It was fun catching up with Chris Crosby in LV and Santa Clara over the past couple of weeks. Chris just posted on the issue of wishing upon a star for maybe these data center conferences would be more interesting.

In doing a quick review of some of the topical fodder that will be discussed at some of the data center industry’s upcoming confabs, I have to say that it looks like we’re stuck in a bit of a rut. Does an over abundance of Power Points expounding on the how it’s “DCiM’s time” and that the Cloud “will change everything” reflect some hidden industry wish that these things will come true? Should we cue Jiminy Cricket?

Chris closes imploring the event staff to change the formats.

While there is little that we can do about the topic’s that speakers will be covering this tradeshow season, I would ask—and I don’t think I’m alone here—that the companies that put on these extravaganzas endeavor to broaden the scope of topics before they implore us to “Join Them” in the one of the nation’s metropolis’s in the future. If I see one more product pitch presentation delivered by someone with the charisma of a newt, I may just lose my lunch. Get out on a limb and say something new. As for DCiM and the Cloud I say look to that Walt Disney classic, Pinnochio, for guidance. After all, after being turned into a donkey and being swallowed by a whale, his wish to become a real boy came true.

But, getting people to change is one of the hardest things in life. Much harder than greening a data center and coming up with new ways to change the industry for a new performance per watt approach.

So instead of asking for change, change yourself. About two years ago I stopped going to AFCOM Data Center World and Uptime Symposium as media and started trying other conferences. I started going to GigaOm Structure as a media attendee and thanks to Barton George he introduced me to Stacey Higginbotham as GigaOm needed a data center analyst. So, I spend time (less than 20%) as an analyst for GigaOm Pro as well as a bunch of other things (the other 80%).

In a month at GigaOm Structure I'll be moderating two panel discussions.

One with following title and presenters

Compute everywhere: the architects behind the change

Chandra Pandey, Vice President, Platform Solutions, BTI Systems

Lane Patterson, CTO, Equinix

And the other

How infrastructure can transform business success

Cynthi Stoddard, SVP & CIO, NetApp

David Giambruno, SVP and CIO, Revlon

I could try to interject something like the above into a typical data center conference, but it is a lot of work. The above people are presenting because of the GigaOm brand and its audience. Also, I'll most likely be jumping into a mode of business value of IT, not data center infrastructure.

The data center infrastructure is important and many of the changes going forward are how the data center infrastructure supports business innovation which is what CIO's care about. It will be interesting whether data center conferences can change to more than a DCIM and Cloud discussion.

I'll be at GigaOm Structure given I work for the GigaOm folks and am a speaker. Here are some of the interesting sponsors that work in the data center industry.

And Open Compute Project will participate.

Facebook and the Open Compute Project are hosting their second hardware hackathon with the winners presenting at GigaOM’s Structure conference on June 19. So start thinking about your idea, and go register.

If you want to hear a different discussion of the cloud you may want to trying something different for a change, or you can keep on going to the same conferences and hope they get more interesting.

What our attendees are saying

Structure has always been, and continues to be, the place with the most vibrant and provocative cloud discussion. I’ve tracked cloud for a long time and still find Structure to be an essential meeting in order to keep up.

- Peter Christy

Co-Founder, Internet Research Group

Structure is a ‘multi-phasic examination’ report on Cloud. In two days, one gets a reading on the state of the technology, the commercial aspects, and the ability to engage in conversation with the people most influential in its evolution.

-Rich Miller

CEO, Telematica

Structure has always been, and continues to be, the place with the most vibrant and provocative cloud discussion. I’ve tracked cloud for a long time and still find Structure to be an essential meeting in order to keep up.

- Peter Christy

Co-Founder, Internet Research Group

Structure is a ‘multi-phasic examination’ report on Cloud. In two days, one gets a reading on the state of the technology, the commercial aspects, and the ability to engage in conversation with the people most influential in its evolution.

-Rich Miller

CEO, Telematica

Structure has always been, and continues to be, the place with the most vibrant and provocative cloud discussion. I’ve tracked cloud for a long time and still find Structure to be an essential meeting in order to keep up.

- Peter Christy

Co-Founder, Internet Research Group

Structure is a ‘multi-phasic examination’ report on Cloud. In two days, one gets a reading on the state of the technology, the commercial aspects, and the ability to engage in conversation with the people most influential in its evolution.

-Rich Miller

CEO, Telematica