What To Do at OOW15 (Social & Serious)? September 30, 2015
Posted by mwidlake in Meeting notes, Presenting, User Groups.Tags: Meeting, Presenting, user group
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I’m going to OOW15 this year, my first Oracle Open World in 11 years I think. And despite the Prom Queen rejecting all my offerings, I will actually be sneaking in a presentation – which I am very happy about.
The European Oracle User Group (EOUG) get a few slots and two are being used on Sunday 25th, 13:30 – 15:15 for “More Than Another 12 on Oracle Database 12c” – 12 European experts all doing six minutes each on a couple of tid-bits on 12C, including Christian Antognini, Bjoern Rost, Brendan Tierney, Julain Dontcheff, Jonathan Lewis… plus Tim Hall and Maria Colgan if we can squeeze them in (thus “more then 12…”). It was a great success last year, so if you are going to OOW15 sign up to the session at this link to avoid disappointment. You can see more details by our organiser, Debra Lilley (thanks Debra), in her blog post about it.
So I know what I am doing for 6 minutes. What do I do for the rest of the time?
A main aim I’ll have is to try and meet up with loads of people I either only know via antisocial media or have not seen in years.
I am sure things have changed in over a decade and, I have to confess, I did not make the most of my last OOW experience. It was all rushed, I was pulled out there very last-minute (as part of being named Oracle Beta Tester of the Year by Oracle Magazine – get me 🙂 ) and they wanted me to be able to do some press stuff (it sounds grand – but there was not a lot of interest in me as I was utterly unknown, but I spent what seems like hours being available in case someone wanted to talk to me). To make it worse, I did not know many people out there who were not actually Oracle employees, and oracle employees found it hard to get into things as priority was given to attendees. I felt pretty alone amongst 45,000 people interested in the same Tech as me. I did not even realise I had to sign up for the top talks and by the time I knew, they were all full. I did stumble into some very good Other Talks by accident though.
So, what should I be doing? What great talks should I be signing up for and which fantastic social events should I be trying to get invited to/slotted into my agenda? I don’t even know if many events are by-invite-only…
After over a decade of doing other conferences (and helping organise a few!), I feel a bit like a conference newbie again…
All help for a lonely out-of-towner gratefully received!
Martin Widlake's Yet Another Oracle Blog 
Hi Martin,
We met at UKOUG_TECH14 Monday evening and had curry with about 10 other people. I was the one who didn’t notice your height; thanks to your posts on the subject I am now sufficiently aware of it 😉
Concerning talks, you are speaking in one of the very best.
The sessions that fill up first are the HOL (hands on labs): look for the ones that might interest you and sign up right away! Most are already full except for Thursday.
Sign up (or keep signed up) for the Sunday evening keynote and the morning keynotes, because there are no alternatives.
Look for “next generation” in the titles if you want to know about version 12.2.
Sign up for Connor McDonald’s stuff.
There is a “YesSQL Celebration” (not listed in the catalog): see http://stevenfeuersteinonplsql.blogspot.fr/2015/09/yessql-celebration-2015-andy-mendelsohn.html
Oaktable Conference on-site, Monday and Tuesday: spend at least part of your time there, it’s great.
Pythian usually hosts a “bloggers meetup” at Jillians (Wednesday afternoon maybe?). Look out for that.
As another lonely out-of-towner, I invite you to join me for any meal you wish starting Saturday evening through Thursday evening. DM me on twitter if you like: @stewashton.
Many thanks for that Stew, I really appreciate it. That was a good evening at UKOUG Tech14. We need to meet up again at OOW15 and have a meal or a couple of beers. Or both.
To follow up on Stews excellent advice:
There is planned a Bloggers Meetup at Jillians Wednesday afternoon according to OTN:
https://community.oracle.com/groups/otn-at-oracle-openworld/blog/2015/09/03/otn-oracle-openworld-group-purpose
https://community.oracle.com/events/1099
I don’t know if it’s hosted by Pythian, but probably?
The Oaktable conference schedule is found here:
http://datavirtualizer.com/oaktable-world-2015-san-francisco-oct-26-27/
The YesSQL celebration ought to be a great for mingling too 😉
See you in San Francisco…
I track most of them as I run into them
https://jhlui1.wordpress.com/2015/09/30/oracle-openworld-2015-networking-opportunity-events-oow15/
Martin, first of all you are definitely not alone this year. It maybe took you 11 years, but you have managed to get a lot of friends 😉
I’m also going to be at OOW this year, and I’ll be happy to have a beer some day. There is also the ACE dinner and a lot of other stuff to do.
Have a great flight and see you soon.
I have fond memories of you, I , Brendan, Alex, Orchan, a chap from ?Bulgaria? and someone from another country? wandering around Dublin having a great time and swapping very off-colour jokes about sheep. All of us from different cultures, half of you translating on the fly into English and I just thought it summed up what I like about worldwide oracle user groups- We are all the same (terrible jokes but all of us had a regional flavour on it). We have the same terrible humour. And we all try to help each other. OOW15 should be a ball.
1. Sod OOW, it’s all about OTW 😉
2. Lori’s diner & Mel’s drive in
3. Shameless link spam – more stuff here: http://www.rittmanmead.com/2014/10/first-timer-tips-for-oracle-open-world/ 😉
[…] better, here are some of them. How to Survive, no, Thrive at Oracle Open World by Jeff Smith. What To Do at OOW15 (Social & Serious)? by Martin Widlake. The Data Warrior Goes to Oracle Open World 2015 (#OOW15) by Kent Graziano. […]