I took a look at the Unconference schedule yesterday, apropos of Ontario Emperor’s post on his own foray into Unconference territory.
Have you looked lately?
There are a lot of interesting sessions. These stuck out for me:
- Monday at 1 PM: Enterprise 2.0: What is is, and how you’ll fail. (by Brian “Bex” Huff)
- Tuesday at 2 PM: How to use native database REST Web Services in Oracle 11g by Marcelo F. Ochoa
- Tuesday at 3 PM: So, You Want To Be An Oracle ACE? by Dan Norris and Sheeri Cabral
- Thursday at 1 PM: Securing Moscone – why biometric entry won’t be implemented at Oracle OpenWorld – yet (by John Bredehoft, Motorola – a.k.a. Ontario Emperor)
I especially like that Dan is using the Unconference to repeat his Suggest-a-Session-winning presentation, which he’s also giving in its official timeslot, Monday at 11:30 AM. I assume Dan is trying to accomodate people with conflicts on Monday. Good looking out, unless of course he just wants to hear his own voice.
Bex will be rerunning his fail session from the Enterprise 2.0 Boot Camp last month at Oracle. I’m curious to see how it plays in person, since I’ve read the blog post and the recap. Maybe he’ll bust out some new content just for OpenWorld.
Even though I probably won’t make it to the OE’s presentation on Thursday, it sounds interesting in a Minority Report sort of way. The session on REST APIs is in our wheelhouse, and I’m curious to know more.
I applaud the Events team for renewing this very un-Oracle part of OpenWorld this year, and I especially like opening up slots for early sign up to fill out the agenda. OpenWorld ain’t a BarCamp people. So, it makes good sense to populate some of the schedule in advance, while still staying true to the format and leaving open on-site signups.
Scanning the sessions, it looks like several people took the advice to use the Unconference for their Suggest a Session suggestions. But there’s something obvious, at least to me, missing.
Where are the fun sessions? Did I miss the memo that said the Unconference had to be straight-laced and serious? If you’ve been to a BarCamp or any other standard unconference, you’ll know there are inevitably light-hearted and humorous sessions. That’s part of the experience IMHO.
So, I’m mulling over a topic to present, or co-present if anyone wants to share the stage with me. Here go my rough ideas so far:
- The LOLcat story, I has it.
- Are you insulting me? Essential acronyms and abbreviations, FTW!
- AYBABTU: Meme time
Yeah, I know they’re all pretty similar, but I haven’t put that much thought into it yet.
Find the comments and suggest a (funny) topic. Maybe you’d like to co-present, or maybe I shook lose an idea in your head for the Unconference.
Or maybe you think I’m a total tool. Be my guest in the comments.
My “Communication For Geeks” talk will be fun… I promise to tell jokes and swear a lot.
Sure. Maybe I should do a companion session: “Communicating with Geeks in their Native Tongue” or some such.
You are sort of a tool, but that's not why I'm posting…this time. 🙂 I only know this because I am a complete tool (most of the time).
The session that Sheeri and I are presenting in the Unconference has the same title and will be substantially the same content, but, if enough ACEs attend the Unconference presentation of that session, I hope to have a more “crowdsourced” format. That is, I'd prefer if the ACEs would do as much or more of the talking during this session. Contrary to what some believe, while I do have a voice (and face) for radio, I get tired of doing all the talking and generally prefer to have others ask questions (and yet others answer them). So, come on down for some good ol' fashioned Unconference antics. And, hey, if it doesn't work out, beer is in the OTN lounge each afternoon just after my Unconference session :).
I found it funny going through the sessions last night and finding that yours in the only one listed under “Networking”.
I'm pretty sure they meant networking as in the Ethernet, not Social, but hey, what can you do when they don't provide descriptions!
Good old crowdsourcing, the lazy person's way to do less work, now with more accuracy! Do you plan to rally ACEs at the dinner earlier in the week? This topic does fit a panel-style approach pretty well.
Too bad the beer isn't before your session.
You mean the *free* beer, right? I mean, really, lunch is before the Unconference session, so in theory, beer o' clock could be any time.
I'll definitely be chatting up the session at the ACE events as well, so hopefully, we'll have a nice turnout. If not, I do enjoy the sound of my own voice, so I guess I'll just tell scuba stories or something. Hope to see you there.
Yes, the “free as in beer” beer is what I meant.
I'll probably be spending a lot of time roaming the Unconference, and I'm sure I'll see you all over SF.
Perhaps any ACEs who disagree with your points at the Monday session will relish the opportunity to “set the record straight” at the Tuesday session. That might be a selling point to get ACE participation.
Is it possible to use Oracle technology to assemble a real-time geek-English-LOLcat translator?
They're welcome to “set the record straight” right in the Monday session too–no need to wait. Much of the content will come from a survey of the ACEs that I conducted recently. The responses weren't contradictory, so I don't imagine there will be much controversy. I always welcome constructive criticisms or corrections, though!
Is there an open mic…I have plenty to contribute :).
No controversy? You're failing at promotion.
Definitely possible, time is the issue. Same problem Matt, Eddie and I ran into with attempts to rock out something cool for Twitter+OOW+location.
Put it on the faillist, if there's room.