360Flex 2011 – Who SHOULD NOT Come

So we’ve done “who should come” posts before, and they definitely apply to every 360|Flex. I thought I’d take a minute to point out who shouldn’t come to 360|Flex 2011.

You shouldn’t come to 360|Flex if…

  • You’re “so busy” you don’t need to learn anything new or meet anyone new.
  • You don’t want to establish and build a network of awesome colleagues that could land you your next gig
  • You’re such an expert with Flex, AIR, AIR for Android, and RIA in general that surely there’s nothing anyone else can teach you.
  • you’re so awesome at Rock Band, playing has just gotten old to you. :)
  • You have no interest in the latest and greatest announcement from Adobe, RIM, Intel, and more
  • You’d rather spend 4 days at home not enjoying the great Denver weather and being surrounded by crazy smart people
  • You’d rather spend more money on another event with fewer sessions, fewer speakers and far less ‘awesome’

Can you think of any i missed?

 

 

Register now! Don’t be one of those people!

360Flex 2011 – Free Flex Components from Flextras

We love doing things that support our sponsors. We hate that so many events have a weird buyer and seller relationship with sponsors. Sponsors are partners, and Flextras, is always fun to work with, especially as another small start up like us!

They’ve decided to give away some copies of their Flex AutoComplete component to a few lucky 360|Flex Denver attendees.  To enter, just order a ticket to 360|Flex anytime, tomorrow, Wednesday February 16th.  If you do that, you’ll be eligible for the unlimited domain edition of the free Flextras AutoComplete Component.

Flextras just released a free, Spark version of their AutoComplete component for anyone to use.  But, with the unlimited domain edition you’ll receive complete source code and full use to their MX AutoComplete component.  Jeffry Houser, the brains behind Flextras, will be talking about building components in MX, Spark, and for Mobile during his 360|Flex presentation.

You can head over to www.flextras.com right now to get the free developer edition, the free Spark AutoComplete, and start developing your applications with it right now.

See you in Denver! Register now!

360|MAX Sessions selected. AWESOME stuff!

As if you needed any more reasons to attend Adobe MAX, we’ve locked down the line up for 360|MAX. Not that you need a reason to attend MAX, but we’ll definitely be bringing the AWESOME to MAX this year, don’t miss it!

It’s gonna be an awesome time! Make sure you check out the schedule page of the 360|MAX Wiki!

Alos make sure you you rcheck out the RIAdventure site. Some awesome topics forming there! More on that super soon! We’ve got some great sponsors supporting the event! Oh and of course, registration for RIAdventure also gets you a pass to 360|Flex San Jose (hint, early March. BIG Adobe news) which last time sold out. Think it won’t this time?

Plus it’s RIA on a boat! Come on!

360Flex – wrapping it up

I wrote some thoughts down on my site, but wanted to post a more official wrap up as well.

What went right

  • Bug quash: They didn’t have the turn out they had hoped for, but I know some bugs got quashed, so that’s a plus.
  • Pre-Conference training: It’s always a pleasure to have Matt Boles with us, this time he took his own time and travel to come and deliver an awesome Flex 101 hands on. What was cool is that while it was “Flex 101″ Matt upped the Anti with some Blaze DS action, so it was a good class for even experienced developers.
  • Welcome Reception and Speaker Sponsor reception: The Rock Bottom Brewery was an awesome location. I really liked it. The food was tasty, the beer yummy, the people nice. The parties are fun and challenging. Tom and I want to make sure they don’t suck but also want to make sure to meet as many people as we can and thank them for coming. That meant being “Gatekeepers” of the drink tickets, keeping the Rock Band action going, making sure if we ran out of food, that more was ordered, etc. AND walking around saying hi to people.
  • Monday’s Keynote: Matt Chotin is awesome. He’s a great speaker and makes the keynotes funny and informative.  It’s always a pleasure to have him at 360|Flex!
  • Charity Code Jam: It almost didn’t happen. Like literally the week before 360|Flex Indy, we were helping Ali and Shannon lock down the details, etc. While we wish we could actually support it fully, we can’t, so we’re really glad someone (webapper) stepped up to help out! The Charity Code jam is just one of those things that feels good. After so many hours of coding non stop, missing sessions, missing the sun, etc. to stand in front of the entire conference to show off what you’ve accomplished, is just awesome. Hats off to everyone who participated, and Ali for organizing it. I really truly hope a company (Adobe! Are you listening! This is HUGE) hires Ali to organize jams at every confernce.
  • Monday night party: We did all our evening events at Rock Bottom, which made it easier for folks to know where to be and when. Same awesome time as Sunday, Rock Band going nuts, folks grabbing a booth to chat, and meet.
  • Wednesday keynote: I love the Wednesday keynote. Sunday and Monday Tom and I work the reg booth, so we meet everyone that comes in, but it’s only for a few seconds usually. We see everyone at lunch, and the parties too, but inevitably there’s people we just never get to connect with. I see the Wednesday keynote as the time to connect with everyone (everyone that is awake that is, LOL). We talk about numbers (something I frankly challenge all other conferences to do), we talk about the code jam, we let community members present their projects, it’s just a great time for Tom and I too look ou at the crowd and see our customers/friends/drinking buddies and really appreciate why we do it. Without sounding corny, the Wednesday keynote really helps refocus Tom and I on why we’re in this business.
  • Our Sponsors! They’re awesome and each one deserves your business. Check them out, see what they have to offer. Without Sponsors 360|Flex would be impossible to offer.
  • Our Speakers! 40+ of the biggest names in the Flex development community. People who are launching open source projects, offering consulting services, and just sharing what they know and what they’ve learned to help everyone else. Our speakers are awesome!

