Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Cisco Live 2008

It has been almost 1 week since i returned from Cisco Live (Networkers) in Orlando and since i enjoyed Michael's report card about it, i decided to use something similar in order to describe (and grade) my experience.


Category Grade Comments
------------------------------------------------------------------
Hotels B+ I stayed at a non-Cisco hotel, but it was good
for its price. It was also only 10 mins walk
from the Convention Center.

Buses - I didn't use them. Maybe Cisco should think
to support other hotels too for its bus routes.

Conference A- Excellent Convention Center!
Center Large area, many session rooms, impressive
keynote rooms, lunch area was more than enough.

Training B I tried to follow 2 categories :
Carrier/Metro, MPLS/VPLS
While you could clearly understand that
most of the presenters were experts in their area,
some of them were talking too fast
or were speaking english in a strange way.
Also i would prefer to have less sessions
overlapping each other and some sessions
should have been longer.
On the other hand, techtorial was very good
and detailed.

Meet the B- It was interesting to see some of the top engineers
Experts together (+ famous Ian from c-nsp), but i was
Session disappointed by the session's limited time.
C'mon Cisco!!! Only 50 mins?

Meet the A I arranged two of them and both went very well.
Engineer I was able to find solutions in some interesting
Sessions problems of our network and i was happy to meet an
old friend of mine (hi Yves :).

Food C- Techtorial-day lunch was too cheap,
breakfast could have been better
(i was lucky to have my hotel's too).
Lunch was ok and desert at WoS was fine.

Snacks D- Not something you would enjoy. It was good to
have them, but a bigger variety would be better.
Also i couldn't find any fresh juice.
At least there was some ice-cream the last day.

On-Site Help A Helpful staff, there were everywhere,
answered most of my questions.
If only their ages were smaller,
i would have it enjoyed better :p

Cisco Store B- Too expensive! Also there weren't many sizes
(regarding clothes) available. The bag that was
given for free (for >$150 buys) could have been
better.

Conference A Excellent! Although a little bit heavy,
Bags it had everything i needed for my daily carrying
needs.

Internet B Everything i needed was there.
Access Maybe a little bit slow sometimes
especially when watching streaming video.

World of C+ Too many vendors, too many people.
Solutions Guitar hero was annoying for nearby vendors.
CCBootCamp, Emulex and Qumu were very HOT!!!

Food at WoS B+ Desert was great, food could have been better.

Certification B+ Nice room, but a little bit cold in the morning.
Lounge The exam procedure was quick 'n' easy and
some of the girls were extremely friendly!

Chambers A+ Excellent speech by John Chambers,
Keynote nice iPhone video-call demonstration
(since when does a Cisco iPhone exist?).
I really enjoyed that John was walking around us
and talking almost directly to our faces.
Human network, human communication was the key.

CCIE Party B+ It was my first CCIE party and it was good.
I still can't believe i meet some fellows
that read my blog.

Warrior's B- If i'm right, this was Warrior's first public
Keynote appearance on her new role and it went well.
Some topics weren't of my interest, but it
was nice to get a general idea about everything.

Conference B- The party at Universal was generally better
Party than expected.
Blue man show was incredible but very short
(although nobody informed us that we were
going to need tickets), live shows were just
interesting (not my kind of music).
Food and drinks were above average.
I was disappointed by its limited time availability,
because you probably needed double the time
to see and enjoy everything.
The CCIE hat (cowboy style) was given as a present
to Amanda for her beautiful blue eyes!

Overall A- One of the greatest networking events i have
been to. It was my first time in the USA,
but if i want to compare it to the European ones,
i would say it was much better.

2 comments:

  1. c'mon, show us some pictures. :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. I would really love it, but i have myself in most of them and i would like to keep my -whatever- privacy.

    I also have 2 pics of myself with John Chambers that would probably make you jealous (yeah, i got an autograph too), but i'm not planning of publishing them.

    ReplyDelete

 
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