IBM Connect 2013, now with more Lotusphere; registration open!
September 4 2012
Earlier today, IBM officially kicked off awareness and registration for the Connect 2013, January 27-31 in Orlando, Florida, USA. Connect is not a new name or conference, but rather an expansion of mission and scope for the Lotusphere events of the past two decades.
For the last few years, IBM has offered parallel events as part of the Lotusphere conference, including Connect 2012. The Connect 2012 sessions were focused on solutions and adoption, and attracted a line-of-business management audience. Those business leaders came from marketing departments, human resources, sales, product development, and research organizations. Prior to and including 2012, we have had CIO tracks, business tracks, mini-conferences, and other events that have run right under your noses as part of Lotusphere.
As part of our leadership in the area of social business, there is a sense that the message and content of Connect has the opportunity to grow and provide even more useful content for multiple audiences. The format of keynotes, sessions, round tables, labs, and exhibits is not exclusively a delivery mechanism for content for architects or for business managers, and a broader mission and scope means we can deliver more of what is needed for all of those audiences.
If you are an IT professional and have come to rely on Lotusphere for technical training content, the broader event banner changes nothing. Lotusphere will continue to run as a technical program, with multiple tracks, within IBM Connect. You might even find the opportunity to attend sessions beyond your focus useful, a way to broaden your horizons. On the other hand, you may simply just want to know that your friends will still be there, hanging out in Kimono's singing karaoke after birds-of-a-feather sessions on XPages or user groups. We will.
The call for abstracts should be coming in the next couple of weeks. The early bird discount expires this month; if you are interested in speaking but also in the discount, we have always made things right for people selected to speak after registering. I know we need to get more content on the website covering the details of the conference, which will further help you justify the trip to yourself, your management, or colleagues. It's coming.
There has been some good discussion about the new conference name on Tom Duff's blog as well as Susan Bulloch's. I, too, see this as a natural evolution, just as the other IBM software events have broad names that provide a way to adapt to new technologies and solutions every year, without worrying about the branding (Examples include: Information on Demand, Pulse, Impact, Innovate). I'll see you in Orlando in January, just as I have every year since 1996 (well, all bar one).
Link: ibm.com: IBM Connect 2013 >
Post a Comment
- 2
Kristin Keene | 9/4/2012 3:17:15 PM
Hi -- yes, some new and some old favorites are back again for 2013. New are Government and Academic, back again are of these special groups:
Alumni
IBM Professional Certified
IBM Champion
If you qualify as a member of one of these special groups, you may be eligible for a $100 USD discount off the current listed rate.
If you have not received a special mailing, contact customer service at
ibmconnect@experient-inc.com to inquire about discount rates.
- 3
Craig Wiseman http://www.wiseman.la/cpw | 9/4/2012 7:54:08 PM
Can you combine the "special group" discounts?
I sent an email off to "ibmconnect@experient-inc.com" to inquire.......
- 4
David Price http://www.meridiansocialbusiness.com | 9/6/2012 8:36:13 AM
The few times I have been able to get business leaders to attend Lotusphere or Connect, they came away with great value.
Congrats on making the change and good luck on putting together what should be another great show.
- 5
Rocky Oliver | 9/6/2012 9:26:13 AM
Before I begin, let me state that, unequivocally, I am still a champion and proud technologist focused on the IBM/Lotus brands. My comments here are not whiny-treehugger comments - I am simply stating my concerns - for what it's worth. With that being said, let me take a moment to play Devil's Advocate here...
Let me begin by stating a few truisms and factoids about Lotusphere and IBM conferences in general:
** Lotusphere as been the most successful conference under the IBM unbrella, especially when attendee evaluations for Lotusphere are compared to the evals from other IBM shows.
** From first-hand experience with other IBM conferences I know that the focus is marketing/sales, not technology. Technology sessions are usually contained within a single, technical track for all platforms and products at these conferences.
** Incidentally the session focus for Lotusphere is the opposite of the previous point - the content of Lotusphere is primarily technical, with a relatively small subset of sessions geared towards marketing and other related topics. Why is it this way? Because Lotus realized early-on that enabling the community to get the most out of their Lotus products and platforms is a more lucrative investment, since it is much cheaper to keep a customer than gain a customer.
** I would surmise that that there is only a small subset of potential attendees who would pay money to go to a marketing convention. The technical attendee pool is a much larger potential group.
** IBM has tried switching the focus of Lotusphere towards marketing before - and when they did they discovered that attendee satisfaction plummeted, as did the attendance of the following year's conference. In order to gain those lost attendees back we had to work very hard to convince these attendees to come back because the focus switched back to technical.
