Bloggers at Lotusphere

December 9 2004

Now that the agenda for Lotusphere 2005 is 99% final, it's a good time to start examining the content plans.  The content team had a stated objective of increasing the proportion of Notes/Domino content on the overall agenda.  If you examine the tracks and sessions list, it seems fairly clear that this obejctive has been met or exceeded.  The early session preferences voting results seem to indicate that these increased sessions have resonated as well.
Neither the initial session postings on the web nor the session preferences e-mail indicate one important data point for the presentations -- speaker names.  One of the nice things about having a conference running for over a decade is the number of quality repeat speakers on the Lotusphere agenda.  Some have even developed a cult following -- to the point where I retitled one session to "Wes Morgan's Network Design for Collaboration".  As I told Wes, his ratings at Lotusphere are so consistently good, that attendees would come to a presentation where he read pages out of the phone book.

For Lotusphere 2005, many of the non-IBM speakers will be familiar names, drawn from two sometimes-intersecting populations.  Set one are repeat speakers.  Set two -- bloggers.  As a content manager, I was more willing to take a flyer on a rookie speaker if I knew of their writing and technical skills from other venues.  That's not to say that all blogger session proposals were accepted -- the sheer number of session proposals this year made that impossible -- but I'm pleased that a number of the Lotusphere speaking virgins were drawn directly from the Lotus electronic community.  That also includes places like the discussions on IBM developerWorks: Lotus, and places like the Partner Forum.

There will also be a Birds-of-a-Feather for the Lotus blogging community during the conference.  That doesn't mean we bloggers will attend to feed each others egos and come up with a secret handshake -- the intent is to foster and grow the community.  Bruce Elgort submitted the session as a facilitator, but many others will be there, myself included.

Here is a partial list of (non-IBM) bloggers speaking at Lotusphere 2005; I'll leave it to them to tell you about their sessions....
Rocky Oliver, John Head, Libby Ingrassia, Chris Miller, Tom Duff, Joe Litton, Bill Buchan, Christopher Byrne, Ben Langhinrichs, Andrew Pollack, Bob Balaban/Karen Hobert, Rob Novak, Declan Lynch, and Richard Schwartz.  Who did I miss?

Ed Brill | DL1223, BOS-CVG, Seat 2C Category:  Lotusphere 05  Add/View Comments [12]

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  1. 1  Dave  | 12/9/2004 9:10:12 AM

    I don't know -- I kinda like the idea of a secret handshake for bloggers. Are you sure that 5 minutes of the session couldn't be set aside for that?

    (Psst -- jonvon, if he says no, lets come up with one when I am out there in 2 weeks and you can pass it along.)

  1. 2  Greyhawk68 http://greyhawk68.dominohosting.biz | 12/9/2004 9:48:01 AM

    Oooh, sorry guys. No one has shown you the secret handshake yet? We'll have to remedy that over drinks at the Sphere :-)

    -Grey

  1. 3  Christopher Byrne http://www.controlscaddy.com/ | 12/9/2004 10:02:46 AM

    I am just torn that I gave my word not to sing at Karaoke if I had a session approved, and I so love to sing:-(

    But serious, I am looking forward to finally meet these bloggers in person (though I have met a few of them). Bit if it is at 7:00 AM, Fuggedaboutit!:-) Are we going to have the "Band of Bloggers" t-shirts made?

    The only other regret is that I did not get the official notification in time to get a room at the Swan or Dolphin. Having learned last year that staying offsite and driving in is a royal pain, I booked a room at the Caribbean Beach, but if anyone at the Swan/Dolphin without a car would like to lend me a parking pass, I would not say no;-).

    Here is the session I will be presenting and the BOF I will be facilitating:

    Session Title: Leveraging the LotusScript NotesLog Class to Build a Proactive Bug Tracking System

    Abstract as submitted:

    One of the key elements of sound information technology practices is proactive bug tracking and resolution in deployed applications. Lotus Notes developers often make extensive use of the LotusScript NotesLog class to track actions taken by agents and errors that occur. But this requires proactive monitoring. This session will demonstrate using the NotesLog class as part of an overall strategy to create trackable bug tickets complete with workflow for approval and escalation of unprocessed actions.

    BOF - IT Strategy and Planning: Sarbanes-Oxley and Other Compliance Initiatives

    This session is designed to bring together people involved with Sarbanes-Oxley and other compliance initiatives with their organizations to discuss what their challenges are, how they are meeting them, and talking about how they are using or planning to use Lotus Software in their compliance efforts.

    I am very excited about this opportunity and I hope many of you can make one or both sessions.

  1. 4  Ben Langhinrichs http://www.GeniiSoft.com/showcase.nsf/GeniiBlog | 12/9/2004 11:26:28 AM

    I would love to tell you about my session, but I decided not to even submit an abstract this year, so I'm not really a speaker after all. I'm flattered to think I've become enough of a fixture that you didn't even realize I wasn't. Maybe next year.

    Of course, you could always waive my conference fee if you just want to pretend I'm a speaker <grin>.

  1. 5  Rock http://www.LotusGeek.com | 12/9/2004 12:01:19 PM

    Scott Good will be there, he's a blogger too: { Link }

    Karen Hobert has an e (HobErt) not an a.

    John Wargo has a blog: { Link }

    That's all I see that you missed off the top of my head :)

  1. 6  Kevin http://www.DominoPreacher.com | 12/9/2004 12:29:36 PM

    Band of Blogger t-shirts would be COOL!

  1. 7  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 12/9/2004 12:40:19 PM

    @4 - LOL, I could have sworn I saw you on the list.... sheesh! I'm getting too old for this.

    @5 - Thanks Rock. I debated Karen vowels all morning...

  1. 8  Christopher Byrne http://www.controlscaddy.com/ | 12/9/2004 12:55:23 PM

    @6

    Chris Toohey has the shirts available at

    https://www.cafepress.com/dominoguru.13569657

  1. 9  Tim Latta  | 12/9/2004 1:18:06 PM

    I've spent some quality post-session, evening time with Wes, but it hasn't included reading pages out of the phonebook. If I get the chance again this year, I'll bring a few pages along and see if he bites.

  1. 10  Chris Toohey http://www.dominoguru.com | 12/9/2004 5:02:32 PM

    @8 (Hey Chris)

    That's just something I threw together - if anyone's really interested, I'll put something "better" up there (or if anyone has a suggestion on a t-shirt vendor etc.)

    -Chris

  1. 11  Tony S Lee www.peripheral.ca | 1/6/2005 4:13:09 PM

    Haven't been there since 1999, but someone deserves to go but don't think will be there is Stan Rogers.

  1. 12  Wes Morgan  | 1/21/2005 8:06:47 AM

    >Are we going to have the "Band of Bloggers" t-shirts made?

    Hmmm...I feel a song coming on...

    <to the tune of "Bonnie Blue Flag">

    We are a band of bloggers and posting to the web,

    Hiking through the Dolphin, each day another bleb;

    And if the session's boring, we say so right away,

    Our HTML RSSed, you'll get our news today!

    Append!

    Append!

    Our blogs will never end!

    For we're the Lotus Bloggers and our ways we'll never mend!

    OK, maybe I'm just a bit *too* pumped for Lotusphere...