Who is going to forumcon 2012?

MagnusB said:
Conventions are never about learning, they are about meeting potential new clients, customers, vendors etc. The biggest value a convention have is the people participating. It is also a good excuse to get drunk....
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well.. I think they are a little about "learning" :rolleyes:

I do agree networking is key but I've been to a number of conversions over the years and you go into them wanting to learn, learn from what others have done and learn from their experiences.
The sessions that you walk away from learning nothing is just a waste of your time. ;)
 
As a Forumcon Panel Moderator and past attendee, I can assure anyone who's concerned that there is a focus by all involved to ensure quality insights are provided to delegates. The "Product Pitch" syndrome is something we all strive to AVOID at all costs. In fact, my panel this year "Leveraging Social Networks" is comprised of forum owners and market experts who have direct experiences in how to successfully accomplish this and achieve qulaity forum growth. All of them have clearly stated that they totally understand there is no product focus and are there strictly to provide advice and guidance based on personal experience. In fact, only one has any vendor affiliation and you'll find that even she is speaking from the heart as a forum advocate.

It's all about sharing and building value together. As a sponsor, we chose not to even have a tabletop or any promotional material available to ensure we supported this initiative of ensuring the focus is on value gained from sharing real life experiences, not "vendor speak". After 25 years experience as a solution "vendor" I've seen many industry conferences grow to become what Forumcon is. They always start with a vendor bias as that is where the initial funding comes from. But, those that have become ultimately successful quickly morph from a Vendor to Delegate focus. Forumcon is quickly evolving much the same way and this year's event is the best yet. Next year will be even better because of the strenght of community participation as a whole.

I personally want to commend VigLink for having the foresight and taking the ultimate risk in starting this. More importantly though, for having the willpower to let it evolve to become a conference for the delegates where peers share with peers for thier own mutual benefit. That's what this is all about!

Hope to see you there!
 
Steve Dodd said:
As a sponsor, we chose not to even have a tabletop or any promotional material available to ensure we supported this initiative of ensuring the focus is on value gained from sharing real life experiences, not "vendor speak".
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As an attendee (see you Tuesday) I like it when the sponsors and speakers have a booth and someone to answer follow up questions. Talk over specifics. I don't see it as a negative at all. Also, person might miss one presentation or another so the booth is good way to catch up.
 
BGL said:
As an attendee (see you Tuesday) I like it when the sponsors and speakers have a booth and someone to answer follow up questions. Talk over specifics. I don't see it as a negative at all. Also, person might miss one presentation or another so the booth is good way to catch up.
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Totally understand, it's a mixed bag for sure. We'll certainly have people floating around to answer questions but the key point i was trying to make is the focus in on the delegates and what they can learn from eachother, not a "pitchfest"....... generally speaking.
 
Steve Dodd said:
not a "pitchfest"......
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I'm good with pitchfest also, knowledgeable sales person can be a great educator and pointing out pros on one packager (theirs) and negatives in the competition is good to know. Alerts people to issues important to them and they can investigate further.
 
Steve Dodd said:
As a Forumcon Panel Moderator and past attendee, I can assure anyone who's concerned that there is a focus by all involved to ensure quality insights are provided to delegates. The "Product Pitch" syndrome is something we all strive to AVOID at all costs. In fact, my panel this year "Leveraging Social Networks" is comprised of forum owners and market experts who have direct experiences in how to successfully accomplish this and achieve qulaity forum growth. All of them have clearly stated that they totally understand there is no product focus and are there strictly to provide advice and guidance based on personal experience. In fact, only one has any vendor affiliation and you'll find that even she is speaking from the heart as a forum advocate.

It's all about sharing and building value together. As a sponsor, we chose not to even have a tabletop or any promotional material available to ensure we supported this initiative of ensuring the focus is on value gained from sharing real life experiences, not "vendor speak". After 25 years experience as a solution "vendor" I've seen many industry conferences grow to become what Forumcon is. They always start with a vendor bias as that is where the initial funding comes from. But, those that have become ultimately successful quickly morph from a Vendor to Delegate focus. Forumcon is quickly evolving much the same way and this year's event is the best yet. Next year will be even better because of the strenght of community participation as a whole.

