Heading to Vegas for DIG

Well, the week of the DIG conference is finally here. Looking forward to the three days. My guess is that the week will go by quickly. Here are some random thoughts and things to look forward to:

1. The clinics on Tuesday should be a good opportunity to roll the sleeves up on some great topics. I will be helping out Glyn Heatley during his clinic on CPM and BI architecture. I took a look at the content this afternoon and there is a lot to cover in the 3.5 hours, but it should provide people with some follow up actions for their organizations! Mark Lorence's talk on analytics is great, especially if you are struggling with what are the right measures for your organization (one thing to note, Mark's clinic will be in the afternoon on Tuesday, not the morning). I am very interested and will be attending Jevon MacDonald's and Thomas Vander Wal's clinic on Enterprise 2.0. If you aren't currently signed up for a clinic, there is still time to register!

2. If you didn't notice the Twitter update box on the right side of the blog, take a look at the talkdig Twitter user. If you aren't familiar with Twitter, it is a "micro-blogging" technology that uses text messaging to make posts. I have been using Twitter for about 3 months and it is a fun way to communicate with friends and colleagues. We are hoping that DIG attendees sign up and use it as a way to receive conference updates, ask questions during the Q&A, or simply try to informally organize with colleagues while at the DIG conference. It will also be a way to stay connected after the conference ends. Signing up is free and all you need to do is start "following" the talkdig user once you are setup.

3. We have one speaker change for Thursday. Bo Cowgill from Google will unfortunately not be able to join us, but instead we will have Mat Fogarty presenting on the topic of prediction markets. Mat is the founder of Xpree, which focuses on providing enterprise prediction market solutions. Prior to starting Xpree, Mat was the Director of Financial Planning on Electronic Arts where he was responsible for running prediction markets forecasting key metrics. Mat's session will be titled "Using prediction markets to tap employee wisdom". We are excited to have Mat speak at DIG!

4. On Wednesday, we have a "mega vendor" panel planned with our three platinum event sponsors Oracle, Microsoft and SAP/Business Objects. I am looking forward to have all three vendors on stage together in a moderated discussion on future technology trends. Since this is a bit of a unique opportunity to have them all together on stage at once, we are going to video tape the discussion and make it available in the coming weeks. Stay tuned.

5. Go Celtics - could you at least win one road game during the playoffs!!!

That's it for now. Looking forward to seeing everyone in Las Vegas. Stay tuned for updates during the week. We plan on blogging at the end of the day and hopefully get some pictures posted.