The 12 People You Meet at Lotusphere
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As you all know, next week is Lotusphere. You may have attended in years past, or this year may be your first. Whether you're a Lotusphere veteran or newbie, you can use this guide to help you get to know some of the friendly faces you're likely to meet this year. Coincidentally, they are the same friendly faces you're likely to meet at any other software or technology conference. They are the 12 universal icons of the conference phenomenon. |
 The
Corporate Line Puller Marketing Session Guy - He's young, handsome, smart and
articulate, and the only subject he knows is his product.
Everything reminds him of it. The thought of his product
delights and invigorates him. He hasn't heard about any of your
references to bugs or complaints about his product, but he'll
take them under advisement and mention a few great new features
in the current release. Often a speaker and marketing-oriented
session presenter (secretly when talking to IBMers he calls his session a "pitch"), he is the darling of the corporate overlords.
Since he knows the product better than they do, they, and
the conference as a whole, are heavily dependent upon him.
Secretly you get to make fun of him because he still calls Lotus products by their names from 2005, which as we know means he's two names behind. Poor guy. |
 The
Let's-Talk-Business Guy - This is the guy who will follow you around most of the week, convinced that there's some synergy between your company and his - you know, his "123 Maple Lane, Suite 200" company. He'll sit next to you when he can find you in sessions, and constantly whisper how "that's something we can really use!" in his proposed collaboration. He'll set up meetings with people you don't care about, but promise that they have budgets and power, calling on some long-distant past project where the guy had saved the world. At Kimonos, he'll seek you out and butt into your conversation with an IBM exec so he can help you. He'll wave you over when he's on a cell phone to see if you call to talk with his prospects. He'll introduce you as his partner. You'll want to kill him sometime by the middle of the third day. Beware of his requests to borrow money. At Kimonos, just pay the bill. If you sit with him long enough, you deserve it. |
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 The
Drunk Conventioneer - This guy may or may not be left
over from the conference that was here the previous week.
Most of his friends are people he sees once a year at
Lotusphere. He has been known to upgrade his room
to a suite and tend bar the entire week. Most of the stories
told in later years will be connected with him somehow, including the one about the former Lotus employee now headlining in Vegas. He
is a central figure in any incidents that involve hotel security,
police, or angry residents from the vacation suites. Like
the jock who peaked in high school, the Drunk Conventioneer
peaks once a year at the end of January. |
 The
Hot Sales Girl - This poor woman is plagued 24 hours
a day by guys with "sales questions" or "issues
they want to raise" or - anything. Can she make an onsite
sales call next week? Wrong territory? Well, I'll be in your
town next month - maybe we could get together. For the Hot
Sales Girl, the week of the conference would be a good time
to schedule that root canal, or maternity leave, or anything
that could get her out of it. Recognize her by the V formation
of developers following her around. Just developers. Admins know they don't have a chance. |
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 The
Opening General Session Energetic Guy - He's the best thing that - you think - has happened to Lotus since R3, yet he came out of nowhere like the guy who flew down from the Swan in 1996. His degree of excitement hasn't been seen this side of a 1993 Hanson concert, yet you can't quite reconcile his "kicking ass more sexy-ness-ness" speech with the fact that the last guy in that job disappeared without a trace. You're pretty sure he is an actor and is trying to make you forget the demo that crashed with his tuarine-induced, yet infectious, energy level. Beware running into this guy at Kimonos unless you really like to sing. Ladies, he's taken. Or gay. |
 The
Live-Blogging Podcasting Press-Wannabe Guy - At first you are flattered by the request for 3 minutes with - YOU! Then you realize that this guy is podcasting 84 times during Lotusphere, has set up a professional studio, and is personally skipping all but the opening and closing sessions, which he will shorthand up to his blog site in unintelligible prose for the less fortunate to read. His goal in life is to wear out your RSS reader and take up as much room as possible on your iPod, crowding out that last episode of Heroes or Battlestar Galactica you really wanted to see. This guy was definitely a middle child. |
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 The
Nerdy Foreign Product Guy - He's quiet, friendly, unassuming,
and doesn't know anybody else in the country so he needs
you to be his friend. He engages you in long conversations
in broken English, and you're never quite sure what the subject
is, or what he wants from you. It's not quite clear what
country he's from. He's got some products that you may be
interested in (how did he get away from the booth so long???), but none of the documentation is in English
yet. At night at Kimonos, Nerdy Foreign Guy can always
be found at one of the tables with others of his ilk - usually
separated from everyone else by an empty table or two. You wonder if his rendition of Rhinestone Cowboy during karaoke might actually kill someone. |
 The
Famous Geek - Tickets for his rockstar sessions are scalped
outside the Swan at high prices. The Famous Geek is
a major draw, both among fellow geeks who worship him, and
among regular attendees who have heard his name so often
that they have to see what all the fuss is about. Generally
his pants don't fit very well, and he has a disdain for shaving, but he's always entertaining.