I personally want to commend VigLink for having the foresight and taking the ultimate risk in starting this. More importantly though, for having the willpower to let it evolve to become a conference for the delegates where peers share with peers for thier own mutual benefit. That's what this is all about!

Hope to see you there!
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To be honest I'd much, much rather have sponsors/vendors having a table than having the sponsors/vendors do all the presentations. In fact, I would really like to have a separate area where vendors will be able to setup and have a representative available to put their products and services out there for people who are interested. It would provide a far greater value for people to be able to approach vendors individually and strike up conversations that are relevant than to just have to sit back and have them talk at us.
 
petertdavis said:
To be honest I'd much, much rather have sponsors/vendors having a table than having the sponsors/vendors do all the presentations. In fact, I would really like to have a separate area where vendors will be able to setup and have a representative available to put their products and services out there for people who are interested. It would provide a far greater value for people to be able to approach vendors individually and strike up conversations that are relevant than to just have to sit back and have them talk at us.
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Or try and snag the speaker who has a flight to catch.

Someone should come up with a virtual product showbooth, big screen with sales and developers live but sitting back at the shop, no expensive road trip, and can customers quiz them live about their product. They could even some mean looking radio controlled robot that herds customers into the booth.
 
If the potential "information gleaned" is no better than what Adrian Harris offered, no thanks. I have much better things to do with my time and money.
 
Shelley said:
Just watched the vid (I was curious) The following stats and I personally counted the following:

  1. 66 ums
  2. 3 partial err's
  3. 9 errs
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Yeah that is quite ridiculous in 11 1/2 minutes...

If you include extended pauses and corrections, a large majority of the video is made up of fumbles.
 
Forsaken said:
Yeah that is quite ridiculous in 11 1/2 minutes...

If you include extended pauses and corrections, a large majority of the video is made up of fumbles.
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I have seen worst why would you even care about such stuffs . Some people tend to have such habits during such presentation .
 
iTuN3r said:
I have seen worst why would you even care about such stuffs . Some people tend to have such habits during such presentation .
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Ever see the average software developer have to make a presentation? :D We are much better with the written word than speaking them.
 
BGL said:
Dude! Your XenPorta is probably single best XenForo add on. I wouldn't be getting XenForo without it. Charge $100 for it tossing in some support vs. asking for donations. You'd be putting on presentations, staying at the Ritz.
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[ot]
I agree. He can even hire someone from here just for support. So he doesn't have to do it himself.
[/ot]
 
I have just finished a pretty active week at BlogWorld Expo and WordCamp here in NYC. There were some good things there and 2 presentations that were worthless. Overall though, good content and excellent ways to network. BW was very expensive (almost 300 bucks), but it was worth it. Would have come to forumcon, but it's too far from here and I can't afford it.
 
Steve Dodd said:
Totally understand, it's a mixed bag for sure. We'll certainly have people floating around to answer questions but the key point i was trying to make is the focus in on the delegates and what they can learn from eachother, not a "pitchfest"....... generally speaking.
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Was really sorry Winter Wong of Tapatalk didn't make it since he was one of the main reasons I went and the fact that everyone was showing stats that mobile access to forums is headed toward 50% range if not there already. Ideas on how to move the revenue stream to mobile. The issues of Facebook and Twitter integration and how to use them to drive traffic to your board and raise your forums profile. Overall I thought it was a good day.

Dan Gill of Huddler was good. Tyler Tanaka of Post Release. Anthony Ha of Tech Crunch and his panel were good. Infographics tip was nice. All the stats that the various players showed were all good info. There's was only one "Buy My Book" slide

Appreciate folks don't want to have "booths" and many are good about "see me in the back or at break". The "people floating" worked OK. Managed to snag the people I wanted to talk to after hearing them (GumGum, PostRelease, Vibrant, Viglink). Suggestion for that, maybe have an area with a two or three wired big screens displays available to presenters to demo their products. "Let me show you over here" People ask them questions they can do it on the big screen.
 
BGL said:
.............the whole XenForo/vB thing has added lots of drama. I'd guess they'll be a few public questions asked about it and a lot of private comments made that people would not put into writing .......
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And to think I'm a few hours away, I could fly down for a Q&A session .....

There is a speaker I could ask a few questions for sure : http://theforumcon.com/speakers

Oh dear I missed it :whistle:
 
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