Hope everyone had a good Christmas. Time to get back into it 
I noticed that Andrew Coates had posted up some thoughts about how TechEd 2007 in Australia could be delivered. First off, let me say that I am pleased to hear that we aren’t just looking at being a mini-TechEd US, I think that this is a lesson that TechEd Europe learnt and they even went as far as to split the event into two parts and even hold it in different parts of Europe – one for developers and one for IT pros.
So the question is – what would a uniquely Australian TechEd look like? Or maybe that is the wrong question, maybe we should be looking at a TechEd Asia, or TechEd Asia Pacific?
As far as extending the event out to cover more of the year, I like the idea, especially if you can hook in content that would normally be getting published anyway. Here is how I would pull it together:
- www.techedlive.com.au (registration, community portal, resources, polished and funded technical articles on TechEd session content)
- www.techtalkblogs.com (group blog for guest editors of TechEd material)
- www.techedlive.com.au/tags/ajax (so people can do tagging – no fixed tags and associate the content on their blogs with TechEd Live)
The problem is going to be that you’ll always have trouble linking in the community and expanding it. Those people that want to “connect” will, and those that don’t are just dark nodes on the network.
Having attended some “Pan Asia” conferences, the thing that strikes me the most is how really different Japan and ANZ are from the rest of the region. The view and use of technology in places like China and India are incredibly different to Australia.
Hi Sean,
I guess that is what I would see as part of the appeal. Not only is it a technical learning event but it is a great way to see how others are doing business. I believe that kind of experience is invaluable.