Virtual conferences, again

Funny how, at the end of the hype cycle, stuff from the earlier days seems to return! One of the reasons for me to become a Second Life resident, was IBM's involvement; more specifically, the IBM Lotus guys seemed very active there. And again it's IBM and IBM Lotus people who pick up where they left off a while ago. A few weeks ago we noticed the IBM and Linden Labs case study on conferences in Second Life. And now, via Massively, we get the Beyond Blogging conference, organised by IBM's Jo Grant a.k.a. Jaymin Carthage. This conference is about..

..Wouldn't it be great, I thought, if we could do a conference where we could talk about what was important to use: how we use virtual worlds in our work and personal life.

This event is slated to take place on April 7 and 8, and it looks like it's going to be an interesting event. I plan to spend some time there, if I can! Tateru said, in her Massively writeup, that non IBM people who wish to attend, need an IBM sponsor, but, having read Jo's blog entry, I do not think that she's right. Non IBM people are free to attend, they just need an IBM sponsor if they want to present or speak at the conference.. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong!

But IBM isn't alone. The Clever Zebras are at it again, too: the third vBusiness Expo is planned for May 2009. I visited a lot of the sessions at vBusinessExpo 2008, and I still regard it as a changing experience, where the power of conferences and meetings in virtual worlds became obvious to me. Keep an eye on this one, and register if you can!




IBM: