Tweeters: use hashtage #C11 to get picked up by our Twitterfeed!
Everybody knows COLLABORATE has great educational content, and it's definitely worth your time to take a look at the slated sessions. As a blogger/tweeter, people are going to be interested in what sessions you're planning to attend, but they're going to be very curious about what you hope to gain from those sessions. Anything you can add beyond the abstract will make for a post. If you'd like to interview a speaker about their session, that's another area where we can provide support (e-mail speakers@ioug.org).
There are also a lot of specific events within COLLABORATE 11 that you can highlight, like:
Operation Classified: Security Hackfest
In 2011, we’re mixing serious education with food & fun at our opening reception. Operation Classified: Security Hackfest is an opportunity for COLLABORATE attendees to form teams and push database security to its limits. Whether you’re forming a team or planning to watch the hack go down, you’ll see multiple perspectives on where most organizations fail in their security, but also how to fix it. Winners will receive prizes, but everyone will leave this party with something useful.
Bootcamps
COLLABORATE is such a big event that the education opportunities are almost limitless; as much as this is a good thing, we know it can be a little intimidating as well. For a lot of attendees, we know that you’re attending because you have a key challenge or topic you want to focus on, so we’ve done the work in advance by planning our bootcamps. Use as much or as little of these pre-planned 1 or 2-day session schedules as you need. Get the whole soup-to-nuts view of a topic, or mix and match with the full conference offerings
Bootcamp topics:
Universal Studios
A conference is more than just individual sessions and keynotes – you’ve worked hard, and you want to play hard. There’s no better place for that than Universal Studios. Our Wednesday night party is your chance to take advantage of short lines for features like the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, plus great roller coasters like Rip Ride Rocket, the Incredible Hulk, Simpsonland, and Jurassic Park. This year, there’s also an option to buy tickets for your guests and kids, since the park has a lot of kid-friendly options like Cat in the Hat & Shrek 4-D.
Recruit some roller coaster buddies prior to the event and meet people who are into the same technology you are throughout the week. There are official networking opportunities like Birds of a Feather, but some of the most interesting conversations you’ll have at COLLABORATE take place in the hallway. Get some one-on-one time with the speakers you came to see, or use Foursquare to see who else is going to the same sessions.
What do you want at COLLABORATE?
There’s a lot of time between the COLLABORATE call for papers and the actual event, so we want to make sure nothing’s missing or been overlooked. Let us know if there are sessions we should add to the schedule, or if we need some networking opportunities for particular groups. As a blogger, you can solicit session ideas, but also influence voting! If you have a favorite session, let people know why they should vote for it.