RE: Conferences - why attend?

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#1 (permalink)

04-20-2008, 12:12 PM

Jean Georges Perrin

Posts: n/a

RE: Conferences - why attend?

Malcolm,

The problem with long mails is even worse than with e-mails containing the
wrong subject...

Ok, first the economic model of IIUG is not a subject of this thread. So if
you want to discuss that, start a new one, but things have changed
quuuuiiiite a bit since you were on the Board. I am grateful to you and the
other would created this organization, but the model did change. I am
closing my 4th term on the Board and quite a few things have changed in 4
years.

On the conference, do the math as you want. My wife is less mad at me when I
go to conferences, even if I am NOT PAID while I go, that spending week ends
hacking my unix boxes ;-). I think conferences bring great value.

I also completely disagree on the 40% marketing you say. This might be true
for some conferences, but guess what, that is maybe why IIUG partnered with
IDUG at some point... Have you looked at the program?

If your company thinks it should not invest in you, it may be time you
consider another job!

jgp

> -----Original Message-----
> From: informix-list-bounces@iiug.org [mailto:informix-list-
> bounces@iiug.org] On Behalf Of malcolm weallans
> Sent: Tuesday, October 03, 2006 20:49
> To: doubleecho@your.com; informix-list@iiug.org
> Subject: Conferences - why attend?
>
> I think we should give this thread the correct title, not have it hiding
> behind something else.
>
> If I can add my few pennorth on the subjects of the cost of conferences
> etc.
>
> The challenge we all face is how to persuade the powers that be that we
> are
> making a good investment by paying for somebody to attend a conference.
>
> What are the benefits of the conference compared with the cost of
> attendance?
>
> The benefits are that you get to sit though lots of presentations which
> might be relevant to your job function. (I would defy anybody to convince
> me that all marketing presentations are that relevant to the audience but
> that's the cynic in me speaking). From my experience of attending many
> worldwide user conferences, local user group conferences, and Infobahns
> the
> %age of relevant presentations is at most 40%, and is often much less.
>
> Even the Chat With The Labs series of webcasts is becoming difficult to
> justify with so much time being spent on the marketing message and so
> little
> time on real technical issues.
>
> OK so you can take certification exams - big deal! What is that worth in
> reality.
>
> OK so you can listen to some of the experienced people talking about the
> product - that is fine for the speakers but if all they do is to
> regurgitate
> information then it is not that beneficial.
>
> OK so you can network with other users of the product.
>
> And what about the costs:-
>
> Generally a 5 day conference is now around $2000. The cost of travel and
> accommodation is roughly the same amount unless you are prepared to catch
> flights at ungodly hours and stay in ungodly hotels.
>
> There is also the question of the time away from work. Currently I am
> sold
> out to clients at a rate in excess of $1000 per day.
>
> So a five day conference is realistically going to cost in excess of
> $9000.
>
>
>
> I did make enquiries about going to the conference in Vienna, and the
> upcoming one in Anaheim. I was told that if I wanted to attend the
> conference I could do so at my own expense and by using my holidays. I
> can
> see my wife's reaction if I tell her I'm taking a week off to attend an
> IBM
> conference and it's going to cost $9,000. (Those of you that know my wife
> can guess at her reaction). My only alternative is to publicise the name
> of
> my company by doing a presentation. (Wake up David Williams!) But so far
> I
> have submitted a possible presentation to three conferences and had them
> turned down. After all I wanted to talk about the realities of how to
> survive disaster recovery and outline some of the reasons why we have
> failed
> to recover from disasters with the promptness that a customer should
> expect.
> (It really is surprising how many things can go wrong when you try to
> recover - I can spend many hours talking it if you would all like)
>
>
> As many of you will know I was a member of the Board of Directors of IIUG
> for about 7 years and was part of the board when we first started getting
> involved with subsidies from Informix to help with our administration
> costs.
> That was a very difficult decision and is still a very difficult decision.
> The challenge facing IIUG was to raise money to fund the services
> (including
> this Newsgroup, the Website, the board meetings etc). We had a choice
> between setting an economic membership fee for all members - including
> those
> from the third world where salaries are less than $50 per month - or
> finding
> somebody to subsidise the services. Nowadays we have been able to get
> subsidies from other organisations but then we had no choice - there was
> only one organisation who were prepared to back us, and then only for a
> limited time. The fact that the subsidy continued even when IBM bought
> Informix is testament to the work of the board of directors in creating a
> model for independent worldwide user groups. OK at times it might seem
> that
> the board is a little too IBM centric but that is really down to the
> membership of IIUG making their voice heard and indeendent thinkers being
> voted onto the board.
>
> As a result of the activities of the BOD there are now choices of
> conferences to attend. The IBM conference, the joint IIUG/IDUG
> conference,
> and numerous local conferences. There are Infobahns, Local User Group
> meetings, and even bigger forums like Washington Area Informix Users
> Group.
> The quality of the conference and the relevance of the conference to the
> attendees varies according to the type of organisation that runs it. If
> the
> conference is run by VARs it will be more relevant to people who work for
> VARs. If the conference is run by IBM then it will be more relevant to
> the
> people who work for IBM - and possibly to people who like hearing a
> sanitised message from the supplier. If the conference is run by a group
> of
> enthusiastic amateurs it won't have the same razzamatazz but it might be
> more worthwhile.
>
> We all have to make the choice and vote with our attendance. If we don't
> attend IBMs conferences they will still run them as some people within IBM
> have budgets to spend, but if we don't attend IDUG/IIUG or local user
> group
> meetings they will inevitably fold.
>
> I don't think the BOD should be telling us to attend the IBM conference -
> although I have seen no publicity for it other than from IIUG - but we
> should really consider if the user organised conferences are what we need,
> and if they aren't then let's make them so. But one message I would send
> to
> the IIUG BOD is that any conferences in Europe are expensive for the
> average
> attendee. Unless the csts are reduced the benefit will be outweighed by
> the
> costs of attendance.
>
> So, that was my two pennorth - feel free to shoot me down in flames if you
> will.
>
> Regards
>
> Malcolm
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Informix-list mailing list
> Informix-list@iiug.org
> http://www.iiug.org/mailman/listinfo/informix-list

#2 (permalink)

04-20-2008, 12:12 PM

Captain Pedantic

Posts: n/a

Re: Conferences - why attend?

"Jean Georges Perrin" <jgp@iiug.org> wrote in message
news:mailman.25.1159909712.29455.informix-list@iiug.org...
> Malcolm,

> On the conference, do the math as you want. My wife is less mad at me when
> I
> go to conferences, even if I am NOT PAID while I go, that spending week
> ends
> hacking my unix boxes ;-). I think conferences bring great value.

Er, with respect, and I'm not saying you don't deserve it, but it's easy for
you to say that, isn't it?!

« Conferences - why attend? | RE: Insider #75: Highlights: IBM Information On Demand 2006,The Next Informix IDS Release... »

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RE: Conferences - why attend?