Lotusphere

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Lotusphere is an annual conference hosted by Lotus Software (now one of IBM's five software brands).

Except for the first conference, which took place in December 1993[1], Lotusphere is held in late January. It starts with a reception party on Sunday night, and continuing on through the closing session on Thursday afternoon. The conference uses the conference rooms in the Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin hotels. Most years have also used the additional conference rooms shared by Disney's Yacht and Beach Clubs.

In addition to the annual conference in Florida, there is also an annual Lotusphere Europe conference.

Contents

[edit] Agenda

The typical agenda starts with an opening general session on Monday, followed by breakout sessions through the rest of the morning and afternoon where different presentations occur simultaneously in different conference rooms, allowing attendees to choose which one they want to go to. Each breakout session is typically an hour long, with pauses in the schedule to allow attendees to mingle and walk to their next choice of breakout session. Tuesday and Wednesday also have six or seven of these breakout sessions throughout the day.

Thursday is the last day of the conference, with a few breakout sessions in the morning, then a large "Ask the Developers" session where attendees are allowed to ask questions directly to a panel of IBM/Lotus employees involved in making the software. The last event of the conference is a closing session.

The opening and closing sessions typically have a form of entertainment and a guest speaker, as well as executives and key employees sharing news and demonstrations of what's happening in the near future.

[edit] Breakout Sessions

In 2008, there were 197 different presentations scheduled during the breakout sessions, scheduled across 18 slots, giving attendees an average of eleven choices per session slot. Each breakout session lasts about an hour. Breakouts are split into several categories called "tracks". Common tracks are

1) Futures and Innovations 
Glimpses of technologies and innovations coming out of IBM and Lotus Research Labs.
2) Application Development 
Presentations on custom application development, ranging from paper prototyping to application development techniques specific to Lotus software products.
3) Planning and Managing Your Collaboration Infrastructure 
Information for administrators and decision makers on architecture, features and capabilities, deployment, and system management.
4) Best Practices 
Tips and tricks for developers, administrators, usually technical and tactical.

In addition to these four tracks, there is sometimes a fifth track with a title and content around "Customer References" or "Sponsor Sessions". There are also "Hands-on" and "JumpStart" sessions.

Hands-on 
These are hands-on classes lasting 1¾ hours, taking place in rooms set up in a classroom style with tables and computers. Attendance is limited such that there are one to two attendees per computer.
JumpStart 
JumpStart sessions are offered during the day on Sunday, usually lasting about 1½ hours, giving an in-depth presentation on a topic.

[edit] History and Statistics

[2]

Year Location Attendance Theme phrase Top messages Host Opening General Session guest(s) Closing General Session guest(s) Sunday night reception Wednesday night party CULT shirt
1993 Orlando 2300 Working Together Don Bulens Geoffrey Moore Disney-MGM
1994 No Event
1995 Orlando The Right Event. The Right Solutions. Right Now. Disney-MGM
1996 Orlando Release The Power None Cirque du Soleil
1997 Orlando Pool of Knowledge
  • Don't compete with, embrace the Web.
  • iNotes Web Publisher
  • Domino
 Ray Ozzie Avery Brooks
1998 Orlando Cultivate Your Senses Notes R5 Steve Beckhardt (?)
  • Jamie Clark
  • Alan Hobson
 Bill Nye
1999 Orlando LOTUS: A Part of Every Solution Jeff Papows
2000 Orlando 10000 Looking Forward/Forward Looking
  • Raven
  • Domino Access for Microsoft Outlook
 Jeff Papows > Al Zollar Walter Cronkite Notes World Order
2001 Orlando 10000 In The Know
  • Lotus K-Station
  • Lotus Discovery Server
 Al Zollar Umbilical Brothers Domino Survivor
2002 Orlando 6000 Proof Positive
  • Notes/Domino 6
  • "Lotus Software" brand
  • J2EE
  • "two-lane highway"
 Al Zollar Ben Stein Kevin Nealon Disney-MGM Fellowship of the Domino Ring
2003 Orlando The Essential Human Element Al Zollar > Ambuj Goyal Dr. Ronan Tynan Magic Kingdom Just-Us League & Collaboration League
2004 Orlando 5273 The Workplace For Innovation Ambuj Goyal Patrick Stewart Richard Jeni Universal Studios Florida CULT SHIRT ON HUMAN
2005 Orlando 5800 Envision Decisions Notes and Workplace convergence Ambuj Goyal Steven Wright Country/Western Universal's Islands of Adventure Zen of Collaboration
2006 Orlando 6000 FutureInSight Mike Rhodin Jason Alexander Jim Gaffigan Poker tables SeaWorld CULT Man Group
2007 Orlando 7000 IT Revolves Around You Mike Rhodin Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson Disney's Animal Kingdom I AM _____
2008 Orlando 7000+ Emergence
  • Notes/Domino 8.01, 8.5
  • Domino Designer in Eclipse
  • Lotus Mashups
  • Lotus Foundations
  • Lotus "Bluehouse"
  • Lotus Symphony
 Mike Rhodin Alton Brown Beach Party Universal's Islands of Adventure Pirates of Collaboration

During the 2008 closing session Lotus committed to hosting Lotusphere at the Swan and Dolphin through 2015.

[edit] Lotusphere Europe

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[edit] External links


[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Lotusphere trivia, Richard Schwartz's blog, May 3, 2005
  2. ^ Lotusphere Lore, C.U.L.T. 2008 Lotusphere Wiki