This morning I got up early, took the train in to SF and am at JavaOne 2006 – and it’s pretty much the same as last year. I watched most of the keynote this morning, saw some mildly interesting things, then went to my first session – which wasn’t the same one that I had intended to go to – I had wanted to go to a Rich Client swing one and instead I ended up going to ‘Wait In line for 2 hours to get into the pavilion then win an iPod’. It was a little better. When I was getting breakfast I went through all of the crap they give you and found one thing that was a usual fixture – they give you a card with 8 logos from super-sponsers and the goal is to go around and listen to their pitch and they’ll stamp your card when you’re done. Then once you’ve got 6 or more of the 8, you can turn the card in at a booth to get a chotchke. This year was a keydrive, mini mouse, or some other piece of crap… except that the first 10 people to turn in a completed card will win an iPod. So I think about it while I’m eating my doughnut and decide, why not give it a chance. So I think about the optimal way to win. I look at the map of the pavilion and plot out what I think will be the optimal and shortest course to the 6 vendors that are closest. One of the eight was way in the back, and the other was right in the center, but had about 24 seperate booths, making it difficult to figure out. I wanted small-Medium sized ones where the ‘stamper’ person was easy to find. So I went to the pavilion entrance at around 9:00 and waited. The pavilion didn’t open till 11, and by 10:15 or so crowds started forming. I stayed right at the entrance and sized up my competition – a middle aged couple – no problem there, mostly developer types – one guy made me nervous – he was about 24, wearing a faded Canada hockey hat and rough shitkicker type boot-shoes. He would be my only real competition.
Time passed, the crowd grew. You could spot the people waiting b/c they’d have the pavilion map marked, or held open with a finger, and the card stuck in there, or even in hand. I had my route ready – BEA – SAP – JBOSS – ORACLE – then over to the other side, the far one first, Sybase, then hitting IBM on the way back to the prize stand. The guards prepared, removed the chain – and I was off. Not mildly walking through with an ‘excuse me, pardon me’ – I sprinted from the gate – pushed my way to the front of each line – by the time I got to the far side and hit Sybase, I was way out front. I tagged IBM – but there was a party foul! They had *2* stampers, one on each side of the boooth – I had to make an end run around the booth babes to get what I wanted – that slick imprint of ink. Done and done, and I left the IBM booth in a dead run to the front of the pavilion. Leaping chairs and elbowing people aside with a hearty “COMING THROUGH HERE, LOOK OUT” I came to a violent halt in front of the Sun Booth and slapped my card down, entirely out of breath – barely managing to gasp out “Am I one of the first 10?” knowing that I was, since she only had 2 cards in her hand so far. She grinned and reached under the table, produced an iPod and handed it to me. I broke for the entrance, staggering past the throngs trying to get in and collapsed into a nearby beanbag chair to regain my wind.
All in all, not a bad learning experience.
Lessons to be learned:
1) A loud voice might not make people move, but it makes them stop and think for the instant that it takes to dart past them.
2) Most nerd/geek types are not in good shape (there are quite a few exceptions though.)
3) in any large gathering of people, there will be enough motivated people to go through the best givaway items in less than 2 minutes (my time: 1 minute, 39 seconds. That’s 30 iPods an hour!)
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COMMENT
AUTHOR: Jason [Visitor]
DATE: 05/17/2006 08:43:18 PM
Sweet. I’m at HRS this week. Its the Heart Rhythm Society annual conference here in Boston. All I can say is expensing is the greatest invention ever.
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