What went less than right

  • Pre-Conference training: We only had one offering this time. I wish more companies would get involved in this. It’s a great way to educate a huge group of possible users of your tool, and get your name out there in front of a ton of people who might not otherwise investigate your offering.
  • Monday Keynote: One of these days I hope to have the check in process so under control that we’re either done by the time the keynote is supposed to start, or able to leave the desk for a bit. My wife Nicole rocks for helping, she’s invaluable, but I wouldn’t leave alone with you monsters :) I think the only keynote I’ve done on a Monday might have been Seattle maybe? Or San Jose ’07? I want to do more of those.
  • Monday Keynote content: We forgot to address “House keeping” items, like the OPEN slots being filled, the session survey being ready by Monday afternoon, etc.
  • Tuesday night party: Officially it was the “Adobe Party” but that was name only. I don’t know if it’s a curse or what, but when it’s an “Adobe Party” it’s kinda weak. Usually it’s our fault, not Adobes. This time was no exception, I selected the food I thought would be a nice fit, and would last. Unfortunately it didn’t last, and unlike previous nights, there was no food to be ordered since the restaurant was packed because of a concert, there was not extra food to be had. Party Fail :(
  • Session Surveys: the app rocks, but it wasn’t ready in time, and we had a hard time conveying it’s importance and how to use it.

Overall 360|Flex Indy was a huge success! Tom and I are very proud of the event, and extremely happy to have had everyone with us, we appreciate that there’s several options out there for technical conferences, and appreciate the faith, and hope we delivered, and we’ll see you next time. Please make sure if you haven’t already, tell us what we did wrong, and right, and spread the word. Word of mouth is more valuable to us, than anything else.

If you’re in the Mobile space, check out our InsideMobile event. If you’re looking at the RIA space (uh yeah, Flex developers, hello) check out our InsideRIA event. Both events are partnerships with O’Reilly, and we’re really excited about them!

Why Sponsor 360Flex?

It occured to me that it might not be obvious why a company would want to sponsor 360|Flex. Well of course it’s obvious to me.

I see it like this, you can sponsor MAX for what? $20k? $30k for a tiny uniform booth in a huge sea of other people who spent the same amount. You could sponsor CF.Objective, and meet ColdFusion developers and dabblers in RIA technology. Same story for CFunited, you could meet a ton of people that don’t fit what you’re looking for.

I won’t even assume a sponsor is hiring, in this economy there’s not much hiring going on. There’s tons of other reasons to be at 360|Flex.

  1. You will be hiring. Sooner or later, so why not meet the best and brightest developers in the RIA space?
  2. You’ll need a consultant at some point. There’s plenty at 360|Flex
  3. You’re looking for people to beta test your new product or service, who better than the biggest names in the Flex community?
  4. You’re looking to establish your company’s name in the community. You won’t find a more vocal and chatty group of Flex developers
  5. You want to make sure that every person who shakes your hand or takes your flier, is a Flex developer. There won’t be Illustrator users, Robo help creators, or anyone else at 360|Flex.
  6. You want to be a part of something huge! That’s about more than taking your money at the door.

We’ve made 360|Flex incredibly sponsor friendly this year, sponsors won’t get a single thing they don’t want, that means they only pay for things they actually find benefit in. Don’t need a booth, don’t get one.

If anyone is interested in what sponsoring 360|Flex is all about, feel free to ask us, we’ll put you in touch with past sponsors.