He's often hard to find at the conference when he's not on
stage; no doubt hiding from all the autograph hounds. |
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 The
Serious Microsoft Bigot IT Guy - He wants nothing to do with your toy
Macintosh or Linux machine, and collaboration is for wussies. He's a Microsoft certified engineer
all the way, and he'll stand for no tomfoolery. The only reason he's here is that his management made him come. If you're
experiencing any kind of a problem or you have a question,
it's your fault for not following strict Microsoft security
guidelines, and published Best Practices. Since nobody actually
does all of those things, nothing is ever his fault. Despite
his permanent Get Out of Jail Free card, the Serious Microsoft Bigot IT Guy
never seems to be very happy. Maybe it's because he secretly
yearns to be like Drunk Conventioneer Guy. |
 The
Grand Old Dame of Collaboration - For years she has been a fixture
in the community. Everyone has read her books and articles,
sat in her sessions, or secretly blessed her at some point over
the past decade. You'd think she'd have made a ton of money
over the years, but still she's never gotten around to getting
a half decent outside life. Or hiring a decorator for her
office. Or getting herself fixed up at the salon, or buying
new clothes. Probably what you see is just a front: when
out of her customers' eyes, she drives a BMW and lives in
a classy neighborhood where she's quite the playgirl. |
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 The
Educational / Government / Non-Profit Attendee - At first
she is heavily courted by all the developers and consultants,
at least until they hear the words "educational", "government",
or "non-profit". At that point they scurry away
like roaches when the light comes on. The showroom salespeople
love her, however, since she always buys about ten thousand
volume licenses. She received her Lotusphere registration
through a lengthy three year process that involved numerous
purchase orders, vouchers, budget reviews, administrative
approvals, and check requests. |
 The
Hot Hotel Employee - Though technically not a conference
attendee, the Hot Hotel Employee always manages to have a
dramatic and lasting effect, and stories are told for many
moons to come. You can overhear guys talking about what days
she works and what her hours are. She gets to listen to the
same tongue-in-cheek pickup lines from the same dorks night
after night. She doesn't mind this one bit. When you count
up her tip income for the week, she's made more money than
anyone else at the entire conference. Including me. |
--by Rob Novak, with thanks to my friend in the obviously more creative Apple industry, Brian Dunning
Comments
Posted by Carl At 03:38:41 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Colin Williams At 04:10:09 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Duffbert At 04:12:09 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Ed Brill At 04:18:26 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Christopher Byrne At 04:28:10 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Gerco Wolfswinkel At 05:23:27 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Tim Haugen At 05:32:44 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Is the Famous Geek delusional? How many people does this apply to? Is having a blog at "lotusrockstar.com" a symptom of this?
Is there a prize for video evidence of hooking up with Hot Hotel Girl?
Who would win in a fight? The Corporate Line-puller Marketing guy, or the Serious Microsoft Bigot IT guy? Can we put them in a cage-match, with the Hot Sales Girl to the victor? (No... she doesn't get a say in it... ALWAYS BE CLOSING, BABE!!!)
Have you ever noticed that the Drunk Conventioneer (should that be the Drunken Conventioneer? Sounds like a pirate ship! YAR!!!!) always finds the Nerdy Foreign Product guy on karaoke night? The inevitable duet of "Ebony and Ivory" is true camera-phone blackmail material, ain't it?
If the Opening General Session Energetic Guy really is gay, is the Live-Blogging Podcasting Press-Wannabe Guy ready to switch-hit for the interview? All signs point to yes.
There's a good Birkenstock & flannel shirt joke to be made about the Grand Ol' Dame of Collaboration and the The Educational / Government / Non-Profit Attendee -- BUT I'M NOT GOING TO PUT IT HERE!!!!
Posted by Nathan T. Freeman At 06:07:48 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Alan Lepofsky At 06:29:21 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Rob Novak At 07:35:51 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
And I can put names - multiple names - behind all of those categories.. Very astutely observed...
Now - I'm going to print name-badges for some of these..
---* Bill
Posted by Wild Bill At 07:45:33 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Karen Demerly At 09:23:36 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Keith Brooks At 09:56:32 PM On 01/18/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Shamus At 08:11:06 AM On 01/19/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Newbs At 09:25:45 AM On 01/19/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Nathan T. Freeman At 09:27:59 AM On 01/19/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Chris Miller At 10:03:50 AM On 01/19/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Dan At 01:29:50 PM On 01/19/2007 | - Website - |
This is a great guide for Lotusphere, COMMON, EclipseCon, JavaOne ... Geez pretty much any big tech conference
Well done!
Posted by Frank Jania At 03:48:42 PM On 01/19/2007 | - Website - |
I asked what conference she was attending in Orlando and if she was an attendee. She said she was there to market her company's new software product. I had not hear of the name of the company she mentioned and said so. She said, "that's all right, I don't really know much about them, they just hired me two weeks ago. I can present [sell] anything. My last job was as a marketer for Thompson Center Arms ({ Link }
I didn't ask if she had any samples from her previsou employer
Posted by Glen At 08:59:11 PM On 01/20/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Cory Mattson At 03:06:15 PM On 01/26/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Ed Brill At 10:48:16 AM On 01/27/2007 | - Website - |
Didn't she?
Posted by Wright Furman At 09:36:25 AM On 01/28/2007 | - Website - |