Announcing the Launch of the Social Applications for BEA Participate '08

You've heard the phrase "social applications" being kicked around by BEA and bdg. But what exactly does that mean?

In a nutshell, it means that your experience at BEA.Participate.08 will be like that of no other conference you've ever attended. In fact, it may change the entire way you feel about technology conferences.

After registration, you'll be directed to a web site where you can help us kick off this grand social experiment. During registration, you'll be asked to fill out a corporate profile by selecting or adding your company, your department, your title and some biographical information. You'll be asked what products (from BEA or elsewhere) you're currently using and what products interest you. You'll be able to "pimp" your profile with an avatar or photo, links, and RSS feeds. Finally, you'll be asked to take a stab at registering for different Participate.08 breakout sessions. (Don't worry, you can always come back later and make changes to your breakout session agenda.)

At this point, you'll be directed to a highly-customized installation of BEA ALI 6.5 backed by a host of bdg-designed and engineered Ruby on Rails applications which form the core of this groundbreaking social system. Log in and you'll be presented with a simple, elegant UI for:

1. browsing and selecting tracks and sessions,
2. viewing other people's company and personal profile pages and adding them to your "mob,"
3. sending "shout outs" other users (a playful way to get people's attention),
4. sending private (mail) or public (podmob) messages to other people,
5. browsing and interacting with product pages,
6. asking questions at a breakout session (through the session rumble),
7. joining and leaving interest groups focused on industries, products or "whatever,"
8. updating your status (to let others know where you are, what your mood is, etc.),
9. browsing an aggregate feed (the observation deck) which allows you to see what others are doing prior to, at (and even after) the conference.

On top of all this social application goodness, everyone who attends Participate will receive an iPod Touch, with 802.11b/g wireless baked in. (Of course, the conference hotel will have lightening fast free wireless internet access.) In addition to a sleek full-sized browser experience, most of the applications will also be optimized for the iPod Touch (or iPhone) form factor. This means that wherever you are at the conference -- sitting in a session, wandering the halls or the partner pavilion, even taking a bathroom break -- you'll be able to network, network, network with your fellow conference attendees.

Let's face it: are you attending the conference to hear a talking head rattle off lists of features in ALUI or ALBPM? No! You're going to Participate to learn from your peers. And not just in sessions, but in the halls, during the meals, at the evening events and of course, through these amazing social applications.

So, don't waste any more time reading about this stuff -- come on in and let's get social!