OOW09 Summary and Rookie Mistake

It is good to be back home. The OOW09 trip was exceedingly beyond expectation especially since this was my first OOW. In general, the technical sessions were very good. Most of the time, however, their contents were very basic, I suppose, to accommodate a large audience of diverse skill levels and interests. Besides networking with colleagues and vendors, I would say that the informal settings of the Unconference, and interactions with product managers and developers of DEMOgrounds are what I enjoyed the most about the conference. I made a  rookie mistake of registering too many sessions with only short breaks between them. Because of that, at the end of each day, I felt very exhausted. I will definitely plan better for the next one.

Here are a couple of highlights from the conference:

• One of the pictures I took at the event was used in the Oracle OpenWorld Blog’s Wrapping Things Up.

• SF is decidedly an iPhone town.

• In almost every conference I’ve been to, there are always groups of people dressing weird and shouting out something no one really understands or cares about. (You have to ask them in person if you want to know what they really want.) This one is no exception. I still have no idea what this group was doing on the street in front of the Moscone West.

• I’m a pen-addict. I’ve not realized this until I found, as I was packing and getting ready to return home, almost 40 pens collected during the visits to vendor exhibits throughout the week. It is my habit to grab pens when stopping by and talking to the vendors. Please help.

• A long line attracts people even if they have no clue what it is for. I’ve encountered this a couple of times when people came behind me as I was standing in line. After 5 minutes of waiting, they would ask me, “What are we waiting for?” 🙂