** Unfortunately I have seen this approach before - and it failed miserably. The year after the last Lotus Devcon in Las Vegas IBM tried to add a "Lotus Devcon track" at the big conference IBM puts on in SF at the Moscone Center. (I forget the name, sorry.) I worked with KK on this, and it failed miserably. Very, very few Loti attended that track, and IBM only gave us a precious few session slots. The few Loti that attended were not very happy with this approach, as was reflected in their conference evals. This experiment was dropped after that - and IBM used the poor attendance and dissatisfaction expressed in the evals to justify killing off that track altogether because "there just isn't a demand for this content anymore - it was a self-fulfilling prophecy.
** Let's face it - for some reason the attitude of the various IBM tech communities is vastly different from the Loti crowd. That was another thing mentioned in the aforementioned Devcon track attendees - they were very uncomfortable being grouped with the IBMer attendees, and felt isolated - almost as if they were in another country.
There are two things that I fear with this approach.
First, the number of Loti attendees is going to plummet because most companies have very little budget to spend on training - and while they knew they would get their money's worth at Lotusphere, they will not risk wasting those funds on the hope that there is enough Lotus-based technical content to make it worthwhile.
Second, I know, for a fact, that there is a set number of rooms and subsequently session slots on the Disney property where Lotusphere is held. The content team struggled every year to get all the content they wanted into this finite set of slots. And now IBM is adding a huge amount of non-Lotus sessions, which will undoubtedly greatly reduce the number of sessions within the allotted Lotusphere track(s).
In conclusion I know that there are some of you who will wonder why I'm even posting this, since I didn't attend Lotusphere the past two years. Just because I have not been able to attend those years doesn't mean that I don't care about it - I attended Lotusphere for 15 years straight, and was a part of the Content Team for about 10 years of that. The reason I didn't attend Lotusphere these last two years was due to personal circumstances - it was not for lack of desire, however.
I truly hope that my concerns are unfounded, and the Lotusphere track(s) will be as robust and successful as ever - and that the attendees continue to be satisfied. If it is possible I know the people in charge of the Lotusphere stuff will work tirelessly to make it successful - and I hope they are.
--Rock
- 6
Thomas | 9/6/2012 11:15:19 AM
I smell what the Rock is cooking! IBM needs to keep the geek quotient for Connect 2013 as high as possible or else this conference will be dead in a few years.
I understand that the changes are necessary, but don't make it a empty hole full of boring sales pitches on social business. YouTube is a lot cheaper for that kind of stuff.
Content rules...
Content, content, content !
- 8
Craig Wiseman http://www.wiseman.la/cpw | 9/6/2012 4:59:23 PM
Thank you, Rocky for your comments. You eloquently echo what others feel.
Re: combine the "special group" discounts:
Thank you for contacting Customer Service.
Unfortunately, only one discount applies.
You cannot use more than one discount at a time.
If you require further assistance, please contact customer service, at 847-996-5877 or 800-650-6870 or by fax at 301.694.5124.
Please make sure to put the name of the show or conference you are referring to in the subject line of all fax and email requests.
Thank you and have a great day!
A. Person
Customer Service Representative
Please note that as part of Experient's PCI compliance, we can no longer accept credit card numbers via electronic message (e-mail, instant messaging, etc.). This policy is designed to increase data security for cardholders and merchants. Emails received containing credit card information will be deleted. Please contact customer service via the fax number above to provide credit card details if you are attempting to submit a payment.
- 9
Alan Lepofsky http://www.alanlepofsky.net | 9/7/2012 3:02:04 PM
> "with other IBM conferences ... the focus is marketing/sales, not technology. "
I attended my first IBM Impact conference this year (the WebSphere version of Lotusphere) and I recall it being quite technical. Since I'm not an admin or developer I skipped those sessions, but the agenda certainly seemed to be filled with them.
- 10
Harald Gaerttner http://www.fifthstreet.biz | 9/10/2012 8:26:55 AM
@5 Rock,
I went to both - the DevCon in LV and the one in SF the year after.
I loved the one in Vegas and hated the one in SF for the reasons you described. Never went to a DevCon after that (and don't know if there even was one as I lost interest)
BUT! ... there has been done a lot of other mistakes at that time too. And I am sure IBM learnt their lesson from that time. So - also I too hate to see the Lotusphere name being gone - we should give them some kind of leeway to show if they are on the right track or not.
So instead of telling people that all will go the wrong way in 2013 we should just support them, try it and still can cry "failure" in February ... in case it was a failure.
- 11
Lars Olufsen | 9/11/2012 8:40:23 AM
@10 In february, we will be a lot wiser, but we will also have spent a lot of money - a substantial amount for us international attendees, even.
So just waiting until february is not really an option. We are in dire need of detailed information about the conference, in order to be able to assess the value.
