Love YouTube sometimes.  I cached videos in the browser yesterday so I could watch it while I sit in a Starbucks getting my morning kick of caffeine (and watching the falling snow).  The caching does tend to limit my desire to actually shutdown my laptop.  Silly Windows Update keeps pinging me to restart (as if on cue, I click on Restart Later and typing continues).

Which videos am I looking at???  The keynotes from Momentum 2008 in Prague. I have been making plans to attend EMC World in May and I was looking back to see any changes from the last EMC World to that Momentum.  More on EMC World later, but if you aren’t already making plans to attend, you need to get on the ball.

Six More Months, No Pizzazz

Mark Lewis delivered the keynote, broken into three parts (1, 2, 3) and while energy doesn’t really come through video as well as it does in person, the audience seemed a little passive.  Nothing exciting.  I’m not going to break down the message as it is 3 months old at this point.  Suffice it to say that the message didn’t appear that different from previous keynotes that I have observed.  The vision will do well for EMC, but it wasn’t delivered in an inspired manner.  It is a shame because Convergence, Community, Context, and Compliance (well maybe not Compliance) are exciting and are easy sells.

I wish they had recorded more of Whitney, but not having attended, there may not have been a lot to record.  There was a speech recorded from Balaji Yelamanchili.  That had a little more energy.  More importantly, Balaji actually mention CMIS briefly when talking about SharePoint.  Not highlighted in any way that would demonstrate the importance of the pending standard.

What I, and the entire community deserves, it a vision delivered with enthusiasm.  The world is going to be hunkering down and focusing on eDiscovery and Archiving, but if EMC has to lay out the future in two years, it can be excited.  A future where CMIS is second nature and new, exciting applications are being developed by partners that can run on multiple systems.

I miss Dave.  He would have at least put on a show to make us excited to be using EMC products.  I’m glad that he is doing well.

EMC World 2009

Are you going?  I am. That is, I am as sure as any consultant is in this economy. My biggest question is how many colleagues to bring.  Maybe if I convince everyone to bill a few extra hours a week for two months I can bring a bunch.

This is going to be a fun one.  I have heard that they are working to make the CMA/Documentum group a more distinct part of the conference.  I know that I’m going to be reaching out to more people and trying to connect and build a sense of community.

If you are an EMC customer, get there.  You have great stories.  You can give life histories of your systems.  You live with mistakes and are part of the long process.  Consultants sometimes fix them, but we rarely get to see a system through it’s entire life like you do.

Let’s get some fresh faces, energy, and stories.  Let’s meet face-to-face so that when we interact online, we have that foundation that builds trust and comfort.

Be there.  Regardless of the keynote, we’ll create our own enthusiasm.