So how many of you went to the fridges yesterday only to find… Diet Coke!

Clearly of all the options available Tech.Ed attendees prefer Diet Coke the least.

Is this a conspiracy? You will no doubt have heard the announcements at lunch time telling us to drink less coffee and soft drink, and drink more water!
Don’t they realise that IT guys have soft drink (in particular caffeinated beverages) running though their veins?
Maybe this will beat the Red Bull shortages of 2005?

So lets help the organisers out by providing them with a YOUR preferences… over on the right of this page you should find a Poll, vote now!

Hopefully this will help them plan the ordering for the last days of TechEd Australia 2008.

Tech.Ben

Well I’ve just bumped into Wayne Small making a dash for the door as he’s just found out the he’s got an 8.30am session, but as he was walking out, he’s spotted Steve Riley and oh no, the jealousy is just shocking.

Ok, well Wayne just couldn’t resist and just had to go and stir the pot and give Steve a piece of his mind….. uh oh… duck for cover!

Stay tuned tomorrow for the Battle of the Posse!

Tech.Greg

OK folks, Wayne Small has just posted to the ANZ-SMB-ITS Yahoo Group (and every other frikken list!) and is Pleading for people to join his posse.

So far, only David Nicholls has responded, so either David has no life or Wayne has sent him a Cheque.

Who Knows? Care to comment Dave?

Tech.Greg

Ok, it looks like Wayne has paid Kevin Royalty off too!

Update (The List Thus Far @ 2337hrs)…Kieran Block, David Nicholls, Matthew Stringer, Ken Higdon, Nick Lloyd, Kevin Royalty, David Phillips, David Houston, Neil Cassidy, Grahan R Seach (Twice!… Tech.Greg thinks someone has multiple personality disorder…. white jacket and padded room to isle 2!), Kerry Brown, Peter Casey, David Mackie and Tim Yates.

This takes the count to about 20 or so. Now how many of you actually have a physical presence at Tech.Ed? I thought a posse was meant to be following you like a bad smell Wayne?

According to UrbanDictionary.com ….A Posse Is…Your homies, your peeps, the gang of friends you hang out with that make you powerful.

Lord, what have I done….

Here’s what some people had to say…. *smacks head*

“Sign me up for the posse. Wayne Small is the cultural bridge between the US and Australia, our link to Trend Micro and SBS guru extraordinaire.” – Amy Babinchak

“If I join your posse Wayne, do I get to blow shit up? Either way, I’m in! – Graham Seach

Tech.Greg

Welcome to Steve Riley and his posse to Microsoft Australia. Straight off the plane from Tech.Ed New Zeland equipped with Velcro Gloved and Mint Jelly

And of course, Tech.Greg was there to ask the hard questions of Steve before anyone else! Who needs a media pass I tells ya!

Ok, Wayne Small is still waiting for someone to join his Posse!

I interviewed Wayne earlier to find out he was going with his Posse Requirement.

So the challenge has been set people, 5 people to join the posse by the end of the week. To join, email waynesmallposse@techedlive.com and we’ll have a photo of the posse (be it all 1 person) at the end of the week to see how it all went.

UPDATE: Wayne in passing has now made comment that he’ll have 40, yes 40 by the end of the day! So far Wayne, you have 1! Frank McCallister!

POSSE UPDATE 2143hrs: OK Wayne, you’re nearly there…. Thanks to Larry Struckmeyer (USA), Linden Jackson (Agile IT Solutions), Sepp (Pappillion Group), Steven Lai (NAI Group) and Cameron McNeill (Microsoft)

POSSE UPDATE 2236hrs: Kevin Weilbacher (Florida, USA)

This week at Tech.Ed you can save some serious spondooli on Microsoft Certification with Prometric.

60% off Microsoft Exams all week!

I was just finishing up my SBS 2008 Beta exam at the same time as Craig from Boral who had just passed his Microsoft Windows Vista Exam.

Good morning from Tech.Ed 2008 Day 1 live from the Keynote.

From what I’m told from my secret sources there are a few surprises in store for us today for the keynote. The main presentation this morning is from Amit Mital, General Manager of Live Mesh and Developer Platform (LM&DP).

I caught up with Peter & Steve a few of this years delegates just outside the entry to the Keynote Arena, and here’s what they had to say.

It’s just gone 8.40am and its all started with a bit of a bang here! The drumb and bass is pumping and all sorts acrobatics to kick off the morning!

The host for the morning is Jonathan Biggins sp?

Over 200 events to take in over the next 5 days, so lots and lots to take in, and hopefully we can keep you up to date with as much as we can right here at TechEdLive.com

(0848) Tracey Fellows, Managing Director of Microsoft Australia has just taken the stage for her opening presentation. Big thanks to all the major sponsors (of course!) HP, Cisco and a whole swag more.

(0849) Welcome to the stage, keynote presenter, Amit Mital.
The big talk for the morning, Software + Services (ie. Managing your environment in the cloud and combining all your devices so you can work more effectively.)

Software + Services is a licensing approach on a pay per use or pay per license approach.

(0925) Demo – Kevin Ransey (The Online Workshop) & Dr Neil

(0931) Dr Neil has just pulled out what looks like his Blackberry and taken a photo. When asked what he was doing he replied… taking a photo… I want to Blog about it

(0933) Justin Adler – Lead Developer, Street Advisor (live.streetadvisor.com)

Well we’re getting to the end of the KeyNote…. a strange Kiwi in a full suit swimming costume just came and gave us a few laughs.

Tech.Greg – I must say… there is something missing from Tech.Ed so far…. NO FRANK! We miss you Frank, hope everything is going well O/S

Well yesterday afternoon was the final of the SBS/EBS Paper Airplane competition.

The final 10 lined up going for glory, and the winner Brad walked away with a free copy of EBS 2008 for his efforts.

Congratulations Brad!

Apologies for the Audio as it was extremely noisy in the main arena.

Was great catching up with some of the vendors last night – Linus from Backup Assist, The team @ New Horizons and Ferdinand from Primal Scripts.

Well what a day it’s been. From not having this website to frantically getting data up and slowly recruiting some bloggers, it’s all going quite well so far.

If you would like to do some blogging for the site and you’re at Tech.Ed, drop me an email – teched@techedlive.com

Well the SMB day in my eyes was in one hand a success, and on the other hand a bit of a flop. A great chance to catch up with some great Microsoft partners and do some networking, but on the technical front, I really was expecting some Level 300 – 400 sessions, and in my eyes, landed more of a 100 – 200 style sessions.

Not to worry, it was the birth of this site, so all the same a good day.

Tonight was the opening of Microsoft Tech.Ed 2008 with some great vendors in the main exhibition hall. The team at Jack Morton (Well done Kate & Team!) should be proud. It really was quite spectacular.

I’ll be doing some interviews with the vendors over the coming week, so if you’re a vendor and see me walking around make sure you grab me for a free plug!

Remember, this site isn’t backed or funded in any way shape or form by Microsoft, it’s simply my way of giving something back to the Worldwide Brotherhood of Microsoft Have to keep spreading the good word!

So, what’s happening tomorrow. Well all of the festivities begin. The Keynote Session @ 8.30am followed by the start of the Track Sessions.

I’ll primarily be doing the SVR and SEC sessions, so if anyone would like to cover any sessions, just email me and I’ll shoot you some details.

Here’s some more thoughts of today…