- 12
Rocky Oliver | 9/12/2012 10:57:22 AM
I think there may possibly be a "middle ground" between Harald's suggestion of giving the conference team "the benefit of the doubt" and Lars' fears of not getting the proper value from the conference. It would be best for all concerned if the attendees are assured that the deliverables/"take-aways" from this new conference incarnation continue to be worth the costs.
I believe the Conference Team (most likely the Content Team and Kristin) should be straightforward, and make available/"publish" a FAQ that answers the most common questions about this format change. Of course exact specifics (like session count) don't need to be divulged; but even providing general information related to their fears will give (potential) attendees a more informed feel for the structure of the conference and sessions.
I actually would put this FAQ somewhere on the conference web site. It should be a "living" document, where additional questions can be submitted via email (I would NOT make it an open discussion thread/replies - you want to be able to massage and control the information being disseminated). The FAQ should then be periodically updated with the most popular or relevant questions with informative answers.
I believe that this effort would definitely help allay the fears of the traditional Lotusphere attendees. It also sends/reinforces the fact that the conference is for the attendees, and the conference team is working hard to present the best conference and content possible.
If you've been customer-focused for any part of your career (and I would say that everyone is customer focused - whether your customers are internal or external), you know that one of the worst things in the world that can happen is leaving them with unknowns. These unknown "gaps", combined with the imagination and pessimism found in most people, will allow their minds to run wild with the worst assumptions possible.
On the other hand, being proactive in providing answers to their doubts and fears will greatly reduce the overall doubts that come with a big change like this. By setting the proper expectations with your customers (i.e. attendees) you'll not only reduce the areas where bad assumptions are created, you'll also begin to lay the foundation of an overall satisfaction with the conference as a whole.
That's my opinion; of course I could be wrong...
--Rock
- 13
Ben Langhinrichs http://www.geniisoft.com\showwcase.nsf\GeniiBlog | 9/27/2012 7:29:07 AM
I think Rock is absolutely right about the necessity of active, specific information about how this will meet the needs of attendees who have so resoundingly approved of the technical content in the BP track and elsewhere.
I fear that it won't be enough. It will possibly allay the fears of the highly committed, including myself and Rock and the other participants on this thread, but only possibly. I am very hesitant about spending the time, energy and money to go to a conference that might be a frustrating pale imitation of what I think of as Lotusphere.
But even if it does, I am actively engaged. There are many more people who may simply say, "Oh well, there isn't a Lotusphere this year. We'll spend the budget elsewhere." or may see this as the writing on the wall and send their people to learn new technologies instead. You may be able to convince the people who are willing to debate about it, but it's very hard to convince the people who aren't committed enough to engage in one-on-one discussions.
Of course, maybe marketing and promotion for Connect 2013 will bring in whole new crowds, and that is probably fine with IBM, which needs to sell a slew of products, not just the Lotus products. It just may not be fine with the hold outs.
- 14
Rick Dickinson | 10/1/2012 5:20:20 PM
I agree 100% with what Rocky and Ben have said, and I'll take it even further: I'm worried that this may be the final nail in the coffin.
As a Notes/Domino developer and administrator, I used to always look forward to Lotusphere, as it gave me a chance to meet the folks who actually wrote the software that I lived and breathed every day. The developers shared what they had been working on, and demoed and explained how to use all the new features they were adding for us. They talked with us, and our feedback helped guide them in prioritizing bug fixes and feature enhancements.
I could always identify the most worthwhile sessions, because they were hosted by someone from Iris. The "Lotus" sessions were generally run by product managers, and were mostly hot air sales and marketing "brochure" sessions, and could easily be filtered out by anyone looking to actually learn anything.
Eventually, the Iris name disappeared from session descriptions. If you had been a Lotusphere regular, you still recognized names, however: Thomas Gumz always had great technical sessions on the "web stuff", and Charlie Kaufman's security sessions were top-notch (even the perennial dancing pigs). The Iris folks were still there, but you had to work a bit harder to identify them.
After IBM bought Lotus, Lotusphere started going downhill. Now, there were very few hardcore techie sessions put on by Lotus folks (Charlie & Thomas were still there, but a lot of the old Iris folks weren't any more). A lot of the technical sessions weren't even put on by Lotus -- they were put on by various Notes and Domino users. Rocky, Ben, Carol Anne, Richard Schwartz, and a number of other "regulars" did excellent presentations, but the lack of Irii was palpable.
I, and a lot of my fellow Notes guys, stopped attending every year. It wasn't worth the time and money to sit through a bunch of sales presentations by product managers and sales flaks. If you want me to read your four color glossies, then don't ask me to pay for the privilege!
And now, it appears that the IBM-ification of Lotusphere is complete. I'm just happy that IBM grew out of its phase of calling everything "Websphere"....
Is it me or are there some new discounts this year? And some discounts that went away are back as well?