Many of the people I work with have not gone to Gartner’s Data Center Conference, and this is the first time for my attendance.

Gartner 28th Annual Data Center Conference

Your source for data center excellence.

1 - 4  December 2009   |   Las Vegas, NV   |   Caesars Palace Las Vegas

I had a friend suggest I try and get a media pass for the event, and the Gartner group says I qualified as a media attendee.  Now the good thing is this means I don’t pay the registration fee.  The bad thing is I walk around with a media badge.  Which in general means vendors want to talk to me, but not end users.

Here are some of these rules for effective live blogging at an event I found, and I’ve tried to follow them, but it is good to remind myself of the purpose.

I've learned from attending dozens of events and watching how hundreds of people create content:

1. Have a purpose. Creating content in a live context can be a great traffic driver to your site, or a brilliant way to connect with those who are sharing ideas and will be reading your efforts soon. Before you get into it, however, make sure you know what you want to get out of it. Are you trying to educate colleagues? Drive more visitors to your site? Have a goal before you start.
2. Focus on the 1st take. In a real time environment, you don't have time to touch up a photo in photoshop or edit a video. A blog post must be 95% right the first time you write it. Speed is the toughest part of covering an event live - and the best way to manage it is to practice getting things right on the first take so you don't have to go back and fix them.
3. Create realistic targets. Do NOT ever think that you can live blog every session you attend and pack your day. That's the surest way to give yourself a major headache and feelings of inadequacy. Even pro bloggers who are covering events professionally take breaks - and your goal should be to share great content, not a high volume of crappy content.
4. Publish nuggets, not manifestos. Think about this - real time means you need to get content up and out quickly. Using shorter content sharing quick thoughts is much better for this. So save the big ideas for a recap post or something that comes later and focus on speed in the short term. Twitter is great for this as well - but don't just tweet everything a speaker says.Instead, focus on finding the best soundbites. And always tag your content with the hashtag (keyword) being used by people at the event (or create one if one does not exist).
5. Have a point of view. Speed doesn't mean lack of substance, however. The worst kind of content to come out of events is where people share what is happening on stage in a word for word "book report style" format. Most social media events already have someone assigned to do that. And trust me, you don't want to be "that guy (or girl)." Always have a point of view on what is happening on stage.
6. Share the real pulse of the event. Often the most interesting thing about an event isn't just what people say, but the intangibles about the event. Did everyone head back to their hotel rooms during the breaks or were they networking? What sessions were the most popular? Keep your eye out for broader trends that help you to understand the vibe and pulse of the event on a greater level.
7. Offer an insider perspective. Being an attendee or speaker at an event gives you a unique insider view of what is happening. If you can, try to share as much of that experience online as you can. Remember, the people following live are most likely those who were interested in the event but could not make it themselves, so give them a good look inside the event.
8. Get help on content promotion. Creating content from an event in real time is complicated enough, but you will probably find yourself simply running out to time when it comes to effectively promoting all the content you're creating. So get some help to submit your posts to Digg and other sites, or to point people to some of your content. Promotion is great real time, but it's most effective if you can split the duties.
9. Represent the virtual attendees. When you find yourself with an audience following your content in a live fashion, you have the option to be their representative at an event. This means you could poll your audience and ask a question in a session on their behalf - or ask others to follow up directly with those individuals as well. Be their voice and they will thank you for it.
10. Do a recap. No matter how many posts or tweets you get out during an event, always do a recap of the event and what you learned as part of your effort. Often, you'll find this post lets you talk about things you just didn't have time to during the event. And it will most probably be your most visited effort from the entire event.

Thanks to Jordi Torres, Barcelona Supercomputing Center for sending a link to http://www.greenit-conferences.org/.

New web page for Green Computing research community

A group of outstanding researchers has set up a simple new web page to make it easier for research community find updated information about the emerging conferences in Green Computing, the next wave in computing.

The www.greenIT-conferences.org site, includes a list of research conferences focused on green computing and energy-aware computer and network technologies. The site has been designed to make it easier for researchers for find information about new conferences (and conference tracks) in the area. Hopefully the page will serve to improve research in this important area.

