Update: Apparently I can't write, or get a point across from the

comments and a few emails, so I have edited this to hopefully make it

clearer.

The pre/post conference sessions came out today for the 2010 SQL PASS

Summit. And to my surprise the list of

sessions wasn’t quite what I expected.

I know I complained last year about the selections, and a few people

said that I should get involved if I didn’t like the way things were

done. So I did. I volunteered and wound up on the Pre/Post Con and

Spotlight committee. I spent quite a few hours of my time reviewing

abstracts, emailing with the speakers to get more information, and then

rating sessions. I got on a conference call, with all that prep work,

and debated the choices with the others and think we had a great list of

sessions. We, the three members of the committee, sent our decisions

over to PASS over a week ago. Actually I think two weeks ago.

Only the sessions I the committee I was on had picked

aren’t the same ones as the ones PASS published.

<insert four letter words here>

  ______-_______ _______ ________ ______ ______

</four letter words rant>

I understand that PASS needs to make money from these sessions, and

there are marketing issues involved. However the instructions I had

stated that my committee “Make decisions with regard to all

Program aspects of PASS Community Summit.” (emphasis mine)

Apparently that’s not the case. I’m not going to disclose which session I

picked that didn’t make it, and which one  got picked instead. That’s

not fair to either speaker, and not the point.

If marketing, money, other issues are the important ones, that’s fine.

If you ask others to pick sessions, and supposedly decide on what the

community wants to see and what is good for PASS, then let the committee

do that. I can't speak for the rest of my committee, but we were

caught off guard and not happy with this decision. I'm upset because I

wanted to make a difference to this process, try to do a good job,

defend the decisions of the committee and take the flack for those

decisions. I was also trying to ensure that PASS wasn't choosing people

because they're a part of some "old speakers network". I feel I've

failed there since I didn't make a difference, and the old speaker's

club reigned.

If that's the way PASS wants to work, let some non-SQL, non-DBA,

non-volunteer honk just rank everyone and pick the sessions they think

are important. Publish the rules and guidelines and make it happen.

Just don’t waste my time as a volunteer.

To be clear: My committee sent selections to PASS some time ago. We were

not informed, queried, or told of any changes. One of our pre-con

sessions was demoted to an alternate. One we picked as an alternate, not

sure it was one we wanted to see, was moved to a regular session.

Nothing in the comments below seems to give a good reason for this.