Thanks to everyone who participated in a very memorable event on Wednesday.
Feedback has been very positive, the sessions were very well received and incredibly thought-provoking – most people even want to do it again already!
We will get round to posting some more detailed reports as time permits and the dust settles, so, more later.
[Edit:Â Just a quickr note from Stuart to say a huge “thank you” to Neil for organising and hosting the event – a really great day…]
When: Starting 10:00am finishing around 16:00
Who: Around two dozens attendees from IBM, IBM Business Partner Channels and Implementors of the Technology
What:
Introductions – Connectr objectives & agenda Neil Burston, Avnet
Introducing Lotus Connections
15 Minutes of Fame
Buffet Lunch
Lotus Connections in context
Where next? Neil Burston & Connectr Team
Speed Geeking and/or Roundtable with Test Team
Why: Explanation of the name and the logo!
We could squeeze in one or two more but you must email neil.burston@avnet.com to confirm as we need to organize lunches etc.
Looking forward to a very interesting day.
Making the most of your connections
Many thanks to the several dozen people who have expressed interest in attending and the many speakers who have willingly offered their services. We will be contacting everyone to confirm numbers as it is likely to be a tight squeeze – an amazing response for a product that has literally been released only a few hours ago!
Overall, our current agenda looks something like this, subject to changes caused by having to confirm arrangements with people who are in different timezones, or flying between them:
Connectr #1 – 4th July 2007
Introductions 10:00
Connectr objectives & agendaIntroducing Lotus Connections
- Business perspective
- Technical perspective
Lotus Connections in context
Lunch + Making Connections
15 Minutes of Fame
- The Art of Blogging
- Building the Business Case for Lotus Connections
- You’ve got all this technology, how are you going to use it?
- MindMapping
Break – Making more Connections
Wrap up – Where next?
- How to continue building the Community, what next for Connectr #2
- Formal end to proceedings
Speed Geeking – 5 Minutes Wonders
(Talk on a single topic on a One-to-One basis, a la speed dating – a feature that has proved popular and interesting from a number of angles at other events for participants and recipients )
Speaker names and timings to be posted in the next couple of days.
Any issues, please feel free to post a comment or email neil.burston@avnet.com
Connectr “Making the most of your connections”
Connectr is a Special Interest Group (SIG) that is being formed to nurture an on-line and face to face community of people who are interested in sharing their experience of IBM Lotus® Connections. This is the first offering from IBM focussed on social software for business that empowers users to be more innovative and help them execute more quickly by using dynamic networks of co-workers, peer-workers, partners and customers, building business-webs to maximise the potential of deep, mass collaboration.
The intention of this group is to:
The group plans to bring together interested parties from across a spectrum ranging from Social and Technical academic research, software developers, solutions implementers and users. The group intends to actually use Web 2.0 technologies to support its operation and organization at the same time expanding the knowledge of these tools. Examples of this can be found by on this very blog and in the Facebook Connectr group.
The first meeting is scheduled for Wednesday 4th July, starting around 10:00am at the premises of Avnet Partner Solutions and is planned to include the following items:
We have a fantastic set of speakers lined up but with some to still be confirmed. More details will be posted shortly. If interested in attending please contact neil.burston@avnet.com
BTW – The name “Connectr” was coined to provide a nickname for the group in the same vein as other Web 2.0 technologies, such as Flickr and IBM Lotus Quickr.
Very interesting news is emerging of an event being organised by long term IBM, Lotus and all things Collaborative evangelist Neil Burston of Avnet – The Connectr!
“The event is scheduled to happen on 4th July in Bracknell (in the UK) starting around 10:00 with the objective of bringing together interested parties from IBM, the IBM Business Partner community and real users to discuss early experiences of Lotus Connections and the future, in a relaxed and informal environment. There is also talk of being able to get hold of the GA code for those who attend and some other goodies.
This is a great opportunity to hear more from IBM Research and early innovators and to discuss the longer term implication of this ground-breaking product set.
Expect more info over the next few days, in the meantime if interested in attending contact Neil Burston via email and start making some Connections!”
This sounds like a really exciting event, and will be taking place just a week after the eGA of the Connections product. This will be a super chance to hear more from the expects, to brainstorm applications and methodologies of the Connections technology and to make “connections” with key members of the IBM/partner/customer community. Can’t wait!