Well, I know I haven’t kept up with this site as I should, but I’m trying to get back into the swing of things.
So, last week was spent out west in San Diego for NECC (National Educational Computing Conference). This is the Mecca for educational technology attracting around 15,000 people this year. We have been attending this conference for several years now, but usually in a very small way. To announce our new logo and platform, we decided to really make a splash at this conference. We purchased a large booth space and had a booth professionally designed. We also brought along a ton of computer equipment so that we could perform live demonstrations of our product. It took us two days to set everything up, but I think it turned out great.
We brought an entire army of people to the conference and did our best to demonstrate what we have accomplished over the last 18 months. All in all, I think we did a good job showing exactly how far we have come and the numerous advantages we can offer to schools. Now it’s just up to sales. ;)
Along with the conference, we also did a little sponsorship promoting as well. We sponsored Internet sensation Judson Laipply. To be perfectly honest, I’m very out of touch with things, so when I first heard about us sponsoring him, I didn’t really know who he was. For the rest of you who also have their heads in the sand, Judson currently has the most viewed video on YouTube, the online video library. It’s for a piece called “The Evolution of Dance” in which he covers a great many of the last 50 year’s most popular dance steps in a 6 minutes routine. It’s pretty funny stuff. He also does a sort of motivational speaker/stand up comic routine as well which is also very good. In any case, we had about 150 people attend the two performances that we put on which is pretty good. Heck, If I had had houses like that during my theatre show, I’d probably still be in Chicago.
Outside of the conference, we had very little time to see the sights. For the most part we just worked like crazy and then slept as long as we could. However, we did get out for a couple of nights. On the 4th, we were invited by one of our sales consultants to a block party at his house. From a roof top view, we were able to watch 4 simultaneous fireworks displays which was pretty impressive. Beyond that, the young punk kids of the group, of which I still consider myself one, went out on Thursday night to a nice dive bar (don’t ask me where, I don’t remember except it was near the beach). I consumed a bit more that I should and ended up, by some mystery, wandering out in the surf at 2:00 AM and got soaking wet. Which, is not the worst way to sober up by far.
In any case, there was a lot more information about a business trip than you ever wanted to know. I’ve posted a gallery of some of the pictures from the trip. Take look if your interested and till next time, keep it on the right side of the road.