The list comes from the following contributing companies.

Here is the current list from the website.  The first date under a conference is the deadline for papers, 2nd – notification, and 3rd – the event.

Conference
Acronym
WebSite
CFP
Venue
DeadLine
Notification
Event Dates
C/T

Intl. Symposium on Low Power Electronics and Design
ISLPED 2009
Link
File
San Francisco, California, USA
March 20, 2009
May 11, 2009
August 19-21, 2009
C*

Workshop on Power Aware Computing and Systems
HotPower'09
Link
File
Big Sky Resort, Big Sky, MT, USA
June 15, 2009
July 13, 2009
October 10, 2009
C

Intl. Conference on Performance Engineering
WOSP/SIPWE
Link
File
San Jose, California, USA
July 21, 2009
September 3, 2009
January 28-30, 2010
T

Energy Efficient Grids, Clouds and Clusters Workshop
E2GC2 2009
Link
File
Banff, Canada
July 23, 2009
August 6, 2009
October 13-15, 2009
C

Intl. Conference Advance Computing and Communication
ADCOM 2009
Link
File
Bangalore, India
August 21, 2009
October 26, 2009
December 14-18, 2009
T

International Parallel & Distributed Processing Symposium
IPDPS 2010
Link
File
Atlanta, Georgia, USA
September 21, 2009
December 7, 2009
April 19-23, 2010
T

Intl. Conf. on Measurement and Modeling of Intl. Computer Systems
SIGMETRICS 2010
Link
File
Columbia University, NY, USA
November 2, 2009
February 9, 2010
June 14-18, 2010
T

International Symposium on Cluster, Cloud and Grid Computing
CCGRID 2010
Link
File
Melbourne, Australia
November 2, 2009
December 18, 2009
May 17-20, 2010
T

Conference on Energy-Efficient Computing and Networking
e-Energy 2010
Link
File
University of Passau, Germany
November 8, 2009
December 21, 2009
April 13-15, 2010
C

International Symposium on Computer Architecture
ISCA 2010
Link
File
Saint-Malo, France
November 9, 2009
January 8, 2010
June 19-23, 2010
T

USENIX Workshop on Sustainable Information Technology
SustainIT'10
Link
File
San Jose, CA, USA
November 16, 2009
December 14, 2009
February 22, 2010
C

Workshop on High-Performance, Power-Aware Computing
HP-PAC 2010
Link
File
Atlanta, Georgia, USA
December 18, 2009
January 18, 2010
April 19, 2010
C

Intl. Conf. on Autonomic Computing and Communications
ICAC 2010
Link
File
Washington, DC, USA
January 11, 2010
March 8, 2010
June 7-11, 2010
T

International Conference on Supercomputing
ICS'10
Link
File
Epochal Tsukuba, Tsukuba, Japan
January 11, 2010
March 22, 2010
June 1-4, 2010
T

First ACM Symposium on Cloud Computing
SOCC 2010
Link
File
Indianapolis, Indiana, USA
January 15, 2010
February 22, 2010
June 10-11, 2010
T

Journal IEEE Micro - Datacenter Computing
IEEE Micro DC
Link
File
(Journal, Special Issue)
February 15, 2010
March 12, 2010
July/August 2010
T

I blogged I chose to go to Santa Fe Institute’s Business Network event instead of 7x24 Exchange.  Santa Fe focuses on complex systems research.

Q: What is "complex systems research?"
A: The study of nonlinear, interactive systems from which interesting and unpredictable behavior emerges is the hallmark of the research that is pursued at SFI. This includes examining the dynamics of these 'complex systems' and how the systems evolve. The work is basic, theoretical science. Organizations that join the Business Network are often involved in applied research areas that have their roots in, or can be informed by, the work being performed at SFI. The Business Network provides a bridge between SFI's basic research and the applied work in which our members are engaged.

There a maximum of 60 companies as business network members.  Out of the list of attendees.  Here are the ones I want to connect to discuss green data centers as a use case in complex systems research.

