Make Me Think

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Make Me Think

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Steve Jones - SSC Editor

Posted Tuesday, November 25, 2008 9:16 PM

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Comments posted to this topic are about the item Make Me Think

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Post #608823

Michael Osmond

Posted Wednesday, November 26, 2008 12:35 AM

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An interesting observation. I have done some speaking, and in the end its all about the audience, be it connecting, bringing them with you or challenging them. The thought of a product centric presentation is that it could be too easy for it to be about the product, not the audience.

Michael

Post #608882

EdVassie

Posted Wednesday, November 26, 2008 3:00 AM

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I agree that the PASS keynotes are often just marketing. And too often the marketing is aimed at senior managers rather than technical staff.

When I see a glitzy application demonstrated, I feel 'so what', any organisation can create a glitzy application given enough time. What I want to know is how it was done and how long it took to design and build. For most of the product demos, we were given no indication that the build took 1 year or 1 week. But if we had been shown how to do the build in 1 week that would have woken me up!

The keynote on Friday was the best I have heard at PASS. The only drawback is that it reminded me very much of a presentation at IDUG in 1998 describing much the same features in the recently launched DB2/PE. Even so, it will be great to have these features in SQL Server. I look forward to seeing how SQL Server deals with adding nodes to an existing shared nothing environment, which was a big availability problem in early releases of DB2/PE for hashed distributions.

So, for the future it would be great to have keynotes that stretch the mind, rather than just showing us what we get if we read the manual.

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Disclaimer: All information provided is a personal opinion that may not match reality.
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Post #608917

MVDBA

Posted Wednesday, November 26, 2008 7:04 AM

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I've been to quite a few events and regardless of whether the speaker is good or bad i always pick up something from the speaker about how to portray yourself when public speaking (whether something not to do or something you should do) .

I always try and bring these learnings into play when i'm training groups of people looking to learn dba skills.

Not all of us DBA's are gifted with charisma, quick wit, or the ability to keep an audience enthralled - quite often we're stereotypically portrayed as sandal wearing beardy wierdies with no friends and the least popular person at a party compared to our more glamourous (and considerably worse paid) Game developers - but each to their own talent.

I've seen some excellent keynote speakers - anyone at dev 2008 last year would have loved Dave Wheeler's excellent keynote speech - but eaqually he was quite poor in a smaller lecture theater. Whereas Itzig Ben-gan, Fernando Heurrero (and most Solid Quality learnings people such as Michael Hotek) were excellent small audience speakers - although i can't imaging Itzig giving a keynote.

bizarrely enough - one of the worst speakers (at devcon 2005 i beleive) - is now editing the microsoft UK MSDN Flash newsletter......

MVDBA

Post #609043

Donna Hawley-340938

Posted Wednesday, November 26, 2008 10:23 AM

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This was my first year at PASS and I greatly enjoyed the experience. I don't get to many marketing events and so I found the information presented at the keynotes useful. They gave me ideas about how to use the newer products to solve our issues. Since Microsoft is a major sponsor of the event, I think it is valid that they would use it as a forum to present their new product ideas and get feedback from the conference attendees. The smaller sessions were filled with technical content and the availability of the DVD afterward will also be helpful in learning the technical features. Overall I felt that the PASS conference was excellent and well worth the time.

Post #609298

GeorgeCopeland

Posted Wednesday, November 26, 2008 11:51 AM

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Best technology speaker hands down: Bill Vaughn (http://www.betav.com/blog/billva/). The perfect combination of business and technical expertise, presented in a manner that doesn't make your head explode. Not relevant to you guys perhaps is Dan Appleman (http://www.desaware.com/company/background.aspx), a guru on the application side, not a Steve Wozniak, but a minor moon in his orbit.

Post #609346

Steve Jones - SSC Editor

Posted Wednesday, November 26, 2008 11:53 AM

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thanks for the recommendations on speakers. I'll check them out. Always good to find someone worth listening to.

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Post #609349

Vivien Xing

Posted Thursday, November 27, 2008 9:36 PM

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David DeWitt’s keynote is the best I have ever listened. It makes me think beyond what we are having for SQL Server. Anything is possible. What could be the next?

He is a pioneer in this field.

Post #610055

Wayne West

Posted Wednesday, December 10, 2008 10:39 AM

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DeWitt's presentation Friday was absolutely brilliant: it was the only one of the keynotes that actually engaged me; most of the time I was reading my daily download of comics, Wired, and Slashdot during the keynote. :D

My one "what if" regret is that I never went to a university and studied with someone like him. I'm hoping they have the video of it in the DVD package, which I really need to order.

Post #617234

Steve Jones - SSC Editor

Posted Wednesday, December 10, 2008 3:00 PM

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OK, I definitely missed out. Need to go watch this on the PASS site.

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