TechEd 2006 has now come and gone for many of us. It was great meeting everyone that I met this year, and If I didn’t meet you well, now who’s fault is that? Here is a rundown of my week…for those that are interested. It is largely un-technical and just random thoughts.
I decided a long time ago when I knew I was coming to TechEd this year to get some Red Sox tickets, for those that don’t know I am big Baseball fan. I even made it down to spring training this year in Arizona, yeah that big. So the day that tickets for the season went on sale I was on the phone for three hours trying to secure tickets to the Red Sox day game on Sunday, the night of the keynote.
It was originally planned to be a day/afternoon game starting at about 2pm which would have been perfect to leave me just enough time to make it to the convention center and meet the other people for the press pre-event and to catch the keynote. Well the weather the day before didn’t cooperate and the Red Sox were forced to reschedule that game to noon on Sunday and our game got moved to 5pm, which would not have worked for us. We didn’t know what to do…
That night talking on the phone with my fiancée she suggested exchanging our tickets for the noon game. I don’t know why I hadn’t thought about it sooner…so that was the game plan for the next day.
Sunday morning we headed over to the convention center early to get registered. It was about 10am and took us about 15-20 minutes to get most of us (I was with several co-workers) finished with the process. We then hopped back on the buses and headed back to the hotel,the Marriott Copley, dropped off our new blue canvas attendee bag and caught a cab to Fenway.
Ten bucks later we were standing on the street outside the park ready to find out how to exchange these tickets. We were not able to do it the night before because the ticket office was closed by the time we had this epiphany. We walked around a bit asking where we might do this and it turns out that Boston has a scalp free zone, but it doesn’t open till just before the game and only deals in the game about to occur, our tickets were for the 5pm game.
So instead we got some Standing Room Only tickets hoping that most would not be able to make it to the game since it got rescheduled on them. We walked around the park in awe taking picture for a bit then headed off the shaded seats in left field by the green monster. This paid off and we were able to have decent seats the whole game. We left around the eighth inning and wouldn’t you know it, we missed a walk off home run to end the game.
We walked along the souvenir shops around the park to buy things for our families then caught a cab back to the hotel to get ready for the keynote. Jeff (Jeff’s connected corner) and I had arranged to meet in the lobby and head to the keynote together. Our site isn’t too terribly old and this was my first time to meet Jeff in person. He is every bit as nice as he has seemed in our online conversations / collaboration.
After a short 30 minute bus ride to the convention center, I say short since some days this trip could take over an hour depending on who the driver was and the route they took, we arrived and headed off to find the media room. We were a little early for the reception that was happening at 5:30 so we decided to check out the media rooms. These rooms are basically a small walled off area that was to give the media/bloggers/analyst area to work on articles/posts. They would also server us lunch and had our own TV to watch World Cup Soccer (Football) on.
The reception started around 5:30 PM and went right up until the keynote was about to start. They then escorted us down to the keynote for some special seating up front during the keynote. I already offered my thoughts on the keynote so I won’t rehash it here. I was curious why we didn’t have Bill or Steve in attendace this year and I guess the announcements made later in the week of Bill leaving sort of explain why we were relegated to Bob Muglia.
A few hours later it was back to the hotel after a long day I was ready to get some sleep and get a fresh jump on sessions the next day.
Monday started way too early for my tastes. Breakfast, if you wanted to eat what they have provided, starts at 7am. Being from the west coast of the US that is about 4am to my still unadjusted body, which was simply way too early….infact the rest of the week I opted to skip breakfast as the food was unappealing and the long days made waking up this early a little difficult. especially after a long day the day before. We divided up sessions amoung us and headed off for a long day of sessions. Around lunch time I headed over to the media work room and caught up with Mary Jo Foley. You can see her and the media lounge in this video. A few more hours of sessions later it was time for the Expo Hall night.
The Expo hall evening event is the best night to get swag. Vendors usually have the prime give-aways that night and your odds of getting them are greatest. Plus, they have free food and beer. I met up with Wes (getwired) and Jeff and we proceeded to meander the walkways looking for the best of the best swag. After scoring all that we thought our suite cases could safely carry we called it a night.
Tuesday I spent most of the morning walking around the Technical Learning booths meeting up with many of the Microsoft PM’s that I know, and meeting ones I would like to get to know. Scheduling future content for the site here and generally getting a feel for how others perceive Windows Vista and its progress to date. I find the quite a lot of value in just listening to the conversation of colleagues on the showroom floor and spent quite a few hours over the week networking and trying to meeting people here.
At lunch I headed over to the Birds of a feather session for Community Server, which is the software we run here on Windows Connected. It was good to put faces to name for the likes of Scott and Rob…two key guy in Telligent. I found out some good info and I am working on establish some closer ties with those guys to better our community.
Tuesday night was the TechNet Magazine party which Jeff, Wes, and I all got invites too. Unfortunately, I was unable to make it….but it sounded like a lot of fun. They held it at the Boston Billiards Club this year and I grew up with a pool table....oh well
By Wednesday many of the press started to leave as they had gotten all the interviews they needed and many weren’t attending the attendee sessions like us. This was fine by us as the the media areas which were usually a busy place, by today had just a hand full of people left like Bink, Paul Thurott, Terri (from the hive) and a few others I didn’t know. Wednesday night was the influencer part which I also could have attended but instead choose to hang out with my co-workers for once for dinner. We ate at the Cheesecake factory near the hotel and called it a night.
Thursday the media lounge was even more desolate and I again spent a few hours milling around on the showroom floor catching the occasional chalk talk, lighting chat, and mingling with individuals. For me the single biggest value of a conference like this is the people I meet and the connections I make. Thursday night was the evening event party at Fenway park. Having already been to Fenway I was thinking of skipping this, but ended up going just to get to walk on the field. We hung in the stands just chatting and lamenting on past TechEd’s the news of Bill’s retirement and everything in between.
After getting home around 9 or 10 I looked over the schedule and decided the only thing I really wanted to catch on Friday was a session too late in the day to make anyway due to my flight time and so I choose to take an earlier flight on Friday.
Boston was a lovely town, but the location of the convention center in relation to the hotels was challenging. The drivers of the buses were all from out of town it seemed and all took differing and confusing ways to and from the convention center. I can’t say I would recommend them try to hold another event of this scale in Boston until such time as the construction in the downtown area is completed. My only other gripe is about how the information on what sessions were when got laid out in the mini-guide. This guide is what most attendees use the entire week, Myself Included. It did not have listed very well the times for the briefings, the chalk talks, or lighting sessions.
Every year TechEd gets better and better, but for me it isn’t as much about the content…which can be hit and miss. It is the people connections you make. These connections for me have and continue to pay for the cost of the trip many times over. I am constantly amazed how small the IT world seems even though we are a large fraternity of brothers and sisters who speak our own unique language full of bits, bytes, and acronyms galore. United not by creed, nationality, or skin tone….but a passion, a passion for technology.
Posted
Jun 17 2006, 08:17 AM
by
Josh Phillips
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