Microsoft, but it would be a real slap at another Web icon like Yang.

WPP Group’s Sir Martin Sorrell? Well, to include an ad biggie would be a good move and Sorrell likes to make pointed remarks about Google, but not that sharp.

Frankly, other than non-tech companies, of which there are probably many choices who owe Microsoft in some way, I am officially out of guesses.

Well, of course, except for one Web 2.0 CEO, who has a big name and is in great–and I mean, great–debt to Microsoft.

In fact, $240 million worth of IOUs. In other words, Facebook CEO and Founder Mark Zuckerberg.

It would be ironic (Yahoo tried to buy Facebook a little more than a year ago), it would be poetic (only in Silicon Valley does the young eat its old) and it would be really fun to watch the fireworks (Facebook is no friend of Google’s).

Most of all, Zuckerberg on the board of Microsoft’s Yahoo would be Steve Ballmer’s ultimate SuperPoke at Yahoo.

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

On Sunday, the AllThingsD team, including Walt Mossberg, Katherine Boehret, John Paczkowski and BoomTown, are headed for Las Vegas for the annual Consumer Electronics Show, that cornucopia of gadgets, gewgaws and whizzy devices and the geeks who love them that takes place all next week.

We’ll be live-blogging, catching keynotes, doing videos and, most importantly, giving you important insights about what the key tech trends are in the coming year. (Also, we hope to get in a few games of craps, but that’s neither here nor there.)

Some of the tech luminaries who will be appearing include Microsoft’s Bill Gates, Yahoo’s Jerry Yang and Paul Otellini of Intel, but the real action is on the noisy floors of the convention where gadgets vie for supremacy.

Some important themes, looking at the news coming out so far: mobile focus, social networking and wireless.