Cisco

eBay

Google

IBM

Intel

Microsoft

I have already connected with one of the attendees from the above list and he is an infrastructure architect.  But, his idea of infrastructure is all at the software level not at the physical infrastructure for data centers.  He is interested in discussing whether others can follow their model of operation.  We’ll see if he gives me permission to blog anything. 

One downside of being a blogger is it can be hard to get people to discuss ideas, so sometimes i don’t start a conversation by saying I am a blogger.  I do blog, but it is still less than 10% of what I do, so there is plenty to discuss with a blog post being written only if appropriate.  If my blogging comes up I explain, I always ask permission to blog on conversations that are private and not specifically set up as blog interviews.

7x24 Exchange is coming up with the theme of “Changing Landscape of Data Centers” and a bunch of my data center friends will be there.

But, I am passing on this event to go to Santa Fe Institute’s Business Networking event where the bicentenary of of the birth of Charles Darwin and evolution theory will be discussed.

2009 Annual Business Network and Board of Trustees’ Symposium

Multi-Dimensions of Evolution

2009 is the bicentenary of the birth of Charles Darwin. This year SFI has been celebrating this event through a variety of wide-ranging lectures, symposia, and public events on the topic of evolution. The idea has been to explore the many ways in which a Darwinian and Post-Darwinian perspective on life and time have changed our science, society and metaphysics.

This November we shall continue our celebrations with a series of talks on the multi-dimensions of evolution followed by a concert performance and readings -- extending our inquiries into the world of nineteenth century, romantic exploration, and historical synthesis, spanning science and music.

Each speaker will address some unique application of evolutionary thought, describing how an evolutionary perspective has transformed our knowledge of the world. Speakers will consider how evolutionary thinking transformed their fields, and how new, post-Darwinian ideas have been evolving and generating further insights.

I’ll be blogging from the SFI event and will let you know how a bunch of Evolution thinkers see a multi-dimensional future.  I am looking forward to immersing myself in people who think about how things evolve.

One potential theme I see is “survival of the fittest.”  Which companies leverage a fittest approach to data centers.  Fittest is about survival in this business environment.

Reuters has a news release written by GreenBiz.com.

Green IT Hits the Mainstream in Data Centers

Tue Oct 27, 2009 3:00am EDT

By Matthew Wheeland - Greener World Media

Over on the GreenBiz.com side of my job, we talk quite a lot about the nature of "green consumer" surveys -- how even over the course of 20 years, there's been very little change in the number of people who say they'd pay more for green products (always the vast majority says they will), while the actual market for green products is only growing ever so slightly.

Survey says:

That, however, doesn't seem to be the case for green IT: a study conducted by AFCOM at its recent Data Center World conference finds that the an ever-increasing number of data center and facility managers (71.3 percent, to be precise -- what we could easily call "the vast majority") have already adopted at least some green IT projects.

Conclusions.

What she found most interesting is how quickly and thoroughly the concept of greening the data center has taken off. "Where maybe five or six years ago green IT was a concept that people were starting to look at, it is no longer just a concept: It's here and it's being taken seriously."

The big reason, of course, has to do with exactly those two top results from the survey: green IT saves money.

"[Green IT] extends a positive savings to the corporation, which is looking at data centers as big wasters of energy -- executives are asking what they're going to do about it," Eckhaus explained

Even so, one of the wrinkles in the study shows that despite C-suite concern about data center energy use, the biggest obstacle to implementing these projects is that there's not enough money to get these projects started: 39 percent said budgets were too tight to purchase more efficient servers or cooling systems.

Gap closing between IT and Facilities.

Another interesting finding in the survey is that, even though there may still be gap between the data center and the C-suite, it seems like the longstanding gap between the IT and Facilities departments is closing: of the 436 respondents to the survey, 59 percent were from the IT department and 31% from Facilities.

With this gap closing -- in essence, by making sure that IT managers are also the ones seeing the energy bill for their systems -- it suggests that energy efficiency will pick up all the more quickly.

And, the marketing pitch for the next conference. :-)

As with all trend surveys, AFCOM plans to undertake another one during the next Data Center World, coming up in March in Nashville. But in the meantime, the first round of survey results suggests great progress toward green, efficient IT systems.